I've started cutting with the lights off and I'm not entirely joking
The studio bulb went a couple of weeks ago and I didn't replace it. Now I work the last hour or so before I lock up with only the window, which in February here means about forty minutes of anything useful and then a kind of grey that isn't quite dark.
What I've noticed is that I stop fussing. In proper light I can see every fibre and torn edge and I go back over things that were already fine. In the grey I only see the shape, which is the only thing I actually care about. The palette reads as three tones instead of nine.
Last night I glued something down and in the morning it was a centimetre off from where I thought. So it's not a method, it's a trick that mostly works. I've put the bulb on the shelf next to the fuse box and I'll get to it. Probably.
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there's something to this alright. I've done a fair bit of carving by a north-facing window in the bad light and you do stop nitpicking. the gouge doesn't lie either way, you can feel it in the wood more than you can see it.
the bit I'd argue with is the palette thing. three tones in the grey is grand for the design, but I've had proofs that looked dead right in that same February light and then I bring them into the kitchen and the blacks are all fighting each other. paper does that to you. so I'd nearly keep the grey for the deciding and the real bulb for the last look before you commit.
though the glued-down thing made me laugh. I did the same with a block once, lined it up lovely in the gloom, turned out a hare was pointing backwards. the wife has it framed now out of spite.