Dithering techniques for images are described herein. An input image of a first bit depth is separated into a luma and one or more chroma components. A model of the optical transfer function (OTF) of the human visual system (HVS) is used to generate dither noise which is added to the chroma components of the input image. The model of the OTF is adapted in response to viewing distances determined based on the spatial resolution of the chroma components. An image based on the original input luma component and the noise-modified chroma components is quantized to a second bit depth, which is lower than the first bit depth, to generate an output dithered image.