Learn how to create beautiful backgrounds
Using brushes in Photoshop can create beautiful backgrounds. Download free brushes can quickly help you to achieve more effective results and improve productivity at the same time. There are virtually unlimited options when working with brushes, so it’s a skill that can always be further developed.
A past client needed a wallpaper background for his project. I was too busy at the time and suggested that he could buy it from a stock photo house. Back in the day, it used to be how many times the image would be in a printed piece or website, and it was charged by a certain amount; it wasn’t what is now, a subscription rate. It was going to be a costly image.
So, I suggested for him to see a colleague who can design it for him. The client called me and said my colleague was going to charge him over $5,000. I thought it was a bit excessive, so, in the end, I did for him with brushes, and it took only a few seconds to get finished.
There are tons of free Photoshop brushes across the Web. Many of them are of high-quality. There are many Web sites dedicated to listing downloadable brushes. The following are a handful of those available that I have come across and used: Brusheezy, Brush Lovers, and CreativeBloq.
Proper Way of Loading Brushes
Put the brush presets you have downloaded into the folder Photoshop\Presets\Brushes in the Adobe folder in Program Files if you use Windows or in Applications if you use Macintosh.
On my PC, it may appear like this: C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CC 2019\Presets\Brushes.
The original brush presets that come with Adobe Photoshop are kept in this folder. The brush presets should have a .abr ending.
Even though you save the Brushes in Photoshop’s folder, they will not always emerge in its workspace automatically. You’ll have to load them.
Note: If the brushes still do not show up in your Brushes palette, it means the brushes were created in a newer version of Photoshop, which your current version cannot load.
The system doesn’t allow me to Load Brushes (Work or School)
- Open the Brushes Presets Panel: Go to Window > Brush Presets
- In the Brush Presets panel, click the triangle in the right upper corner. Click & a fall-out menu where you should select the item Load Brushes.
- You will see the Load Brushes dialogue box. Choose the brush preset you want from the list — for example, Snowflakes M Johnson.
- The new Brushes will appear in the Brush Panel & Brush Presets panel. The brushes that you just loaded will be found at the bottom of the Brush & Brush Presets panel.
- Open a new document. Click on the brush tool in the toolbox. Select the Snowflakes brush, and you should see an outline of the snowflake brush on your page.
Drawing with your Brushes
To make your brush smaller use the keyboard shortcut [ and to make the brush larger, use the keyboard shortcut ]