A form of smart conversion from a higher bit depth to a lower bit depth, used in the conversion of audio and graphic files. In the conversion from 24-bit color to 8-bit color (millions of colors reduced to 256), the process attempts to improve on the quality of on-screen graphics with reduced color palettes by adding patterns of different colored pixels to simulate the original color. The technique is also known as "error diffusion," and is applied to audio bit rate reduction and graphic resolution.