Guy at the lumber yard in Reno told me to stop picking boards, still bugs me 2 weeks later
I was sorting through a stack of 2x4s at a yard off 4th Street last week, pulling out every bowed one, when an old timer in a NRA hat walked by and said 'kid, you're building a shed not a piano.' He grabbed the next board off the pile, bowed side up, and told me to crown them all the same way and quit wasting daylight. Do you crown every stud or just shrug and screw it in?
The old timer at the 4th Street yard is right. I crown every single stud now, bows up, and it goes way faster than sorting for perfect boards. A 2x4 has a natural curve and fighting it just makes the wall wavy. Pick the side that bows out, face that up, and screw it down.