Creating High Resolution Photoshop Brushes the Correct Way

Starting Off

First lets get an image that we want to make into a brush. I found a cool looking high resolution smoke picture on a wallpaper website. Download it here: Smoke

Step One

First of all, let me give you a little background information on photoshop brushes. In CS4, photoshop brushes can have a max size of 2500px by 2500px, so whenever it is possible, you should make them this resolution. Nobody wants to make a sick brush in a low resolution and have to come back a few days later to make it bigger when they could have just made it big in the first place. Also, any brushes made with photoshop are NOT backwards compatible, but they ARE forwards compatible. Meaning that if I made a brush in CS4, it would only work in CS4 and on, while if I made a brush in photoshop 7, it would work in 7, CS, CS2, CS3, and CS4.

So knowing all this, we first want to resize the image we have to 2500px on the long side like I did below so it is the biggest it can be. Go to Image>Adjustments>Image size and copy my settings.

Step Two

When making a photoshop brush, it works like this: Every part of the image that is pure white, is NOT part of the brush. The black parts of the image are fully opaque, while a grey color in between black and white would be 50% translucent. That being said, when you are making a brush, it should always be in black and white, and a little over-contrasted. The image we have has a black background and the smoke is white, but we want the smoke to be black because that is the part that we want for the brush, so lets invert the image. You can do this by going to Image>Adjustments>Invert (or Ctrl+I in windows)

Now you should have an image like the one below.

Step Three

As you can see, the smoke has a very slight red/orange hue in it, and we need to get rid of that. Go to Image>Adjustments>Hue/Saturation and change the saturation slider to -100 like shown below.

Step Four

Now lets play with the contrast a little bit to make the brush a little more clear. Go to Image>Adjustments>Curves and make your curve like I did below. To explain what this does: The curve that I made on the top right to go a little bit higher than the midline makes the light areas of the image lighter, and the curve on the bottom of the midline makes the darks in the picture darker. This is essential when making a brush because it makes it turn out alot clearer in the end.

Now your image should look roughly like what I have below. We are almost done.

Step Five

Now all we need to do is define the brush.  Go to Edit>Define Brush Preset and name it whatever you want. I just named mine Smoke Brush 2500px to know that it is a high res smoke brush.

Step Six

Now we need to test the brush to make sure it works.  We of course want to test its max resolution, so make a new document that is 2500px by 2500px and fill the background with white.

Now select your smoke brush and set it to 2500px on the Master Diameter Slider.

Now select a color and brush away. You have just made your first brush! Congrats.

The brush can work on a black background as well with white or a light color as seen below.

In Conclusion

When you go to make another brush, be sure to experiment with your settings, these settings will not work with every brush you try to make. Just remember what you learned about the blacks whites and greys and always remember to make your brush at the max resolution. Have fun!

Questions?

Leave a comment. I always answer.