126 PCWorld MAY 2020HERE’S HOW PHOTOSHOP TIPS TO BOOST YOUR SKILLS
Brushes, to name a few. There are thousands
of brushes available on the Internet, and
most are free. (Most of these sites also offer
free patterns, gradients, textures, shapes,
symbols, and styles.) After you download
these additional brushes, follow steps 1
through 9 above to add them to your
Brushes Palette.HOW TO CREATE CUSTOM
BRUSHES IN PHOTOSHOP
Basic custom brushes are easy to create; it’s
the added “effects” that get complicated.
For this tutorial, we’ll create a “picture”
brush (process is the same for all brushes).
For starters, locate a picture that you’d like to
convert into a brush. We chose a tiny dancer.- Open the picture file.
- Choose Image > Adjustments > Invert
(Ctrl + I) to make the image a negative.
Note: Brushes must be converted to
negative images in order to display as
positive images when used. Also note that it
is not necessary to remove the color from
(Desaturate) the image before converting it
into a brush. All brushes in Photoshop are
grayscale until you add color to the brush
layer. Brushes in Photoshop are not the same
as Picture Tubes in Paint Shop Pro. - Use the Magic Wand to select the
background, then choose Select > Invert to
reverse the background with the foreground
and select the foreground image. - Use the Polygonal tool to clean up the
selected image and smooth out any jagged
or missing pixels.
Note: If there are colors in the image that
are the same as the background color, those
pieces of the image may blend with the
background, which means they won’t be
included in your brush image.- With the foreground image still
selected, choose Edit > Define Brush Preset.
Enter a name for your brush in the Brush
Name dialog, then click OK.
And that’s it! Brush created, unless you
want to add some special effects. - With the Brush tool still selected, click
the paintbrush on the file folder icon at the
top menu to open the Brush Settings menu. - Play around with these settings until
you’re happy with the results. Check the
boxes to view the different effects. Notice
that the options in the right panel change
based on which effect is highlighted, such as
the Texture effect. - The brush must be in its own layer if
you want to change the brush color, but
note that unless you use a pattern or
gradient, the brush will still be just a single
color.
Note: On the Brush menu, the number
below the brush is the pixel size of the
original brush you created. It’s better to
create large brushes that you can size down
when used rather than create small brushes
and attempt to enlarge them. Enlarging
brushes, images, patterns, or anything else