Tutorial: Photoshop with mouse

Tutorial: How to paint smooth images in Photoshop without a pen tablet (mouse only).

Intro: Having a pen tablet makes it more easy to draw smooth gradients and fine lines. But it is possible to draw and paint with a mouse: The secret is to use a brush that draws a lot of lines with one stroke.

Brushes: You can download my brushes from [link] or you can build your own - they are quite simple. My set contains 3 brushes:

mouse_strokes_curve

• makes 4 relatively fat lines


• the stroke "bends" when drawing curves

mouse_strokes_direction

• the same 4 fat lines


• but it stays in the initial direction -> The first movement rotates the lines. Example: When you start stroking downwards the lines will be horizontally next to each other, but when you continue this stroke in a curve to the right the lines will start to overlap.


• therefor its not that handy for drawing. but great to add some randomness (like for hair)

mouse_strokes_finecurve:

• will produce many fine lines


• bends with curve (no overlap)


• "sketchy" because the brushtip is not cirles but thin lines

The standard size of the brushes is about 70px.
The standard opacity (and flow) is 100%.
You'll have to adjust those values regularly according to your needs (needles to say...).
You can see an example of the brushes under step 2.

I'll now add a short walktrough (although there is info under each step too) with additional explainations and an expanded tips-section.

Walkthrough
Start with an image big enough for small details. At least 1000px x 1000px. All photoshop brushes get washy at very small sizes (under 3px). I prefer a 50% grey background. I sketched in a general pose and composition (remember, you can move and scale it till it looks interesting). I made a portrait, but you can do anything... (->1.)

First thing: I selected a little cirle in a corner of my workspace and drew a reference sphere (->2.). Do it and look at it regularly! Now you know where to put your light and dark sides. I didn't use the whole range from white to black because it gives you the freedom to add stuff later.

Everything you have to do now is: Smoothing, sharpening, smoothing, sharpening... Keep switching between your brushes, opacity and size.

Tips

• Use mid-opacity and overlaping strokes to make smooth blendings and hatching


• Follow the form with your strokes


• quickly pick up mixed tones wit the Alt key


• use a photo reference, especially if you got problems with lighting. Collect photos and practice drawing from ref


• you can use the number row on the keyboard to quickly change the opacity


• use keyboard shortcuts to in-/decrease brush size


• or use right mouseclick


• make your image interesting: high contrast and sharp edges in the focus point -> blur the lines that are out of focus with the finecurve brush

The Master Tip for everyone with a fast computer: The Paint-Brush is not the only tool with a "brushtip"... e.g. Erasers and SMUDGE (great!) can have the same fine adjustments. Especially the lot'o'lines preset works great with smudge (and eats your CPU).


brushes: [link]