Lucida Camera

Lucida is a browser-based observation aid for painters and drawers who work from photo reference. It runs entirely in your browser with nothing to install, and it's free to use. Most studio artists already have a monitor next to their easel with a reference photo open in Preview, a browser tab, or a generic image viewer. Lucida is designed to replace that habit. Open the same photo in Lucida instead, and you get a purpose-built set of tools for seeing and analyzing your reference more accurately. The toolset includes value posterization to simplify tones, a live webcam view of your canvas alongside your reference, grid and ruler overlays, perspective correction, grayscale and color analysis, and a synchronized side-by-side layout for observation work. A Pro tier unlocks additional features including session save and restore, timelapse recording of your painting sessions, and a curated library of high-resolution Bargue plates for classical drawing studies. Lucida is built for classical realist and traditional artists: painters and drawers who study at ateliers, work from life or photo reference, and want analytical tools that fit a studio workflow without the complexity of software designed for digital painters. A companion set of free, standalone tools is also available at tools.lucidacamera.com, covering notan, value study, composition grids, edge detection, focal point analysis, and color temperature mapping.