hDC Bitmaps Colorformats Bits per pixel

The header lists alot.

Well I am curious as what bit a hDC is in.
An hDc gathered by using LoadImage(); then getting a DC from CreateDC and Selecting the HBITMAP from LoadImage into the DC you created.

Is it a unchanged representation of the bitmap?
Does it change how many colors are per pixel?
Can it read in 24-bit 16-bit 8-bit black and white?

Next,
Can you create black-and-white bmps? which contain very low color values.
Like 20-30...with shades between black and white of gray.

Correct me if I'm wrong since I'm no C++ guru or anything like that (yet), but even after using LoadImage() and all of that, wouldn't the number of bit's of your loaded bitmap be the same as the number of bit's the bitmap file was?

And you can create black and white bitmaps using 256 color bitmaps and providing a greyscale pallete.

There's also 16 color and monochrome, but I would never worry about those. 256 color is more flexible.