Grayscale in layer effect ?

[egerie]

Hi gang. I thought I knew my way around photoshop but lately I've been at a loss for something so stupid there must be something in photoshop about it.
I want to easely turn my image in grayscale in order to see the luminosity / tone of my colours. I've been trying to use a layer effect on top of my work in order to do that, but I can't find a suitable one that will really perfectly match the "true" grayscale mode.
Here's an example :
http://www.artbyaline.com/forum/grayscalequestion.gif
http://www.artbyaline.com/forum/grayscalequestion_anim.gif
I've been trying with Hue/Saturation layer going monochromatic or even into separate channels and adjusting the luminosity of a channel. Same thing for Channel Mixer layer, etc. >:{

Anyone been doing that ? If all else fails, I guess I can throw an action together to do the same...

[bonedog]

Maybe I don't understand the question, but can't you just go "image-->mode--->grayscale".

Or, "image-->adjust-->desaturate" will do the same thing I believe.

If you just need to quickly see it in greyscale, there's a shortcut key to desaturate. Then you can just undo it to go back to color.

-Bonedog

[nudie.se]

You can convert the image to LAB-mode, the Lightness channel will be almost identical with the true grayscale of your colour image.