Ch 4: Painting

Photoshop CS6 EssentialsBy Scott Onstott

Ch 4: Painting

Understanding HSB Color• Hue is what we think of as colors of

the rainbow• Saturation refers to how much hue is

present• Brightness refers to the light intensity• Tints have full brightness but low

saturation• Shades have full saturation but

decreased brightness• Desaturated color is grayscale,

having only variation in brightness

Ch 4: Painting

Heads Up Color Wheel• You can select the HUD Color Wheel in

the Preferences dialog box• On the Mac, hold down

Cmd+Opt+Control and drag the left mouse button in the document window.

• On Windows hold down Shift+Alt and drag the right mouse button in the document window.

• The HUD Color wheel is useful for identifying complementary colors and picking any combination of saturation and brightness in the central color ramp

Ch 4: Painting

Rotating the View• Press R to select the Rotate View

tool (under the Hand tool in the Tools panel)

• It is helpful to rotate the view when sketching with a pencil or painting with any brush tool

• You can align the view to the arc of your arm or wrist’s natural swing when you are tracing a photo or painting in fine detail

• Click Reset View on the options bar to rotate back to the default view

3D model courtesy of Google 3DWarehouse user Krzysio

Ch 4: Painting

Eraser Tool• Use the Eraser to paint in the

background color• The Eraser tool has three modes:

pencil, brush, and block• Pencil mode is good for removing

one pixel at a time• Brush mode supports partial erasure

when the brush has reduced hardness

• Block mode is good for erasing rows and/or columns while holding Shift

Ch 4: Painting

Background Eraser Tool• Erases pixels leaving only

transparency• Sampling: Continuous erases

everything you paint over• Sampling: Once can be used to

remove a single sampled color where you start the brushstroke

• Sampling: Background Swatch removes the color in the background swatch no matter where you start the brushstroke

Ch 4: Painting

Flow vs. Opacity• The Brush tool has flow and

opacity percentages on the options bar

• Painting at 100% in both flow and opacity doesn’t allow you to build up paint

• Painting at decreased flow (top) builds saturation where brushstrokes overlap

• Painting at decreased opacity is like painting with a wash (watered down paint) where overlapping paint has increased opacity

Ch 4: Painting

Understanding Brush Controls• Brushstrokes are actually a series of

copies of a shape made in the direction of the stroke

• By increasing the spacing in the Brush panel you will perceive a staccato repetition of the shape along the brushstroke

• Use Scattering controls to randomly reposition shapes along the brushstroke

• You can randomize color with Color Dynamics controls

Ch 4: Painting

Using a Tablet• The mouse is not a good input

device for brush work (it’s like painting with a bar of soap!)

• Pressure and tilt sensitive tablets are highly recommended for painting in Photoshop

• Bristle tip brushes take advantage of tablets by allowing you to make a wide variety of marks by varying tilt and pressure, just like you might use a real paintbrush

• The stylus is an absolute positioning device which is more intuitive

Ch 4: Painting

Using the Mixer Brush• The Mixer Brush is the closest tool

Photoshop has to a real paintbrush• You can treat the pixels of a photo as if

they were wet or dry paint• The Mixer Brush can push wet paint

around with or without mixing in new pigment

• Toggle on Load Brush After Each Stroke if you want to mix in fresh paint and then adjust Mix percentage

• Press Opt and sample an area to load that as new paint on the brush if you prefer

Original photo courtesy of iStockphoto, ©Andrew Penner, Image #6376617