Question

In the early days of the internet, images and GIFs were usually 120 by 50 pixels. A pixel was saved by its Red, Green, and Blue (RGB) values that are each an integer from 0 to 255.

1. How many possible distinct colors could be represented by a single pixel with these RGB values?
2. How many distinct 120x50 pixel images could be created using these colors?

Answer 1

A single pixel with RGB values ranging from 0 to 255 can represent 16,777,216 distinct colors. For a 120x50 pixel image, using these colors, it's possible to create a number of distinct images equal to 16,777,216 raised to the power of 6,000, which is an extremely large number.

Step-by-step explanation:

In the RGB color model used by displays, each color channel (red, green, blue) is represented by an integer between 0 and 255. This allows for 256 levels of each primary color, which when combined give us 256 x 256 x 256 = 16,777,216 possible distinct colors for a single pixel.

To calculate the number of distinct images using these colors for a resolution of 120x50 pixels, we raise the number of possible colors to the power of the total number of pixels, which is 120x50 = 6,000 pixels. Thus, we get 16,777,216^6,000 possible distinct images, which is an astronomically high number and not practically computable for a simple digital representation.