Need help with soft round brush

[MarcySB]

I am using the newest version of Photoshop on a completely updated Windows 11 PC. I changed something but I don't know what. Now my soft round brush has a diffused looking perimeter edge and only draws about half the size inside. The hard round brush seems to be working fine. I tried a sampling of my other brushes and they all seem fine. It is only the basic soft round brush.

I checked brush settings, I reset the brush settings, I reset all the tools settings. Nothing has worked. I can't take a screenshot of the brush because when I try the actual brush disappears. I tried drawing it but I can't get that to look good enough to show the issue.

I'm hoping this makes sense to someone out there who can tell me how to reset that brush so it looks like it is supposed to, not like it was created with a diffusion pattern around it.

Please ask anything you need to help me figure this out. I appreciate all the help I can get.

Thanks,

Marcy

[J E L]

Hi @MarcySB, is it possible to take screenshots of just your brush settings like this? Have you tried the brush on different types of images and layers?

[Semaphoric]

Also show the Option bar for the Brush. It sounds like the drawing mode might be set to Dissolve.

[MarcySB]

That is the first thing I checked, both in the options bar and in the layers panel since I was not sure which might do this. Both were set to normal. I wish it had been that easy! Thanks.

[MarcySB]

@J E L I have tried the brush on different layers, different documents, different colors. It even has the weird edge when I use it as an eraser. With that brush selected, I've reset the tool and then I reset all tools. That did not work either. I tried clicking the little icons to the right of both flow and opacity. The cog wheel to the right of smoothing options is grayed out.

Here are the screen shots you asked for.

Top options bar:

Brush Tip Shape:

Shape Dynamics:

The only other thing checked is smoothing and that just clicks on and off.

I'd rather not uninstall and reinstall Photoshop if I can avoid it but that is all I can think of to do next.

I really appreciate your taking the time to help with this.

Marcy

[J E L]

Thanks for adding this info, @MarcySB. I note you have the brush size set to 500 px. Do you still see the same weird (diffused-looking) perimeter edge if you adjust the brush down to 24 px? What about a size somewhere in the middle, around 260 px or so? I don't know if that has anything to do with the problem or not but we have to go through a process of elimination. Did you try a full Preferences reset? You also mention this happened when you started using a completely updated Windows 11 PC. What exactly was updated? Only the OS from Windows 10 to 11? Or is this a new computer altogether? If the former, you might try uninstalling and reinstalling Photoshop (current version is 25.2.0 Release) or using the Creative Cloud Cleaning Tool to start fresh. Also, make sure you have updated your GPU driver to the latest version. With NVIDIA cards, be sure to install the Studio, not the Gaming, driver. Let us know how it goes!

[MarcySB]

@J E L OK, let me try to address these one at a time.

Yes, it happens whatever brush size I use. It even happened when I used the soft round brush as an eraser. I also tried it at several hardnesses. It seems to be there all the way to 100%. With each step - I went up in 25's - the amount of 

It actually did not have anything to do with the operating system. I just wanted to be sure whoever answered knew I was using the most up-to-date version of Windows 11. It actually happened when I was trying to do something in the brush options bar. I clicked something, or several somethings, and that is when it went wonky.

I do not know how to do a full preferences reset. I also did not know avbout the Creative Cloud Cleaning Tool.  I'll look them up and try them.

I have the latest GPU driver and have Studio not Gaming installed. Interestingly, to that point, this GPU has never seen Photoshop. It sees Lightroom and Davince Resolve, but not Photoshop when I search for apps. But that has been since November 2022 so I don't think that has anything to do with this issue, which started much more recently.

There are just too many variables here - Photoshop, brushes, GPU, Wacom tablet. I had them all way before this started. It is starting to look like I may have to actually reinstall Photoshop. I did not want to but I can't think of anything else. I do a lot of composting and this brush is getting very annyoing. I wish I could figure out some way to show it.

I just had an idea. Since I could not get a screen shot to work, I took a photo of my screen and am attaching it here. The brush was at 600 size and 0% hardness. Hopefully that will help show you how my soft round brush now looks. The first photo is the brush. The second it when I tapped it once. (They are not great photos. They both have moire effects from either the phone or the window - please ignore those. Just look at the edge of the brush and the little white that showed up in the tapped photo.)

Thanks.

[Trevor.Dennis]

Hi Marci.  So what do you think is not looking like you think it should look?  Only your screen shots are looking noral for a full size cursor.  I use full size with cross hair turned on, and this is what I see.  Yours on the left, mine on the right.  That's one click with the mouse.   Am I missing something here?

[MarcySB]

Yes, they do look the same!

Mine did not used to look this way. The edges of the circle used to be much smoother, even at 0% hardness. It almost makes me wonder if I had something turned off that should have been turned on.

Thanks for taking the time to show me yours. I feel like maybe the issue is not as drastic as it has seemed to me.

[Trevor.Dennis]

I suspect your main issue is that you are particularly observant, and noticed what does appear to be a change to how the cursor is displayed.  The graphic below is the same brush (380 pixels) at the indicated hardness settings.  100% shows exactly the same size as the 75% hardness but as a thin line with a tiny bit of anti allias.  My guess is that the change gives us a better visual indication of how hard the preset is.

 I don't have any old versions installed to compare with, but there plenty of images online, and that looks quite different to me.  The brush is silightly smaller at 227 pixels according to the rest of the screen shot  

I remember we used to get a lot of posts about the brush cursor being difficult to see against some backgrounds.  Ex Adobe engineer Chris Cox told us that Windows and Mac blend modes did not work exactly the same way, which made it difficult to make the cursor more visible for both platforms.  I can't remember when that issue was eventually fixed, but I am wondering if the soft cursor, we are discussing, came to be at the same time, and you are the first person to notice it?

[Shelly37317828ofqf]

Have you found a solution to this? I just had to update my Photoshop to the latest version and am DEVASTATED the soft brush is gone. I've been using that for close to 20 years as a designer and the other brushes don't come anywhere close to doing what the old brush did. Would love to know if you discovered a solution!

[Trevor.Dennis]

Hi Shelly.  Could you explain exactly what you are seeing, or not seeing as the case may be?

I don't think anyone is missing fully hard to fully soft control.  It was more a case of confusing about what various cursor are showing.

Are you using a tablet, or mouse.

What are your brush settings, as well as what is happening in the Options bar?

If you can show us a screen shot showing your full workspace, layers panel and brush settings panel as we as some brush strokes, that should help.