color images into black and white, grey

[SCEtoAUX]

Some free graphics programs:
IrfanView - Official Homepage - one of the most popular viewers worldwide can covert color to greyscale.

Free Online Image Editor - Convert your pictures is an online converter.

GIMP - The GNU Image Manipulation Program is another graphics program that can do the conversion.

You could do a search for free graphics programs and see which one you prefer.

I use Paint Shop Pro. Some use PhotoShop. Both have to be bought.

[bernoullis]

[EDIT - My post crossed with that by SCEtoAUX so there is some duplication in the answer.]

is photo shop free?

spaceagent-9, I'm guessing that computer image manipulation is not your thing? Hey, we all have to start sometime!

Nope, Photoshop is most definitely not free, in any of it's guises. It comes in different forms - see here: Photo editing programs, Photo editing software | Adobe Photoshop family

However, there are free products out there that will do the job you want just as well, and much better than Microsoft's embarrassing Paint!

Google have Picasa which is well regarded - have a look here: Picasa

Amongst other things, I use Irfanview quite a lot, which is a very popular and useful bit of software - get it here: IrfanView - Official Homepage - one of the most popular viewers worldwide

I began my computer image manipulation learning curve with JASC Paintshop Pro version 3 many years ago, when it was shareware! It become a commercial product, was later bought out by Corel and is now on its 13th version (I am still on version 12). It does the vast majority of what the full version of Adobe Photoshop does, for a fraction of the cost, and is substantially more powerful than the similarly priced (but much cut down) Photoshop Elements.

However, like I said, there is good free stuff out there for what you want to do. Have fun!

[spaceagent-9]

i will try that!
thank you.
jim

[spaceagent-9]

you were right about the grey scale in the scan display.
i set the save image to grey scale and it is exactly what i wanted.
thanks!
jim

[n810]

For even better adjustment to grey scale in Photoshop, change the mode to Duotone (Image>Mode>Duotone). This will allow you to set what your white and black are, and the computer in interpolate everything in between. I'm fairly certain Gimp will do this for you too.