The three color components for each pixel are often stored as three separate grayscale images called what, which must be recombined for display?

• A. Color Models
• B. Color Maps
• C. Color Planes or Channels
• D. Grayscale Sets

Answer: (C)

Color information for a pixel is stored as separate planes called color planes or color channels—one grayscale image per color component (for RGB, a red plane, a green plane, and a blue plane). Each plane captures how bright that component is at every pixel. When displaying, the three planes are recombined by pairing each pixel’s red, green, and blue values to form an RGB triplet, which the display uses to render color. This organization also lets you process or filter each color component independently. Other terms like color models describe how colors are represented, color maps are lookup tables, and grayscale sets aren’t standard terminology for this concept.