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

Report · Oct 18, 2011

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.

Report · Dec 08, 2014

Ability to assign hot keys for rotating brush

Report · Dec 09, 2014

Very useful feature!

Report · Dec 10, 2014

3 year for a hot key for color picker , how long we can get a hot key for rotating brush,,,,,,,,,,, this time, ,,, ..... :DDD

Report · Feb 04, 2015

I've been wanting this for years. It would increase my productivity when using the clone tool, paint brush tool, etc. Why doesn't Adobe implement this?

Report · Feb 04, 2015

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

Report · Mar 17, 2015

Hello. We are here a lot of graphic designers how really want a shortcut to rotate the brushes without opening the window each time. There is already one to resize and change hardness. Regards, Philippe.

Report · Mar 21, 2015

I am NOT and never were looking for this 'shortcut'; the shortcut I would like to see is of using the wheel on my mouse to change the SIZE of the brush as I go. Nothing more nothing less, but I guess I'm the only one who would use that feature from the lack of response on this particular issue. ...3 years now...still waiting.

Report · Mar 22, 2015

i am just finding the short cut of rotating the bursh
and see this thread...
JPierre33 you are so funny hahahahha

i am using the shoutcut "R" to rotate the picture,
so that i can use my bursh at different angles,
but it still very annoying......

COME ON ADOBE!!! IT IS 2015 !!!!

Report · Mar 22, 2015

yep, just rotate the monitor/screen for getting the Brush rotated,

some comments from adobe photo shop...:DDD very helpful.

Report · Mar 22, 2015

There is one option, that has been mentioned by JPierre earlier in this thread, and that is to rotate your canvas.

I too want to see an option to rotate the brush though some sort of short-cut, I'm hoping this is the year.

In the mean time, I'm sure by now, or atleast I hope by now Adobe has got the message alot of people want to see a short-cut to rotate brushes.

Report · Apr 03, 2015

Dedicated brush angle short-cut please Photoshop.

I would like to see brush angle short cut also. It could work like this, when you press down the hotkey you could see a little widget that shows the angle your brush is presently at and then this widget could change with any adjustments made. It would also be helpful if it could to be snapped incremental angles. This would be nice and im glad to see other feel the same...

Report · Sep 28, 2015

In the meantime while waiting for a dedicated shortcut, just click in the angle box on the brushes palette and use the up/down arrows to rotate anti/clockwise by one degree, use shift to rotate by tens.... been that way for as long as I can remember.
I find it surprising that Chris, being so long winded, in his reasons why a shortcut still has not been implimented after 4 years didnt see it fit to mention this!

Report · Nov 18, 2015

You can rotate the brush angle through the brush dialogue box, but anyone actually using the brush tools in Photoshop will tell you that it would be great if you could do it with a control wheel or keyboard shortcut. Its a no brainer.

Report · Jan 06, 2016

Why hasn't this been done yet?! Do they have a licensing agreement with Wacom to sell Art Pens or something?

Report · Jan 27, 2016

Well, after lurking on this topic for the past couple years, I have to say, it's a crying shame it hasn't been implemented yet, but they must have their reasons.

However, it got me thinking that if I had programming skills, I could map the functionality onto my MIDI DJ controller and possibly assign the knob to brush angle....but no. I'm a designer, not a programmer after all, and though it'd probably be feasible, my time is worth more than the $$ I'd pay to have something that does exactly that for me.

And then, I stumbled upon this piece of gorgeous genius:
http://palettegear.com/photoshop

As per their Nov '15 release notes (http://palettegear.com/release_notes), they've added "Photoshop new functions - Brush roundness and Brush Angle" (CUE: NERDGASM!)

It's not a cheap piece of hardware, nor does it look like it, but having a little dial I can adjust brush angle with on the fly and a slider to control size for EVERY brush I want is about as close as you can get to perfect in the digital paint realm. Plus I can map a few more buttons for undo+redo, AND still have an extra slider for something? SOLD.

Report · Jan 27, 2016

ryze - How does the Palette gear automatically map the brush rotation to the device is it in the drivers ?

Report · Jan 28, 2016

All looks to be user-mappable on the fly according to your preferences; can even save multiple profiles so you can use different functions across the adobe suite!

From what I can gather on their website, it's installed as an extension or a plugin, and yes, I'm sure they've created drivers for the specific use of their hardware (which is first of its kind, as far as I know).

Since it's able to do things that aren't mapped to any keyboard shortcuts, they must've written custom scripts and then connected it all together with nice looking GUI at the user end:

TESTED: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MdGq...
PALETTE YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/user/paletteU...

Brush angle + size confirmed as mappable via this video (SO STOKED!):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_UVa...

They do say you need to be using Adobe CC for their full functionality, so a good reason to upgrade for anybody that's not using it already.

Report · Jan 28, 2016

I wonder how they got Photoshop to communicate with their hardware, what was their technique.

Report · Jan 28, 2016

Looks like they're injecting OS events fairly quickly or adding tablet events.
Currently the only way to directly change the brush angle is via tablet events (acting like a wacom pen with rotation).

Report · Jan 28, 2016

What do you mean OS events, and tablet events ?

Report · Jan 28, 2016

The events that the OS gives to the application for key presses, mouse movement, tablet changes, etc.

Report · Jan 29, 2016

Could this not be done by listening in on the rotation of the brush then communicating with the hardware device ?

Report · Jan 29, 2016

OS Events are how the hardware/drivers communicate changes to applications.

Report · Jan 29, 2016

I understand; are there any methods to which it can be done with scripting identical to the method the company used to get their hardware to communicate with the rotate brush tool in Photoshop ?

Report · Jan 29, 2016

No, OS events have to come from drivers or the OS.

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

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