Photoshop Elements / Brushes /

2 - Intermediate: Part 1

By default, the size of the brush cursor is 50% of the size of the brush.

You can change the cursor size to 100%.

Go to Edit > Preferences > Display & Cursors.

Go to Photoshop Elements > Preferences > Display & Cursors.

In the Painting Cursors section, select Full Size Brush Tip.

Select Show Crosshair in Brush Tip if you wish.

The cursor will be solid if the edge of the brush doesn't have any feathering, and diffuse, if there's feathering.

Here's a 50 pixel (px) brush.

Here's the same 50 px brush, but with feathering.

The brush circle is larger to show the feathering, and the circle is diffuse.

To see more brushes in a library, make the Brush Picker window larger.

Click the lower-right corner, hold, and drag.

With the cursor over your photograph, right click to open up the Brush Picker window.

You can change how the brushes are displayed in the Brush Picker window.

1) Go to Menu #1 by clicking the blue arrow in the Brush Picker window.

Here's Menu #1.

Experiment with the display choices in the middle of Menu #1.

When the Brush Picker window is open, use the arrow keys to move up-and-down the brushes in the library.

If the Brush Picker window is closed, move up-and-down the brushes by pressing the comma and period keys.

The opacity setting, in the options bar, changes how much will show through from under the brush.

A brush set at an opacity of 100% will cover all of the pixels with one pass.

A low setting is good when you're blending one area into another.

You can do one pass along the edge of the transition, two passes further back, and so forth.

Hardness is a measure of the feathering of the edge of a brush.

A brush with a hardness of 0% has the most feathering.

A brush with a hardness of 100% has no feathering.

You can select the hardness in More Options, in the options bar.

Hardness can also be changed by increments of 25% on the keyboard.

Shift + [ = Decrease by 25%

Shift + ] = Increase by 25%

If you need to brush in a straight path, such as along an object, position the brush at the starting point, and click.

Move the brush to the endpoint, press and hold Shift, and click the brush.

The brush will trace a path between the two points.

Next, let's learn how to protect the Brushes folder, and learn more about brush libraries.

To continue, use the menu above, or click Next below.