Part of the Multimedia and graphics glossary:

True color is the specification of the color of a pixel on a display screen using a 24-bit value, which allows the possibility of up to 16,777,216 possible colors. Many displays today support only an 8-bit color value, allowing up to 256 possible colors.

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The number of bits used to define a pixel's color shade is its bit-depth . True color is sometimes known as 24-bit color . Some new color display systems offer a 32-bit color mode. The extra byte, called the alpha channel , is used for control and special effects information.

This was last updated in September 2005
Posted by: Margaret Rouse

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