You are here:

Using the Develop Brush

The Develop Brush is designed to allow you to make a variety of edits to specific areas of your photos. You can adjust the Exposure, Saturation, Fill Light, Contrast, Clarity, and Sharpness in your photo by brushing on the effects. For example, instead of adding fill light to an entire photo, you may want to only add it to certain areas, such as backlit subjects. You can apply up to eight brushes to separate areas in the image and assign each with unique effect settings.

You can save edits you make with the brush tool as a preset for future use.

Develop Brush

The Develop Brush button displays at the top of the Tune and Detail tab.

To Use the Develop Brush:

In Develop mode, on the Tune or Detail tab, click the Brush button at the top of the pane to open the control panel and enter Brushing mode. Or, toggle the Brush panel open and closed with the B key.
Specify the brush settings in the panel, or as you work, as described in the table below.
Start painting the effects onto your photo.
Adjust the sliders to get the effect you want.

To apply another brush, (up to eight are available), select the next brush in the sequence at the bottom of the panel. The box above the brush will become checked. The checkmarks represent the activated brushes, while the selected brush icon (highlighted in blue) represents the currently enabled brush. You can return to any of the brushes at any given time by selecting its respective brush icon. A blue brush represents a brush that has been used. You can deactivate or re-activate any brush by unchecking or re-checking its respective checkbox.

Press Save As or Done.

If all of the sliders are at zero, brush strokes will appear in color, (as selected in the drop-down next to the Show brush strokes checkbox), as no changes have been made to the image.

Hold Command while using the brush tool to activate the pan feature.

To Delete Brush Strokes:

To remove brush strokes, select the brush you wish to delete and press the button. Note that unchecking a brush checkbox will only remove the brush strokes until the box is re-checked.

Develop Brush Options

	Nib Width	Adjusts the size of the brush. You can use the mouse wheel to adjust nib width or adjust the Nib Width slider.
	Feathering	Adjust the slider to control the softness of the transition between the brush strokes and the image. Use Shift + mouse wheel to adjust the amount of feathering or adjust the Feathering slider.
	Pressure	Adjust the slider to control the strength of the brush.
	Add brush stroke	Brush while holding the left mouse button down.
	Erase brush stroke	Brush while holding the right mouse button or control key down.
	Clear all brush strokes	Removes all brush strokes of the currently selected brush from the image.
	Invert all brush strokes	Toggle this option to invert the brush strokes of the currently selected brush. This makes brushed areas no longer brushed and untouched areas brushed. This is useful if you want the majority of the image brushed and a small section untouched. Simply brush only the small area you don't want affected and invert the brush strokes.
	Smart Brushing	See the Smart Brushing section below.
	Show brush strokes	When this option is checked, the currently selected brush's strokes will be displayed in the color shown. This is helpful when brushing a complex area with a subtle effect because it can be hard to tell if you have missed a spot. The color can be changed in case you are brushing on a red area of the image.
Using the Develop Brush on the Detail Tab:
	Sharpness	Move the slider to the right to brush on sharpness.

You can right-click a slider to reset to the default value.

To exit the brushing panel, toggle the Develop Brush button.

Smart Brushing

You can use the Smart Brush to target your brushing to specific colors, brightness values, or a combination of color and brightness. The Smart Brush only affects pixels similar in value to the pixel in the center of the brush stroke, and allows you to apply adjustments to those pixels.

To Use the Smart Brush:

In Develop mode, on the Tune or Detail tab, click the Brush button at the top of the pane to open the control panel and enter Brushing mode. Or, toggle the Brush panel open and closed with the B key.
Select an option from the Smart Brushing drop-down menu:

Color	Uses the color of pixels similar in value to the pixel in the center of the brush stroke to determine if they should be brushed on, depending on the Tolerance slider setting.
Brightness	Uses the brightness of pixels similar in value to the pixel in the center of the brush stroke to determine if they should be brushed on, depending on the Tolerance slider setting.
Magic	Uses a combination of the color and brightness values similar to the pixel in the center of the brush stroke to determine which pixels should be brushed on, depending on the Tolerance slider setting.

Use the Tolerance slider to increase or decrease the range of pixels affected by the Smart Brush.
Place your cursor over the color or brightness you wish to select and begin painting on the effect.
Adjust the sliders to get the effect you want.

To apply another brush, (up to eight are available), select the next brush in the sequence at the bottom of the panel. The box above the brush will become checked. The checkmarks represent the activated smart brushes, while the selected brush icon (highlighted in blue) represents the currently enabled smart brush. You can return to any of the brushes at any given time by selecting its respective brush icon. A blue brush represents a smart brush that has been used. You can deactivate or re-activate any brush by unchecking or rechecking its respective checkbox.

Press Save As or Done.

You can erase brush strokes by right-clicking and brushing over your strokes.

To Turn off Smart Brushing:

Select Off from the Smart Brushing drop-down menu.