This painting tip is brought to you by Sue Marion!
When working from reference photos, I always have a black-and-white version nearby so I can get a better understanding of the values in the image. This helps me see the relationship of light/dark areas to each other, and to paint the full range of values, rather than being distracted by focusing just on the vivid colors.
This is easy to do on your phone or in Photoshop.
On your phone, first, duplicate the image you want to convert so you don’t lose your original color image! Next, tap on Edit, then go to Filters. Here you will see a variety of options. Look for the B&W filter and then click done. Easy!
In Photoshop, open the original image, go to Image, and in the drop-down menu select Mode, then Grayscale. I window will pop up saying to go to Adjustments to convert. Either way will work. Just make sure you do a Save As before you save the new black-and-white image giving it a new name.
