Skip to main content
Adobe Photoshop Family
roman_weiser's profile
roman_weiser
1k Points

56 Messages

 • 

1.8K Points

Tue, Oct 18, 2011 11:23 PM

102

Photoshop: Rotate Brush Tip 'On the fly' (Keyboard shortcut, Mouse-wheel or Click + Drag)

This may seem wild, but many ideas might've seem that way when first introduced, so bare with me as I believe it would be rather sexy addition to using brushes in Photoshop.

Imagine you choose a brush tip and are ready to use it in your art. But it's not quite right and you could use the Brush Tip to rotate few degrees. So you go to your Brush Palate and Brush Tip Shape Palate and manually rotate the wheel in that Dialog Box or type the number of degrees in a Angle Box(°).
Then you go back to your art and continue using the newly set up brush. Until - you need to adjust the rotation of the Tip again, and again... you get the point.

Wouldn't it be fantastic if we can rotate the Brush Tip 'on the fly' without having to go to the brush palate over and over again, just like we can now change it's size and softness?

Perhaps Left Bracket and Right Bracket would rotate the brush Tip CCW and CW by a 1° (by 10° with Shift) or in increments you set up in Preferences?
Wouldn't that be something?
I am aware of similar function can be achieved using the Pen Tool. This idea however would be available for both, Pen and Mouse and for all Tools using Brush Tip, including Stamp (Clone) Tool.
If this is already possible and I was living in the dark, please enlighten me.

Ideas

 • 

Updated 

10 m ago

5.1K

67

102

Responses

Official Solution

stephen_nielson

Adobe Administrator

 • 

41 Messages

 • 

1.6K Points

2 y ago

This feature has been implemented in Photoshop 2020 (version 21.0). You can rotate a brush tip with the left/right arrow keys. Holding Shift will increment in 15-degree increments. There is also a new angle widget in the Tool Options bar.

Enjoy!

3

jacob_granouillet

1 Message

 • 

64 Points

This is awesome ! I Don't know if anyone can help but I would like to customize the shortcut for this feature. I am disabled suffering from a hand deformity, I'm having hard time to reach the arrow keys each time I want to rotate my brush. I always try to gather and reshortcut all my frequently used functions around the left part of my keyboard...

Could you do that  ? I can't find this function in the keyboard shortcut window....

If not, could you tell us or show us more about that new "angle widget tool" you are referring to ?

I can't find it although I'm in version 21.0.3...

Thanks a million

Like

1 y ago

0

ashe_lewis

3 Messages

 • 

108 Points

Agreed. I love that they added this feature and I think it will help with many peoples' workflows, but for me setting down my wacom pen and hitting the arrow key isn't any faster than rotating the brush manually. Fortunately I don't have a disability, but I've set up nearly all hotkeys to run with my left hand so I can work very quickly with a pen. With a little customization, this feature could do wonders for my workflow and certainly others.

It's not the best solution and if it were possible for you you've probably already thought of this, but if you can hold a wacom pen in your right hand you could set the buttons on that to rotate your brush. Unfortunately that would mean giving up right-click which a lot of people wouldn't want to do.

Alternatively I spent an hour trying to make an autohotkey script to change the button away from the arrows but it also led to problems, so if anyone has a solution please post it. Thanks! 

Like

1 y ago

0

ahmed_mousavi

1 Message

 • 

60 Points

Hi,
Is it possible to have more "ON THE FLY" feature and as we use the brush by pen or mouse we able to change the angle dynamicaly?

The current feature needs releasing the brush and rotating and using it again, so it does not allow changing the brush rotation as the pen tip is down and being used.

Thank you.

Like

10 m ago

0

jean_pierre_turcotte

15 Messages

 • 

274 Points

10 y ago

What I'd like to see is the brush tip controlled from the scroll wheel of my logitech - For those of you also wanting to change angles (it's the sizing that I'd presently want to be able to control with the wheel) leaning the wheel over one way or the other should also be available in preferences. Then you could really fly.

4

chris_cox_2148894

15.1K Messages

 • 

195.8K Points

Your scroll wheel isn't an absolute value control - just relative (up, down).

For rotation, you really want something like a Wacom Art Pen -- and that's already available.

Like

10 y ago

0

jean_pierre_turcotte

15 Messages

 • 

274 Points

Not for me. I've got a Wacom but for work I do falls way short. Used to be I could go and select brush sizes, then bring my cursor down to workspace and use scroll wheel to set exact brush size I wanted (+/- 1 pix), but for some reason I can't do that now. Why?

Like

10 y ago

0

roman_weiser

56 Messages

 • 

1.8K Points

Chris, like it or not, there are many people using mouse while working in Photoshop.

Like

10 y ago

0

hanna_rakitina

1 Message

 • 

60 Points

I don't even see brush tip! Where is it?

Like

9 y ago

0

pierre_courtejoie

Champion

 • 

1K Messages

 • 

21.4K Points

10 y ago

Jean-Pierre, Bonjour! The shortcut for brush resizing in CS5 is: alt+right click+drag on windows, ctrl+option+drag on mac left-right for size, up down for hardness.

3

jean_pierre_turcotte

15 Messages

 • 

274 Points

salut PE, merci pour ton renseignment. This will work for me.

Like

10 y ago

0

jean_pierre_turcotte

15 Messages

 • 

274 Points

salut PE, getting back to this...now that I've given it a bit of a trial, as it turns out this does work but is not very practical nor is it very precise for some instances in the work that I do. If there was some way to control resize with the scroll wheel once the resize brush has been selected (as in some previous versions of PS) then that would be optimal...less entropy. thanks again, cheers

Like

9 y ago

0

jean_pierre_turcotte

15 Messages

 • 

274 Points

salut PE, meant to get back to you on this...but that technique does not work for me since it involves 'dragging', and I require that my mouse be in stationary position while enlarging tip size - it's a matter of adjustment to graphic constraints.

Like

7 y ago

0

vaughan_greer

2 Messages

 • 

92 Points

9 y ago

Photoshop needs a better way to rotate brushes! Why can't we rotate brushes by holding down a hotkey and click-dragging with the left or right mouse button? I can't be the only person who's thought of this.

Rotating brushes using the widget in the brushes panel is archaic and a major impediment to my workflow.

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
When are we going to get a keyboard shortcut for ROTATING BRUSHES?.

0

0

FerdiCildiz

69 Messages

 • 

1.3K Points

9 y ago

When resizing and changing hardness the brush, i mean holding alt and right click button we can rotate the brush with mouse wheel same time.

0

0

vaughan_greer

2 Messages

 • 

92 Points

9 y ago

Wait pHeR-d, is that a suggestion for Adobe? or are you saying that's a way we can rotate brushes now? because I just tried it and it's not doing anything

0

roman_laney

12 Messages

 • 

310 Points

9 y ago

Everyone loves the ease of bracket up or down to change brush size right? How bout the same thing for changing the angle of the brush? (For it to be really useful, the brush ghost preview needs to rotate too ) This could allow for quick decal like dropping of shapes, as well as quick adjustments to calligraphy brushes without any visits to the menus and windows.

While we're on the subject; keyboard commands to brighten or darken the current color, add or remove red, add or remove blue, add or remove green, increase saturation, decrease saturation all to the current color would be a great option under the hood of PS. Thanks for listening!

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
Photoshop: Keyboard keys for rotating brush.

1

michael_serafin

12 Messages

 • 

208 Points

In response to your second paragraph, that is all possible via JavaScript. I have mine set up this way for lighter/darker. I haven't done the rest but it is certainly possible. One script file for each of the functions you want to do then assign a shortcut key to run each of those script files. The catch, though, is that you have to hit the key combination once for each increment you want to do so if you set your increments to, say, a value of 1 unit and you want to add 50 units, you'd have to tap that key combination 50 times. Holding the key combination doesn't allow for repeating to get around this like it does for brush sizing/softness.

I've not been able to find a way to rotate the brush via JavaScript yet, though.

Like

2 y ago

0

allison_westbrook

18 Messages

 • 

390 Points

9 y ago

Oh, man brush rotate key commands would rock so much! It would be very nice to program them into a slider on a wacom tablet or a peripheral like the Griffin Powermate. If you use PS to paint in, you understand how monumental this would be. When Adobe introduced the rotate page feature, that was like manna from heaven, this would be equally monumental and appreciated. Their implementation of the color wheel "shortcut" is a total cockup, but that's another story...

0

0

nick_kippes

1 Message

 • 

60 Points

9 y ago

If you're using a pen tablet (that supports tilt) to draw, there's a workaround you can use. In the "Shape Dynamics" options inside of the brush settings, change your Angle Jitter Control to "Pen Tilt". This will change the rotation of the brush based on the angle in which you hold your pen. :)

0

0

allison_westbrook

18 Messages

 • 

390 Points

9 y ago

Nick, the results of that method are unsatisfactory, as you end up having to hold the pen at goofy angles to draw. It becomes a situation of the software controlling you instead of you controlling the software. Thanks though.

0

jean_pierre_turcotte

15 Messages

 • 

274 Points

9 y ago

still no brush size adjustment/control on mouse wheel - Xmas perhaps?...YEARS LATER AND NO NOTICE

0

0

candra_nur_rokhman

2 Messages

 • 

62 Points

9 y ago

-go to Brush Palate and Brush Tip Shape Palate and manually rotate the wheel in that Dialog Box or type the number of degrees in a Angle Box(°)
set your Angle, for example 90°

-go to Brush Presets and save your brush without capture brush size in preset

-repeat with different Angle (90°,65°,45°,25°,0°,-25°,-45°,-65°,-90°)


-now you can use < and > to change that brush

-if you have two or more brushes you can use "tool presets" with 0° as the default

I hope this can help

0

0

candra_nur_rokhman

2 Messages

 • 

62 Points

9 y ago

-go to Brush Palate and Brush Tip Shape Palate and manually rotate the wheel in that Dialog Box or type the number of degrees in a Angle Box(°)
set your Angle, for example 90°

-go to Brush Presets and save your brush without capture brush size in preset

-repeat with different Angle (90°,65°,45°,25°,0°,-25°,-45°,-65°,-90°)


-now you can use , and . to change that brush

-if you have two or more brushes you can use "tool presets" with 0° as the default

I hope this can help

2

0

jean_pierre_turcotte

15 Messages

 • 

274 Points

might help someone else who uses brush angles

Like

9 y ago

0

jim_epler_7058260

2 Messages

 • 

70 Points

This is perfect! Thank you for this workaround, candra nur rokhman!

Like

6 y ago

0

jean_pierre_turcotte

15 Messages

 • 

274 Points

9 y ago

still no brush SIZE adjustment/control on mouse wheel while cursor is on workspace (not anywhere in the menu or some sidebar) - Xmas perhaps?

0

0

alphavalues

6 Messages

 • 

154 Points

8 y ago

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
Photoshop: Keyboard shortcut for "Brush Rotation" and "Brush Roundness".

I want to rotate my brush with my Wacom Intuos5 ring. To do that, I need to be able to use keystrokes to change the rotation angle of the brush. Looking in Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts > Tools we have "Brush Hardness" and "Brush Size"* but no option for "Brush Angle". Huge bonus points for adding keyboard controls for "Brush Roundness", too, but that's not as important to me.

Thanks!

*these are handled well by Wacom

I'm using Photoshop CC 14.1.2 x64 (Windows)

0

Helpful Widget

Tags

brush

brush rotate

brush tip rotate

brush size-mouse control

brush tip

© 2020 Adobe Photoshop Family Community