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Introducing the Brush King: the Painter Brush Tool!While Photoshop still has a large amount of brushes, the Painter brush tool is an artists’ wet dream in terms of finding a digital brush medium. In fact, the Photoshop brush tool is one of the many categories of brushes (known as the airbrush) in the Painter brush tool!That gives an idea of just how infinitely better the Painter program gives when deciding on a medium to paint digitally. With that in mind, how you will go about learning the program is up to you. But one thing I’d like to inform you of, when getting used the Painter brush tool, is to keep it simple and to keep it real! There’s no possible way to know all the different brush categories! Now, let’s look closely at the tool to see what I’m talking about. 1. Finding the brush toolIt’s not hard to locate the brush tool. It’s just the first tool on the top left corner of the vertical tool bar. This tells you how high in the priority list the Painter brush tool is!
Plus, there are no other hidden tools, such as the pencil tool in the Photoshop when you hold down the brush tool, as it is literally all you need! What you do need to know is the options available for the Painter brush tool when you select it. These options generally appear on the top bar and to the far right corner for you to select. The top options select the properties available for the brush while the far right side selects the brush categories and the brush variants. Ok, so it may be fairly confusing as of now. Don’t fret though; I will explain for sure what you need to know in this program. Just continue to follow along! We’ll start with the brush categories. 2. What are the brush categories?Just think about it in terms of picking out what to draw with. You can choose pencil crayons, chalk, pastel, an airbrush; whatever floats your boat! Like wise, even when you’re starting to paint digitally, you most likely will have a favorite medium in mind already! On the far right hand side of the screen, look for the Painter brush categories.
As you can see, there are a lot to choose from! Because of this, I highly recommend you using the standard airbrush category or artists’ oil. They will definitely be the most used as they create the best effects for your efforts. Even more so, if you have experience with a medium that you are used to using in real life, go ahead and pick it. It will make things easier for you in the long run! Just keep it simple! After you have picked the brush category that you desire, the next thing to do is to pick the brush variants. 3. What are these brush variants?Again, when you decide on what medium to use, you may as well get all tools associated with that medium. For example, if I choose to paint using traditional artists’ oils, tools that are associated with that are the palette knife and the bristle brush.If I choose to paint with charcoal, then the tools associated with that are the charcoal sticks and charcoal pencils just like real life! The brush variants are right beside the brush categories.
You can think of the variants as a sub category of the brush types available. If you think about all the different possible combinations of brushes available, you would just stress yourself out! That is why you might need to make mental notes of variants that you want but may not be in that specific brush category. Even after you have decided on the variant that you want, you still need to decide what properties to give it! That is why we have the options as each brush variant behaves differently depending on it is set on. 4. Finally, the brush options!Once you have decided on your variant, you can then manipulate it to your heart’s desire.
You can choose the brush to be as big as you want, as well as how round or straight your painting trail can be, within the first two options. These are great when you’re drawing bodily curves or for building construction. You can also choose how opaque or transparent your painting trail is. It is great for doing atmospheric drawings. Or, if you want to give is some texture, the grain option is available too for those gritty elements on old objects. Other than that, you can change the viscosity, the blend, and the wetness of the brush to simulate how the brush variants behave in real life. It’s like buying new brushes at the touch of a button! Obviously, these options will change depending on the brush variant that you are using. Some may have all the options available while others lack them. Again, it’s all about personal preference and personal painting style. As with anything, the Painter brush tool is as it is--just a tool! Don’t get caught up with finding the right tool for the right job. You will easily discover that using the same variants can do multiple jobs with ease. Keep it simple, keep it real, and keep motivated to learn!
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