How to practice with the studio.
Short, practical guides for each tool and trainer — and one workflow that ties them together, from a blank reference to a finished painting.
From reference to finished painting.
Five steps. Read it once end-to-end, then keep it open beside your easel.
- 01Line & Shape
Composition — find the structure
Before any colour or value decisions, see the bones of the image. Drop a rule-of-thirds or golden-ratio overlay on your reference and decide what the painting is actually about. Crop and re-crop until the structure feels inevitable.
Use the Grid OverlayGuided project images coming soon - 02Value
Value — plan the light
Collapse the scene into 3 or 4 value tiers. If it doesn't read at 3 tiers, it won't read finished. This is where the painting is won or lost — make the big shadow shape one shape, and protect your lights.
Use the Value IsolatorGuided project images coming soon - 03Colour
Colour — read the relationships
Now sample. What's the temperature of the light? What's the surprising hue inside the shadows? Use the picker to confirm what your eye half-saw, and the proportion view to plan the palette before mixing.
Use the Colour AnalyserGuided project images coming soon - 04Practice
Train — close the gap
A short trainer session before you paint warms up the relevant muscle. Memory Canvas for proportion and observation. Value Gym for tier accuracy. Colour-Matching Gym to calibrate your eye for the day.
Open a trainerGuided project images coming soon - 05Practice
Execute — paint with intent
Now go to the easel. The studies you just did mean every decision at the canvas is informed: you know the structure, you know the value plan, you know the colour story. The painting becomes execution, not guesswork.
Open the studioGuided project images coming soon
One guide per tool.
What each one is for, when to reach for it, and one tip that usually saves a session.
Grid & Proportion Overlay
Drop programmatic grids — traditional, rule-of-thirds, golden ratio, triangles, diagonals — over any reference so you can see structure before you draw it.
Read the guideMemory Canvas
Study a reference, then redraw it from memory on a blank canvas. Overlay the two when you're done to see exactly where your eye drifted.
Read the guideValue Isolator
Collapse any image into 3–8 value tiers so you can see the value structure underneath the colour and detail.
Read the guideValue Gym
A round-based eye-training game. You're shown a point on an image and asked to guess its value tier on a slider.
Read the guideColour Analyser
Sample any reference in two modes: pin-based picking with honest hue names, or k-means proportion breakdown with saturation and temperature splits.
Read the guideColour-Matching Gym
An in-browser eye trainer. Match target colours with HSL sliders and get per-axis feedback scored in CIE Lab.
Read the guide