Artist Reference & Value Study
Faster prep, more painting
Free · In‑App Purchases · Designed for iPad. Not verified for macOS.
The all-in-one reference tool built for painters. Grid, value study, and color harmony. Everything you need, nothing you don't.
Artists Reference is made for painters, illustrators, and traditional artists who work with real materials, not pixels. It gives you the digital reference tools you need while you're creating physical art.
Key Features
- Value Study Mode: Instantly view your reference in 7-value scale to see shadows and highlights or greyscale to see tone and contrast clearly.
- Gridlines: Helps get your under-sketch down accurately.
- Side-by-Side View: Compare your reference and your canvas at the same time, optimized for tablets and stands.
- Crop and Frame Tools: Adjust composition and aspect ratio of your reference to match your canvas before you begin.
- Collections: Curated starter projects to help you practice and improve, including Animals, Architecture, Botanical, Figure, Landscape, Master Study, Portrait, and Still Life.
- Color harmonies: Experiment with color harmonies to define the feeling if your piece and save swatches
- Offline Friendly: Works anywhere, even in the studio or outdoors.
- Clean, Focused Design: No ads. No clutter. Just the reference tools you need.
Made for Traditional Artists
Whether you're painting with oils, gouache, watercolor, or charcoal, Artists Reference helps you translate what you see into confident compositions and balanced values. Start with curated Collections to build your skills, or bring your own references for any project.
No AI art is used for any of the starter project references in this app. All photos are attributed to the original artists with links to their portfolio.
Ratings & Reviews
New collection for "skulls"
Fixed an issue where rotating the device within a project, closed the project
The developer, Gil Osborne, indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy .
Data Not Collected
The developer does not collect any data from this app.
Accessibility
The developer has not yet indicated which accessibility features this app supports. Learn More
Information
- Seller
- Gil Osborne
- Size
- 188.4 MB
- Category
- Graphics & Design
- Compatibility
Requires iOS 26.0 or later.
- iPhone
Requires iOS 26.0 or later. - iPad
Requires iPadOS 26.0 or later. - Mac
Requires macOS 26.0 or later and a Mac with Apple M1 chip or later. - Apple Vision
Requires visionOS 26.0 or later.
- iPhone
- Languages
English and 8 more
- English, French, German, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Spanish
- Age Rating
4+
- 4+
- In-App Purchases
Yes
- Lifetime Full Access $14.99
- Copyright
- © Gil Osborne
