rgb2pct(1)

Usage

rgb2pct [--help] [--help-general] [--creation-option OPTION]
           [-n colors | -pct palette_file] [-of format] <source_file> <dest_file>

Overview

This utility will compute an optimal pseudo-color table for a given RGB image using a median cut algorithm on a downsampled RGB histogram. Then it converts the image into a pseudo-colored image using the color table. This conversion utilizes Floyd-Steinberg dithering (error diffusion) to maximize output image visual quality.

NOTE:

rgb2pct is a Python utility, and is only available if GDAL Python bindings are available.

TIP:

Equivalent in new "gdal" command line interface:

See gdal raster rgb-to-palette.

--help: Show this help message and exit

--help-general: Gives a brief usage message for the generic GDAL commandline options and exit.

-n <color>: Select the number of colors in the generated color table. Defaults to 256. Must be between 2 and 256.

--creation-option OPTION: Optional creation parameters for the GeoTIFF driver, for example "COMPRESS=LZW". Can be specified multiple times.

-pct <palette_file>: Extract the color table from <palette_file> instead of computing it. Can be used to have a consistent color table for multiple files. The <palette_file> must be either a raster file in a GDAL supported format with a palette or a color file in a supported format (txt, qml, qlr).

-of <format>: Select the output format. If not specified, the format is guessed from the extension. Use the short format name. Only output formats supporting pseudo-color tables should be used.

<source_file>: The input RGB file.

<dest_file>: The output pseudo-colored file that will be created.

Return status code

The program returns status code 0 in case of success, and non-zero in case of error (non-blocking errors emitted as warnings are considered as a successful execution).

Examples

If it is desired to hand create the palette, likely the simplest text format is the GDAL VRT format. In the following example a VRT was created in a text editor with a small 4 color palette with the RGBA colors 238/238/238/255, 237/237/237/255, 236/236/236/255 and 229/229/229/255.

$ rgb2pct -pct palette.vrt rgb.tif pseudo-colored.tif
$ more < palette.vrt
<VRTDataset rasterXSize="226" rasterYSize="271">
    <VRTRasterBand dataType="Byte" band="1">
        <ColorInterp>Palette</ColorInterp>
        <ColorTable>
        <Entry c1="238" c2="238" c3="238" c4="255"/>
        <Entry c1="237" c2="237" c3="237" c4="255"/>
        <Entry c1="236" c2="236" c3="236" c4="255"/>
        <Entry c1="229" c2="229" c3="229" c4="255"/>
        </ColorTable>
    </VRTRasterBand>
</VRTDataset>

Releases

10 releases since Debian 5.0 (Lenny); the text changed 9 times.

5.0
6.0
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
Arch

--creation-option since Arch Linux 2026-11-01; --help since Debian 13 (Trixie); --help-general since Debian 13 (Trixie); -pct since Debian 7 (Wheezy).