The Magic of Dithering
Like Duolingo, but for The Magic of Dithering. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
For the part of you with thirty open tabs that never became anything.
54 levels across 4 sections, about 108 minutes end to end, roughly 22 days at five minutes a day. It moves through The Basics of Pixels and Colors, Simple Ways to Dither, Spreading the Error, and Dithering in the Real World. It starts from scratch.
Free forever · No credit card · iPhone & Android
Key ideas in The Magic of Dithering
- Digital screens use the RGB additive color model
- Red and green light combine to create yellow
- Bit depth determines the range of possible color values
- Higher bit depth allows for more granular color transitions
- Higher pixel density (PPI) makes pixels smaller and harder to distinguish
- Equal intensities of RGB produce grayscale values
- Small, dense pixels create the illusion of continuous tones and smooth curves
- Maximum intensity of all three primaries results in white
- 1-bit color (monochrome) is the simplest digital color state
- 8-bit and 24-bit depths provide exponentially more color options
- The hierarchy of color complexity based on bit depth
- The effect of pixel density on human perception of image smoothness
- The mapping of RGB intensity values to perceived brightness
- Pixels are mapped to the nearest available color in the palette
- Banding occurs in gradients when intermediate shades are lost
- Rounding errors occur when the exact color is missing
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives The Magic of Dithering the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
When your screen wants to make a picture, which three special light colors does it mix together?
Get it right to open this lesson and 53 more in the app.
Where The Magic of Dithering takes you
Learn how computers use clever patterns of dots to show millions of colors with only a few. Master the art of tricking the human eye to make digital images look smooth and beautiful.
- 1
The Basics of Pixels and Colors
- How Screens Show Color
- The Problem with Limited Colors
- What is Dithering?
- Tricking the Human Eye
- 2
Simple Ways to Dither
- Random Noise Dithering
- Using Fixed Patterns
- The Checkerboard Method
- Ordered Dithering Explained
- Creating Your Own Threshold Maps
- Pros and Cons of Patterns
- 3
Spreading the Error
- What is Error Diffusion?
- The Floyd-Steinberg Method
- How Math Moves the Color Mistakes
- Why Some Images Look Grainy
- Comparing Different Diffusion Styles
- 4
Dithering in the Real World
- Dithering in Old Video Games
- How Printers Use Dots
- Modern Uses in GIFs and Web Design
4 sections · 18 units · 54 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
You pick the voice
The Magic of Dithering is taught in the Explain Like I'm 5 style: no big words. promise.. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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Start The Magic of Dithering today.
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