[FiletOFish]

Hello everyone. I am curious if there is an efficient method, in Photoshop, of dithering an image with numerous colors into just a few colors (6-10 colors) while keeping the file size small (100X100 pixels).

Example:

Starting picture




The picture uses, obviously, a ton of colors and is approx 1000X1000 pixels large.



Poorly dithered picture/result



It uses just 6 colors (you can see the color palette on the left) using Index Color/Custom Palette in Photoshop. The file size is reduced to approx 100X100 pixels. The result does not look good.

So basically the picture is going through 2 major quality reductions: color reduction (from many to just 6) and size reduction (from 1000X1000 to 100x100).

In the past I have seen people successfully dither images in the way I described above with quality, recognizable results (I wish I saved the pictures). In my research I have concluded that there are 2 types of people who know how to dither effectively: 1. Math guys with very technical algorithm/programming related answers 2. Artists.

If anyone can direct me in the right direction I would appreciate it so much!

[ax--hv]

Hi. Like this?
10 colors

If it is what you are looking for - it's done with indexed colors.
Image>Mode>Indexed Color
There are plenty of controls there.