Create and modify brushes

Last updated on Feb 27, 2025

Photoshop

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As of July 2024, Photoshop’s legacy 3D features have been removed. However, now in the Photoshop (beta) app you can seamlessly add 3D objects to your 2D Photoshop design using the Adobe Substance 3D Viewer (beta) app. Click here for more details.

Create brushes that apply paint to images in a variety of ways:

Select an existing preset brush or a brush tip shape.
Create a unique brush tip from the part of an image.
Choose options from the Brush Settings panel to specify how the paint is applied.

Try it in the app
Use the Brush Settings panel to customize brushes in a few simple steps.

Open Photoshop

Brush Settings panel overview

Use the Brush Settings panel to modify existing brushes and design new custom brushes. This panel contains brush tip options that determine how paint is applied to an image.

Use the brush stroke preview option in the panel to view how paint strokes look with the current brush options.

Choose from the given brush tip shape options from the Brush Settings panel

Display the Brush panel and brush options

Select Window > Brush Settings.

Or select a painting, erasing, toning, or focus tool (such as Eraser tool, Clone Stamp tool, Hue/Saturation, Curves, and Gaussian Blur) and then the Brushes Settings panel icon in the options bar.
In the Brush Settings panel, select the checkbox beside each set to enable or disable it. View and adjust the options available for each of these sets while making your selection.

Import brushes and brush packs

From the flyout menu in the Brushes panel, select Get More Brushes. You can also right-click a brush in the Brushes panel and select Get More Brushes from the menu that appears.
Download your desired brush pack.
With the Photoshop application running, double-click the downloaded Adobe brush file (ABR) and view it in the Brush panel.

Note:

Select Import Brushes in the Brushes panel flyout menu to access the downloaded ABR file. Once done, the downloaded brushes are added to the Brushes panel.

Create a brush tip from an image

Use a selection tool to select the image area you want to use as a custom brush. The brush shape can be up to 2500 x 2500 pixels in size. You can't adjust the hardness of sampled brushes while painting.

To create a brush with sharp edges, set Feather to 0 pixels and to create a brush with soft edges, increase the Feather setting.

Note:

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.
Select Edit > Define Brush Preset.
Enter the brush name and select OK.

Create a brush and set painting options

Select a painting, erasing, toning, or focus tool and then Window > Brush Settings.
In the Brush Settings panel, select a brush tip shape or Brush Presets to choose an existing preset.

Select your preferred option from Brush Tip Shape in the Brush Settings panel.
To set other options for the brush, see the following topics:
Select the unlock icon to unlock brush tip shape attributes (retaining them if you select another brush preset) and the lock icon to lock the brush tip shape attributes.
Select New Brush Preset from the Brush panel menu to save the brush for future use.

Note:

To save your new brush permanently or distribute it to other users, you must save the brush as part of a set of brushes.

Select 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 them in a set, you could lose your new brush.

Standard brush tip shape options

Select from the given options in the Brush Settings panel for standard brush tips.

Size: Control 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: Reset 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: Change the direction of a brush tip on its x-axis.

Photoshop Flip X — Flipping a brush tip on its x axis

A. Brush tip in its default position B. Flip X selected C. Flip X and Flip Y selected

Flip Y: Change the direction of a brush tip on its y-axis.

Photoshop Flip Y — Flipping a brush tip on its y axis

A. Brush tip in its default position B. Flip Y selected C. Flip Y and Flip X selected

Angle: Specify 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.

Photoshop angle — Angled brushes create a chiseled stroke

Roundness: Specify 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, 0% indicates a linear brush, and intermediate values indicate elliptical brushes.

Photoshop roundness — Adjusting roundness to compress a brush tip shape

Hardness: Control 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.

Photoshop hardness — Brush strokes with different hardness values

Spacing: Control 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.

Photoshop spacing — Increasing the spacing makes the brush skip

Note:

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

Specify bristle characteristics and create realistic natural-looking strokes with bristle tips. Set the following brush tip shape options in the Brush panel:

Shape: Determine the overall arrangement of bristles.
Bristles: Control overall bristle density.
Length: Change bristle length.
Thickness: Control the width of individual bristles.
Stiffness: Control bristle flexibility. At low settings, brush shape deforms easily. Adjust stiffness setting to vary stroke creation when using a mouse.
Spacing: Control 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: Decide the brush tip angle when painting with the help of a mouse.
Brush preview: View the brush tip that reflects changes to settings, as well as current pressure and stroke angle. Select the preview window to see the brush from different sides.

Erodible tip options

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

Size: Control the size of the brush. Enter a value in pixels or drag the slider.
Softness: Control the rate of wear. Enter a value in percentage or drag the slider.
Shape: Control the shape of the tip. Choose from a variety of tip options.
Sharpen Tip: Return the tip to the original sharpness.
Spacing: Control 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.
Brush preview: View brush tip to reflect changes to settings, as well as current pressure and stroke angle. Select the preview window to see the brush from different sides.

Airbrush tip options

Airbrush tips replicate spray cans with a 3D conical spray. Use a stylus to alter the spread of sprayed strokes by changing pen pressure.

Size: Control the size of the brush. Enter a value in pixels or drag the slider.
Hardness: Control the size of the brush’s hard center.
Distortion: Control the distortion to apply to the spray of paint.
Granularity: Control how grainy the paint drops look.
Spatter Size: Control the size of the paint droplets.
Spatter Amount: Control the number of paint droplets.
Spacing: Control the distance between the droplets. Deselect this option to decide the spacing depending on the speed of the cursor.
Brush preview: View the brush tip that reflects changes to the settings, as well as current pressure and stroke angle. Select the preview window to see the brush from different sides.

Brush pose options

Get stylus-like effects and control the angle and position of the brush with brush pose options.

Tilt X: Determine the tilt angle of the brush from left to right.
Tilt Y: Determine the tilt angle of the brush from front to back.
Rotation: Determine the rotation angle of the bristles.
Pressure: Determine the pressure the brush applies on the canvas.

Enable Override options to maintain a static brush pose.

Other brush options

Noise: Add 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: Create a watercolor effect by causing paint to build up along the edges of the brush stroke.
Airbrush/Build-up: Apply 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: Produce smoother curves in brush strokes when painting quickly with a stylus; however, this option may produce a slight lag time in stroke rendering.
Protect Texture: Apply 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

For intelligent smoothing on your brush strokes, simply enter a value (0-100) for Smoothing in the options bar when working with any of these tools: Brush, Pencil, Mixer Brush, or Eraser.

Use 0 to apply the same effect as legacy smoothing in earlier versions of Photoshop, and higher values to apply increasing amounts of intelligent smoothing to your strokes.

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

Pulled String Mode: Paint only when the string is taut. Cursor movements within the smoothing radius leave no mark.

Stroke Catch-Up: Allow the paint to continue catching up with the cursor when the stroke is paused. Disabling this mode stops the application of paint as soon as the cursor movement stops.

Catch-up on Stroke End: Complete the stroke from the last paint position to the point where you released the mouse/stylus control.

Adjust for Zoom: Prevent jittery strokes by adjusting smoothing. Decrease smoothing when you zoom and increase smoothing when you zoom out.

Brush scattering

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

Scatter and Control: Specify how brush marks are distributed in a stroke. Select Both Axes to ensure brush marks are distributed in a radial direction. Deselect Both Axes to distribute brush marks perpendicular to the stroke path. Enter a value to specify the maximum percentage of scattering. To specify how you want to control the scattering variance of brush marks, choose an option from the Control pop‑up menu:
- Off: Specify no control over the scattering variance of brush marks.
- Fade: Fade the scattering of brush marks from maximum scattering to no scattering in the specified number of steps.
- Pen Pressure, Pen Tilt, Stylus Wheel, Rotation: Vary the scattering of brush marks based on the pen pressure, pen tilt, position of the pen thumbwheel, or rotation of the pen.
- Count: Specify 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: Specify 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: Specify no control over the count variance of brush marks.
- Fade: Fade the number of brush marks from the Count value to 1 in the specified number of steps.
- Pen Pressure, Pen Tilt, Stylus Wheel, Rotation: Vary 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

Select Clear Brush Controls from the Brush Settings panel menu to clear all options changed for a brush preset (except brush shape settings) at once.

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