Custom brushes
Brush Settings ▸ Custom Brush — building a brush from tip sets, paint textures, swept ribbons or 3D elements, and saving it.
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- Custom Brush
The Custom Brush section is the authoring layer. The sections above it tune a brush's numbers; this one changes what the brush fundamentally is — what it stamps, whether it stamps at all, whether it sweeps a design or instances geometry.
It holds four rows, each a collapsible section. Only one is open at a time.
| Row | Turns the brush into | Summary when off | Summary when on |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tip Set | A brush that stamps shapes from a set | procedural | 1 shape / n shapes |
| Texture Paint | A brush that paints with an image | off | canvas-locked / per stamp |
| Continuous (Ribbon) | A brush that sweeps a design | off | every n pt / stretched |
| 3D Element | A brush that instances geometry | off | n of yours / billboards |
The header above these rows names the system currently winning — "Stamps 6 shapes", "Sweeps a design along the stroke", "Reveals a texture pinned to the canvas", "Paints 3D elements", or "Procedural shape" when the brush uses none of them.
Nothing here saves itself
Every edit in this panel changes the brush in hand and stops there. Dragging a slider to see what it does is not a decision to change your brush forever.
Writes the edits over the current brush. Shown for custom brushes only — a shipped brush cannot be overwritten.
Keeps the edits as a new brush and leaves the original alone. The prompt reads "Save as New Brush" with a Name field; an empty name becomes Custom Brush.
Discards these edits and returns the brush to its saved definition.
The save bar states which of three states the brush is in: Modified in orange when it differs from its saved definition, Saved when a custom brush matches it, or Built-in — unchanged when a shipped brush is untouched.
Session edits survive switching brushes — each brush keeps its modified version for the session — but only Save or Save as New reaches the library.
The footer line
The section carries one sentence permanently at its foot:
"Brush edits only affect strokes drawn afterwards — never ones already on the canvas."
This is not a caution, it is a guarantee. Every stroke bakes the brush it was drawn with and its random seed, and assets are addressed by the hash of their bytes, so an edit cannot reach back into finished work even in principle.
Editing in place or forking
Two routes, and the difference matters.
Editing in place — tune a brush and press Save. Only your own brushes can be saved over.
Forking — tune a shipped brush and press Save as New. The shipped definition is untouched and remains available; your version becomes a separate entry. Because a shipped brush shows Built-in — unchanged and offers no Save button, forking is the only way its edits ever persist.
Tip Set
A tip set turns one brush into many shapes: each dab stamps one member of the set. This is what makes the Nature brushes read as foliage rather than a repeated stamp.
When the brush has no tips the row reads: "This brush uses its procedural shape. Add tips to make it a multi-tip brush — each dab stamps one shape from the set."
The 19 procedural tips as thumbnails — soft, bristle, chalk, charcoal, spray and sparkle, plus six leaves, four grass blades and three petals. A tip already in the set is outlined. Tips are generated at runtime rather than shipped as art, so they stay crisp at any size.
Adds an image from disk to the set. See below for how coverage is read.
Draws the current layer into a tip and adds it to the set, at up to 512px. If the layer is empty: "Nothing to capture — draw the shape you want to stamp on this layer first."
How each dab chooses from the set. Shown only when the set holds more than one shape. The seven modes are below.
The chance that each dab mirrors its shape, per axis. The panel puts the value of this plainly: "Chance each dab mirrors its shape — a 6-leaf set reads as two dozen."
Each tip in the set is a chip with its own separate remove button. Adding a tip already in the set is refused. Applying a tip set forces Grain to 0, because the tips carry their own texture — the Grain slider stays live if you want it back.
Pick modes
"Each dab picks at random — scattered foliage, confetti."
"The set is walked in order — footprints, dashes, a marching sequence."
"The set is walked up and back down, so an ordered set never snaps from last to first." The end shapes are not repeated at the turn.
"Press harder for a later shape in the set." Order the set thin to broad and pressure selects the width, as the Grass (Pressure Set) brush does.
"Move faster for a later shape — a dry tip at speed, a full one when you linger."
"Upright picks the first shape, flat picks the last — a fine nib and a broad one."
"The stroke's heading picks the shape — for a set sorted by direction."
Switching pick mode never changes the rest of the stroke. The tip choice is drawn last from the random sequence, and a draw is made for every mode including the ones that ignore it, so a brush's scatter and jitter stay exactly where they were.
Texture Paint
Texture painting replaces the colour well as the source of the mark: "Paint with an image instead of the colour well — paper, fabric, bark, or a photo you paint back in."
Imports an image as the paint texture. Reads Replace with image once a texture is set.
Captures the current layer as the texture. Reads Replace from this layer once one is set. If the layer is empty: "Nothing to capture — paint the texture you want on this layer first."
The three procedural textures — paper, canvas weave and cross-hatch.
Whether the texture belongs to the canvas or to the dab. The two cases are below.
The texture's scale.
How far the texture is tinted toward the colour well. At 0 the image's own colours are used; at 1 it takes your colour entirely, which is what makes a near-white motif visible on white paper.
Which parts of the texture take ink. See below.
Whether the texture's own transparency cuts the mark.
Returns the brush to painting with the colour well.
Mapping
"The texture is pinned to the canvas and the brush reveals it — two strokes over the same spot show the same pixels." The texture behaves like a surface the canvas already has and the brush uncovers.
"Each dab carries its own copy of the image." The texture travels with the brush, so it repeats, rotates and scatters with the dabs.
Tooth
Tooth is the control that separates a painted surface from a flat tint. The panel says so directly: "Tooth bites the texture into coverage, not just colour — the difference between a painted surface and a flat tint."
| Tooth | Effect |
|---|---|
| Positive | The texture's bright areas take ink — canvas threads, the high spots of paper. |
| Zero | Coverage is untouched; the texture only colours the mark. |
| Negative | The texture's dark areas take ink — hatching, ink pooling into a pattern. |
Negative tooth is how the Cross-Hatch brush draws the hatch lines themselves in your colour rather than laying colour around them.
Swapping the image on a brush that already has a texture keeps mapping, scale, tooth and tint — only the image changes. Applying a texture forces Grain to 0.
Continuous (Ribbon)
A ribbon brush sweeps one design along the path instead of stamping it. The panel makes the case for the distinction: "Sweep a design along the stroke so it bends with the path — chains, cloth trim, lace. Swept, not stamped: that continuity is what makes a chain a chain."
Imports an image as the motif. Reads Replace with image once one is set.
Captures the current layer as the motif, at up to 512px. Capture one repeat — a single link, one scallop — not a whole chain. If the layer is empty: "Nothing to capture — draw one repeat (a link, a scallop) on this layer first."
The five procedural motifs — chain, rope, lace, stitch and beads.
Tile or Stretch. The two cases are below.
How often the motif repeats along the stroke. Shown only for Tile.
The ribbon's width as a multiple of the brush size.
How far the motif is tinted toward the colour well.
Mirrors every other repeat. Useful for a motif that must alternate to interlock.
Whether the ribbon's width follows pen pressure and the stroke's taper.
Returns the brush to marking rather than sweeping.
Repeat modes
The motif repeats every Repeat length points of distance travelled. Because it tiles by distance rather than by segment, spacing stays even around curves.
One motif is stretched across the whole stroke, so the design's length is the stroke's length. Repeat length is not used. This is how Banner (Stretch) works.
A motif's horizontal axis runs along the stroke and its vertical axis across the width, so motifs are authored wide and short and tile left to right. A swept ribbon rasterizes into the stroke's own tiles like any other mark: it stays erasable, layer-composited, open to effects, and drapes onto the 3D surface.
Swapping the image on a brush that already has a ribbon keeps period, width and mirroring.
3D Element
The fourth row turns the brush into a scatter brush that instances geometry. Its controls and the Capture 3D object as element and Billboard actions are covered on 3D scatter brushes.
Importing an image as a tip
Two routes, and they do different things:
- Import, inside the Tip Set row, adds the image to the current brush's set.
- Import an image as a tip, on the Sub Tool action row, makes a new custom brush that stamps it, in the Custom category.
An imported image is downscaled to at most 512px and read for coverage by one rule:
- If the image has real transparency, its alpha is the coverage — the shape is what is opaque.
- If the image is fully opaque, coverage is inverted luminance: dark is ink, on the assumption of a shape drawn on white paper.
The chip you see in the panel is generated with exactly the same rule as the painting pipeline, so a thumbnail cannot flatter a tip that will stamp differently. Tips are stored as coverage, not as a picture — the colour comes from the colour well.
A capture is a snapshot, never a live link
Capturing a layer as a tip, a texture, a motif or a mesh takes its pixels once. Editing the source layer afterwards does not change any brush that sampled it, and does not change any stroke already drawn. Re-capture to update a brush, and it mints a new asset — the old strokes keep the pixels they were drawn with.