How To Save Photoshop Brushes

Photoshop User Guide
Introduction to Photoshop
1. Dream it. Make it.
2. What's new in Photoshop
3. Edit your first photo
4. Create documents
5. Photoshop | Common Questions
6. Photoshop system requirements
7. Migrate presets, actions, and settings
8. Get to know Photoshop
Photoshop and Adobe services
1. Photoshop and Adobe Stock
2. Creative Cloud Libraries
3. Creative Cloud Libraries in Photoshop
4. Grid and guides
5. Creating actions
6. Undo and history
7. Default keyboard shortcuts
8. Touch capabilities and customizable workspaces
9. Use the Touch Bar with Photoshop
10. Use the Capture in-app extension in Photoshop
Photoshop on the iPad
1. Photoshop on the iPad | Common questions
2. Get to know the workspace
3. System requirements | Photoshop on the iPad
4. Create, open, and export cloud documents
5. Add photos
6. Work with layers
7. Draw and paint with brushes
8. Make selections and add masks
9. Retouch your composites
10. Work with adjustment layers
11. Adjust the tonality of your composite with Curves
12. Apply transform operations
13. Crop and rotate your composites
14. Rotate, pan, zoom, and reset the canvas
15. Work with Type layers
16. Work with Photoshop and Lightroom
17. Get missing fonts in Photoshop on the iPad
18. Japanese Text in Photoshop on the iPad
19. Manage app settings
20. Touch shortcuts and gestures
21. Keyboard shortcuts
22. System requirements 1.x | Photoshop on the iPad
23. System requirements 2.x | Photoshop on the iPad
24. Edit your image size
25. Livestream as you create in Photoshop on the iPad
26. Correct imperfections with the Healing Brush
27. Create brushes in Capture and use them in Photoshop
Photoshop on the web beta
1. Common questions | Photoshop on the web beta
2. Introduction to the workspace
3. System requirements | Photoshop on the web beta
4. Keyboard shortcuts | Photoshop on the web beta
5. Supported file types | Photoshop on the web beta
6. Open and work with cloud documents
7. Collaborate with stakeholders
8. Apply limited edits to your cloud documents
Cloud documents
1. Photoshop cloud documents | Common questions
2. Photoshop cloud documents | Workflow questions
3. Manage and work with cloud documents in Photoshop
4. Upgrade cloud storage for Photoshop
5. Unable to create or save a cloud document
6. Solve Photoshop cloud document errors
7. Collect cloud document sync logs
8. Share access and edit your cloud documents
Workspace
1. Workspace basics
2. Create documents
3. Use the Touch Bar with Photoshop
4. Microsoft Dial support in Photoshop
5. Tool galleries
6. Performance preferences
7. Use tools
8. Touch gestures
9. Touch capabilities and customizable workspaces
10. Technology previews
11. Metadata and notes
12. Quickly share your creations
13. Place Photoshop images in other applications
14. Preferences
15. Default keyboard shortcuts
16. Rulers
17. Show or hide non-printing Extras
18. Specify columns for an image
19. Undo and history
20. Panels and menus
21. Place files
22. Position elements with snapping
23. Position with the Ruler tool
24. Presets
25. Customize keyboard shortcuts
26. Grid and guides
Web, screen, and app design
1. Photoshop for design
2. Artboards
3. Export files in Photoshop
4. Device Preview
5. Copy CSS from layers
6. Slice web pages
7. HTML options for slices
8. Modify slice layout
9. Work with web graphics
10. Create web photo galleries
Image and color basics
1. How to resize images
2. Work with raster and vector images
3. Image size and resolution
4. Acquire images from cameras and scanners
5. Create, open, and import images
6. View images
7. Invalid JPEG Marker error | Opening images
8. Viewing multiple images
9. Customize color pickers and swatches
10. High dynamic range images
11. Match colors in your image
12. Convert between color modes
13. Color modes
14. Erase parts of an image
15. Blending modes
16. Choose colors
17. Customize indexed color tables
18. Image information
19. Distort filters are unavailable
20. About color
21. Color and monochrome adjustments using channels
22. Choose colors in the Color and Swatches panels
23. Sample
24. Color mode or Image mode
25. Color cast
26. Add a conditional mode change to an action
27. Add swatches from HTML CSS and SVG
28. Bit depth and preferences
Layers
1. Layer basics
2. Nondestructive editing
3. Create and manage layers and groups
4. Select, group, and link layers
5. Place images into frames
6. Layer opacity and blending
7. Mask layers
8. Apply Smart Filters
9. Layer comps
10. Move, stack, and lock layers
11. Mask layers with vector masks
12. Manage layers and groups
13. Layer effects and styles
14. Edit layer masks
15. Extract assets
16. Reveal layers with clipping masks
17. Generate image assets from layers
18. Work with Smart Objects
19. Blending modes
20. Combine multiple images into a group portrait
21. Combine images with Auto-Blend Layers
22. Align and distribute layers
23. Copy CSS from layers
24. Load selections from a layer or layer mask's boundaries
25. Knockout to reveal content from other layers
26. Layer
27. Flattening
28. Composite
29. Background
Selections
1. Select and Mask workspace
2. Make quick selections
3. Get started with selections
4. Select with the marquee tools
5. Select with the lasso tools
6. Select a color range in an image
7. Adjust pixel selections
8. Convert between paths and selection borders
9. Channel basics
10. Move, copy, and delete selected pixels
11. Create a temporary quick mask
12. Save selections and alpha channel masks
13. Select the image areas in focus
14. Duplicate, split, and merge channels
15. Channel calculations
16. Selection
17. Bounding box
Image adjustments
1. Perspective warp
2. Reduce camera shake blurring
3. Healing brush examples
4. Export color lookup tables
5. Adjust image sharpness and blur
6. Understand color adjustments
7. Apply a Brightness/Contrast adjustment
8. Adjust shadow and highlight detail
9. Levels adjustment
10. Adjust hue and saturation
11. Adjust vibrance
12. Adjust color saturation in image areas
13. Make quick tonal adjustments
14. Apply special color effects to images
15. Enhance your image with color balance adjustments
16. High dynamic range images
17. View histograms and pixel values
18. Match colors in your image
19. How to crop and straighten photos
20. Convert a color image to black and white
21. Adjustment and fill layers
22. Curves adjustment
23. Blending modes
24. Target images for press
25. Adjust color and tone with Levels and Curves eyedroppers
26. Adjust HDR exposure and toning
27. Filter
28. Blur
29. Dodge or burn image areas
30. Make selective color adjustments
31. Replace object colors
Adobe Camera Raw
1. Camera Raw system requirements
2. What's new in Camera Raw
3. Introduction to Camera Raw
4. Create panoramas
5. Supported lenses
6. Vignette, grain, and dehaze effects in Camera Raw
7. Default keyboard shortcuts
8. Automatic perspective correction in Camera Raw
9. How to make non-destructive edits in Camera Raw
10. Radial Filter in Camera Raw
11. Manage Camera Raw settings
12. Open, process, and save images in Camera Raw
13. Repair images with the Enhanced Spot Removal tool in Camera Raw
14. Rotate, crop, and adjust images
15. Adjust color rendering in Camera Raw
16. Feature summary | Adobe Camera Raw | 2018 releases
17. New features summary
18. Process versions in Camera Raw
19. Make local adjustments in Camera Raw
Image repair and restoration
1. Remove objects from your photos with Content-Aware Fill
2. Content-Aware Patch and Move
3. Retouch and repair photos
4. Correct image distortion and noise
5. Basic troubleshooting steps to fix most issues
Image transformations
1. Transform objects
2. Adjust crop, rotation, and canvas size
3. How to crop and straighten photos
4. Create and edit panoramic images
5. Warp images, shapes, and paths
6. Vanishing Point
7. Use the Liquify filter
8. Content-aware scaling
9. Transform images, shapes, and paths
10. Warp
11. Transform
12. Panorama
Drawing and painting
1. Paint symmetrical patterns
2. Draw rectangles and modify stroke options
3. About drawing
4. Draw and edit shapes
5. Painting tools
6. Create and modify brushes
7. Blending modes
8. Add color to paths
9. Edit paths
10. Paint with the Mixer Brush
11. Brush presets
12. Gradients
13. Fill and stroke selections, layers, and paths
14. Draw with the Pen tools
15. Create patterns
16. Generate a pattern using the Pattern Maker
17. Manage paths
18. Manage pattern libraries and presets
19. Draw or paint with a graphics tablet
20. Create textured brushes
21. Add dynamic elements to brushes
22. Gradient
23. Paint stylized strokes with the Art History Brush
24. Paint with a pattern
25. Sync presets on multiple devices
Text
1. Work with OpenType SVG fonts
2. Format characters
3. Format paragraphs
4. How to create type effects
5. Edit text
6. Line and character spacing
7. Arabic and Hebrew type
8. Fonts
9. Troubleshoot fonts
10. Asian type
11. Create type
12. Text Engine error using Type tool in Photoshop | Windows 8
13. World-Ready composer for Asian Scripts
14. How to add and edit text in Photoshop
Video and animation
1. Video editing in Photoshop
2. Edit video and animation layers
3. Video and animation overview
4. Preview video and animations
5. Paint frames in video layers
6. Import video files and image sequences
7. Create frame animations
8. Creative Cloud 3D Animation (Preview)
9. Create timeline animations
10. Create images for video
Filters and effects
1. Use the Liquify filter
2. Use the Blur Gallery
3. Filter basics
4. Filter effects reference
5. Add Lighting Effects
6. Use the Adaptive Wide Angle filter
7. Use the Oil Paint filter
8. Layer effects and styles
9. Apply specific filters
10. Smudge image areas
Saving and exporting
1. Save files in graphics formats
2. Save your files in Photoshop
3. File formats
4. Save and export video and animations
5. Save PDF files
6. Digimarc copyright protection
Printing
1. Print 3D objects
2. Print from Photoshop
3. Print with color management
4. Contact Sheets and PDF Presentations
5. Print photos in a picture package layout
6. Print spot colors
7. Duotones
8. Print images to a commercial printing press
9. Improve color prints from Photoshop
10. Troubleshoot printing problems | Photoshop
Automation
1. Creating actions
2. Create data-driven graphics
3. Scripting
4. Process a batch of files
5. Play and manage actions
6. Add conditional actions
7. About actions and the Actions panel
8. Record tools in actions
9. Add a conditional mode change to an action
10. Photoshop UI toolkit for plug-ins and scripts
3D and technical imaging
1. Creative Cloud 3D Animation (Preview)
2. Print 3D objects
3. 3D painting
4. 3D panel enhancements | Photoshop
5. Essential 3D concepts and tools
6. 3D rendering and saving
7. Create 3D objects and animations
8. Image stacks
9. 3D workflow
10. Measurement
11. DICOM files
12. Photoshop and MATLAB
13. Count objects in an image
14. Combine and convert 3D objects
15. 3D texture editing
16. Adjust HDR exposure and toning
17. 3D panel settings
Color Management
1. Understanding color management
2. Keeping colors consistent
3. Color settings
4. Work with color profiles
5. Color-managing documents for online viewing
6. Color-managing documents when printing
7. Color-managing imported images
8. Proofing colors

You can create brushes that apply paint to images in a variety of ways. You select an existing preset brush, a brush tip shape, or create a unique brush tip from part of an image. You choose options from the Brush Settings panel to specify how the paint is applied.

Note: Symmetry painting and Pattern Preview do not support Live Tip Brushes. Choose a normal brush for symmetry and pattern painting.

Symmetry painting and pattern preview are not support with Live Tip Brushes.

Brush Settings panel overview

The Brush Settings panel lets you modify existing brushes and design new custom brushes. The Brush Settings panel contains the brush tip options that determine how paint is applied to an image. The brush stroke preview at the bottom of the panel shows how paint strokes look with the current brush options.

Photoshop brush panel — Brush Settings panel (Left) and Brushes panel (Right)

A. Locked/UnlockedB. Selected brush tipC. Brush stroke previewD. Brushes panel

Display the Brush panel and brush options

Choose Window > Brush Settings. Or, select a painting, erasing, toning, or focus tool, and click the panel button on the left side of the options bar.

Select an option set on the left side of the panel. The available options for the set appear on the right side of the panel.

Click the checkbox to the left of the option set to enable or disable the options without viewing them.

You can import a wide variety of free and purchased brushes—for example, Kyle's Photoshop brush packs—into Photoshop. Follow these steps:

In the Brushes panel, from the flyout menu, choose Get More Brushes. Alternatively, right-click a brush listed in the Brushes panel and select Get More Brushes from the contextual menu.

get_more_brushes2 — Select Get More Brushes from the Brushes panel flyout menu...

Download a brush pack. For example, download Kyle's "Megapack".

With Photoshop running, double-click the downloaded ABR file.

The brushes you added are now displayed in the Brushes panel.

You can also use the Import Brushes option in the Brushes panel flyout menu to locate the downloaded ABR file and open it. Once you do so, the downloaded brushes are added to the Brushes panel.

Getting started with advanced custom brushes

Create a brush tip from an image

Using any selection tool, select the image area you want to use as a custom brush. The brush shape can be up to 2500 pixels by 2500 pixels in size.

When painting, you can't adjust the hardness of sampled brushes. To create a brush with sharp edges, set Feather to zero pixels. To create a brush with soft edges, increase the Feather setting.

If you select a color image, the brush tip image is converted to grayscale. Any layer mask applied to the image doesn't affect the definition of the brush tip.

Choose Edit > Define Brush Preset.

Name the brush, and click OK.

Create a brush and set painting options

Select a painting, erasing, toning, or focus tool. Then choose Window > Brush Settings.

In the Brush Settings panel, select a brush tip shape, or click Brush Presets to choose an existing preset.

Select Brush Tip Shape on the left side and set options.

To set other options for the brush, see the following topics:

To lock brush tip shape attributes (retaining them if you select another brush preset), click the unlock icon . To unlock the tip, click the lock icon .

To save the brush for use later, choose New Brush Preset from the Brush panel menu.

To save your new brush permanently or distribute it to other users, you must save the brush as part of a set of brushes. Choose Save Brushes from the Brush Presets panel menu, and then save to a new set or overwrite an existing set. If you reset or replace the brushes in the Brush Presets panel without saving it in a set, you could lose your new brush.

Standard brush tip shape options

For standard brush tips, you can set the following options in the Brush Settings panel:

Size

Controls the size of the brush. Enter a value in pixels or drag the slider.

Photoshop Standard brush tip shape options — Brush strokes with different diameter values

Use Sample Size

Resets the brush to its original diameter. This option is available only if the brush tip shape was created by sampling pixels in an image.

Flip X

Changes the direction of a brush tip on its x axis.

A. Brush tip in its default positionB. Flip X selectedC. Flip X and Flip Y selected

Flip Y

Changes the direction of a brush tip on its y axis.

A. Brush tip in its default positionB. Flip Y selectedC. Flip Y and Flip X selected

Angle

Specifies the angle by which an elliptical or sampled brush's long axis is rotated from horizontal. Type a value in degrees, or drag the horizontal axis in the preview box.

Roundness

Specifies the ratio between the brush's short and long axes. Enter a percentage value, or drag the points in the preview box. A value of 100% indicates a circular brush, a value of 0% indicates a linear brush, and intermediate values indicate elliptical brushes.

Hardness

Controls the size of the brush's hard center. Type a number, or use the slider to enter a value that is a percentage of the brush diameter. You can't change the hardness of sampled brushes.

Spacing

Controls the distance between the brush marks in a stroke. To change the spacing, type a number, or use the slider to enter a value that is a percentage of the brush diameter. When this option is deselected, the speed of the cursor determines the spacing.

While using a preset brush, press the [ key to decrease the brush width; press the ] key to increase the width. For hard round, soft round, and calligraphic brushes, press Shift+[ to decrease the brush hardness; press Shift+] to increase the brush hardness.

Bristle tip shape options

Bristle tips let you specify precise bristle characteristics, creating highly realistic, natural-looking strokes. Set the following brush tip shape options in the Brush panel:

Shape

Determines the overall arrangement of bristles.

Bristles

Controls overall bristle density.

Length

Changes bristle length.

Thickness

Controls the width of individual bristles.

Stiffness

Controls bristle flexibility. At low settings, brush shape deforms easily.

To vary stroke creation when using a mouse, adjust the stiffness setting.

Spacing

Controls the distance between the brush marks in a stroke. To change the spacing, type a number or use the slider to specify a percentage of the brush diameter. When this option is deselected, the speed of the cursor determines the spacing.

Angle

When painting with a mouse, determines the brush tip angle.

Brush preview

Shows brush tip that reflects changes to settings above, as well as current pressure and stroke angle. Click the preview window to see the brush from different sides. The brush preview window has been discontinued in Photoshop 21.0.3 (January 2020 release) and is no longer available.

Erodible tip options

Erodible tip brushes behave similar to pencils and crayons, and wear down naturally as you draw. You can see the amount of wear with the Live Brush Tip Preview to the upper left of the image.

Size

Controls the size of the brush. Enter a value in pixels or drag the slider.

Softness

Controls the rate of wear. Enter a value in percentage or drag the slider.

Shape

Controls the shape of the tip. Choose from a variety of tip options.

Sharpen Tip

Returns the tip to the original sharpness.

Spacing

Brush preview

Shows brush tip that reflects changes to settings above, as well as current pressure and stroke angle. Click the preview window to see the brush from different sides.The brush preview window has been discontinued in Photoshop 21.0.3 (January 2020 release) and is no longer available.

Airbrush tip options

Airbrush tips replicate spray cans with a 3D conical spray. With a stylus, you can alter the spread of sprayed strokes by changing pen pressure.

Size

Controls the size of the brush. Enter a value in pixels or drag the slider.

Hardness

Controls the size of the brush's hard center.

Distortion

Controls the distortion to apply to the spray of paint.

Granularity

Controls how grainy the paint drops look.

Spatter Size

Controls the size of the paint droplets.

Spatter Amount

Controls the number of paint droplets.

Spacing

Controls the distance between the droplets. If this option is deselected, the speed of the cursor determines the spacing.

Brush preview

Brush pose options

Brush pose options let you achieve stylus-like effects and let you control the angle and position of the brush.

Tilt X

Determines the tilt angle of the brush from left to right.

Tilt Y

Determines the tilt angle of the brush from front to back.

Rotation

Determines the rotation angle of the bristles.

Pressure

Determines the pressure the brush applies on the canvas.

Enable Override options to maintain a static brush pose.

Other brush options

Noise

Adds additional randomness to individual brush tips. This option is most effective when applied to soft brush tips (brush tips that contain gray values).

Wet Edges

Causes paint to build up along the edges of the brush stroke, creating a watercolor effect.

Airbrush/Build-up

Applies gradual tones to an image, simulating traditional airbrush techniques. The Airbrush option in the Brush panel corresponds to the Airbrush option in the options bar.

Smoothing

Produces smoother curves in brush strokes. This option is most effective when you are painting quickly with a stylus; however, it may produce a slight lag time in stroke rendering.

Protect Texture

Applies the same pattern and scale to all brush presets that have a texture. Select this option to simulate a consistent canvas texture when painting with multiple, textured brush tips.

Stroke smoothing

Photoshop performs intelligent smoothing on your brush strokes. Simply enter a value (0-100) for Smoothing in the Options bar when you're working with one of the following tools: Brush, Pencil, Mixer Brush, or Eraser. A value of 0 is the same as legacy smoothing in earlier versions of Photoshop. Higher values apply increasing amounts of intelligent smoothing to your strokes.

Stroke smoothing works in several modes. Clicking the gear icon () to enable one or more of the following modes:

Pulled String Mode

Paints only when the string is taut. Cursor movements within the smoothing radius leave no mark.

pulled-string-mode

Stroke Catch Up

Allows the paint to continue catching up with your cursor while you've paused the stroke. Disabling this mode stops paint application as soon as the cursor movement stops.

enable-stroke-catch_up

Catch-Up On Stroke End

Completes the stroke from the last paint position to the point where you released the mouse/stylus control.

catch_up-on-stroke-end

Adjust For Zoom

Prevents jittery strokes by adjusting smoothing. Decreases smoothing when you zoom in the document; increases smoothing when you zoom out.

eraser_smoothing

Brush scattering

Brush scattering determines the number and placement of marks in a stroke.

Scatter and Control

Specifies how brush marks are distributed in a stroke. When Both Axes is selected, brush marks are distributed in a radial direction. When Both Axes is deselected, brush marks are distributed perpendicular to the stroke path.

To specify the maximum percentage of scattering, enter a value. To specify how you want to control the scattering variance of brush marks, choose an option from the Control pop‑up menu:

Off

Specifies no control over the scattering variance of brush marks.

Fade

Fades the scattering of brush marks from maximum scattering to no scattering in the specified number of steps.

Pen Pressure, Pen Tilt, Stylus Wheel, Rotation

Varies the scattering of brush marks based on the pen pressure, pen tilt, position of the pen thumbwheel, or rotation of the pen.

Count

Specifies the number of brush marks applied at each spacing interval.

If you increase the count without increasing the spacing or scattering values, painting performance may decrease.

Count Jitter and Control

Specifies how the number of brush marks varies for each spacing interval. To specify the maximum percentage of brush marks applied at each spacing interval, enter a value. To specify how you want to control the count variance of brush marks, choose an option from the Control pop‑up menu:

Off

Specifies no control over the count variance of brush marks.

Fade

Fades the number of brush marks from the Count value to 1 in the specified number of steps.

Pen Pressure, Pen Tilt, Stylus Wheel, Rotation

Varies the number of brush marks based on the pen pressure, pen tilt, position of the pen thumbwheel, or rotation of the pen.

Clear brush options

You can clear all options that you changed for a brush preset (except brush shape settings) at once.

Choose Clear Brush Controls from the Brush Settings panel menu.