A 24-color picture refers to an image that utilizes a palette of 24 distinct colors. This can be found in various graphic formats and is commonly used in digital images, where the color depth is measured in bits per pixel (bpp). In a 24 bpp format, each pixel is represented by three bytes, one for each of the red, green, and blue color channels. This results in a wide range of colors that can be displayed on most modern computer screens.