# Dither

Bayer · diffusion · palettes

Dither fakes in-between colors with patterns of the few colors it has. It's how old computers, handhelds and fax machines showed a photo, and in NANALOG the pattern can crawl, breathe and cycle with the loop.

## Controls

### Pattern

- **Method** (Select: Bayer / Blue noise / Noise / Floyd–Steinberg / Atkinson / Sierra / Sierra Lite / Stucki / Jarvis / Burkes / Sparse / Hilbert / Row mod). The pattern. Bayer is the classic grid. Diffusion methods look more organic.
- **Bayer size** (Select: 8×8 / 2×2 / 4×4 / 16×16). The Bayer grid size. 2×2 is chunky, 16×16 is fine and smooth.
- **Pixel** (hero knob, 1.0px to 30.0px, rests at 5.1px). How big each dither pixel is.
- **Angle** (Knob, 0° to 90°, rests at 23°). Rotates the pattern.
- **Diffusion** (Knob, 0 to 100, rests at 85). How much error a diffusion method passes along. Lower is cleaner, higher is busier.
- **Scan** (Switch: Serpentine / Left to right). The order diffusion walks the picture. Serpentine is smooth. Left to right leaves streaks.

### Palette

- **Color** (Select: Palette / Adaptive / Tones / Two-tone / Source / RGB). Where colors come from. A palette, colors read from your picture, tones of one color, two tones, the source, or RGB.
- **Palette** (Select: Newsprint / Chrome / Riso / Pocket Green / Fantasy 16 / CGA / Home 8-bit / 1-Bit Desk / Faded print / Sunset / Mono 4 / Dial-up Dusk / Red Sunset / Arcade Neon / Sea Glass / Moss). The palette.
- **Colors** (Knob, 2 to 32, rests at 17). How many colors to use.
- **Palette cycle** (Select: Off / 1× / 2× / 4×). The palette rotates through its colors over the loop.

### Tone

- **Black** (Knob, 0 to 100, rests at 0). Sets the black point.
- **White** (Knob, 0 to 100, rests at 100). Sets the white point.
- **Gamma** (Fader, -100 to +100, rests at 0). Lightens or darkens the midtones before dithering.
- **Sharpen** (Knob, 0 to 100, rests at 25). Sharpens edges first, so detail survives the pattern.
- **Radius** (Knob, 1.0× to 6.0×, rests at 1.0×). How wide the sharpening reaches.
- **Bit crush** (Knob, 0 to 100, rests at 0). Fewer bits per channel before dithering, for banded, crunchy color.

### Signal

- **Channel split** (Knob, 0 to 100, rests at 0). Pulls the color channels apart.
- **Drift** (Knob, 0 to 100, rests at 0). The channels wander through the loop.
- **Row errors** (Knob, 0 to 100, rests at 0). Rows slip in steps, like a bad signal.

### Motion

- **Crawl** (Select: Off / 1 lap / 2 laps / 4 laps). The pattern walks a whole number of laps per loop, so it never jumps.
- **Crawl way** (Select: Across / Down / Diagonal). Which way the pattern crawls.
- **Sweep** (Knob, 0 to 100, rests at 0). The threshold breathes in and out with the loop.
- **Rate** (Select: 1× / 2× / 4× / 8× / 16×). How many times a loop crawl, sweep and row errors change.
- **Shimmer** (Knob, 0 to 100, rests at 0). The pattern shimmers frame to frame.
- **Shimmer rate** (Select: 12 fps / 8 fps / 4 fps). How fast the shimmer runs.
- **Spin** (Select: Still / 1× / 2×). The pattern turns with the loop.

## Presets

- **Bayer Dither**: Ordered Bayer dither in three levels per channel, like the old Dither effect.
- **Circuit**: Error carried along a winding path: a maze-like grain in two inks.
- **Scan Rows**: Row-modulated dither in six dusk colors.
- **Sparse Grain**: Error that skips a pixel: open, airy grain in Arcade Neon.
- **Mono Bayer**: Pure 1-bit Bayer, crisp and stable on video.
- **Newsprint 1-bit**: Black ink on newsprint, Atkinson diffusion.
- **Fantasy Bayer**: A sixteen-color fantasy console palette, Bayer ordered.
- **Home 8-bit**: A home computer palette, chunky Bayer pixels.
- **CGA Four**: Black, cyan, magenta and white, ordered.
- **Grey Four**: Four greys, Floyd–Steinberg diffused.
- **Blue Noise Film**: Even blue-noise grain in four levels that shimmers like film.
- **Dusk Gradient**: Diffused into a dusk ramp, dark to light.
- **Sunset Stucki**: Stucki diffusion into six sunset colors.
- **Glitch Rows**: Row-modulated neon with the channels split apart.
- **RGB Bits**: One bit per channel, Bayer ordered.
- **Jarvis Smooth**: Jarvis diffusion in five levels: soft and even.
- **Burkes Moss**: Burkes diffusion into a mossy green palette.
- **Shimmering Bayer**: 1-bit Bayer that re-rolls eight times a second.
- **Adaptive Eight**: Eight colors taken from the picture, Sierra Lite diffused.
- **Big Pixel**: Huge fantasy-palette pixels, ordered.
- **Crawling Bayer**: A 4×4 Bayer grid that walks across the picture twice a loop.
- **Breathing Threshold**: The threshold swells and falls with the loop, so the picture breathes in and out of the dark.
- **Palette Waterfall**: Classic color cycling: the colors flow down the palette as the loop plays.
- **Crushed Bits**: Color crushed to a handful of steps before a fine dither.
- **Scan Errors**: Rows of pixels jumping out of place, a new set every beat.
- **Channel Split**: Red, green and blue dithered apart and drifting.
- **Error Streaks**: Diffusion that only runs left to right: the error piles into streaks.
- **Chunky 2×2**: The coarsest Bayer grid: bold, graphic stipple.
- **Fine 16×16**: A 16×16 Bayer grid for smooth, fine-grained gradients.
- **Pocket Camera**: Four greens, Bayer-dithered like a handheld camera print.
- **1-Bit Desk**: Atkinson dithering in pure black and white.
- **Quiet Pixels**: Blue-noise dither to Fantasy 16 colors: even grain that holds still on video.