Colored Pencils
Username: Joanna Hill
Post Date: 2026-01-19 22:56:01
I was using the colored pencil tool and fiddling with the settings. I am able to get the texture and opacity of a real life colored pencil, but I noticed the colors don't mix like they do in real life. For example, if I use a medium value teal and a bright cadmium orange in real life, the two darken into a dark muddy green when mixed, but in Rebelle they blend into a much lighter value than they should. I've experimented using the 'pigment' button on and off. Anyone else have any settings that would bring the mixing closer to real life?
Username: Melampode
Post Date: 2026-01-20 18:29:50
I've been working on making a set of colored pencil brushes (which I am almost done with/ready to share, I just need to test them out on an actual piece instead of theoretical tests, to ensure they work as intended in practice). What I've done is make an extra brush specifically intended for layering/color blending, save it so it defaults to being in Paint & Blend mode, and [B]set its Paint Blending to Darken[/B] (under the Paint tab in the Brush Creator panel). You can also just swap the blending and paint modes for your regular brush back and forth, if you prefer that over creating duplicate brushes.
(Note that Darken only works when paint is being applied, so you may need to adjust the Paint & Blend curve. From some quick testing, one easy adjustment could be to move the leftmost note of the Paint curve straight up by about 1 box, so there's always a minimum-but-notable amount of paint affecting the blend color.)
It's not perfect, as some colors will mix poorly. From my previous testing, darker colors suffer the most, as they darken each other to a fairly extreme degree. (Or, at least the red and blue I tested did.) But from what I've seen, it works pretty well with light and medium colors, with a bonus of semi-realistically imitating how light colors don't have as much effect when used over dark colors!
Note that semi-transparency, from either overall opacity or paper texture leaving "holes," will allow light colors to have a stronger effect when used over what would otherwise be darker colors. This lets you achieve a more natural-looking blend of the colors you're using than what happens with a 100% fully opaque section.
Also, when using Darken while your brush is in Paint & Blend mode, I generally recommend using the lighter of the colors as the active one. The darker color will have a stronger effect, and typically leave more obvious traces of itself beyond where active blending happens. Having the lighter color active allows for the blending itself to be the focus. Though, depending on the colors used, it may have some effect on the hue of the darker color if your brush strokes extend too far beyond where the blending itself happens.
...On the other hand, if you're willing to go back with Blend mode (or swap to the light color) to fix/smooth out any undesired excess/imperfect edges left by having the darker color active while in Paint & Blend mode...that could prevent the excess hue shifting that can result from having the light color active.*
(As another example of how Darken is not perfect: in my tests I used Cadmium Yellow Medium over Oxide of Chromium from the Oil Pigments default color set, and you can see that the yellow does shift the hue of the green to be slightly more yellow, though the effect is incredibly subtle and easy to miss/ignore. For what you mentioned, using Cadmium Orange Medium over Cobalt Green causes the teal to look notably more green beyond where the color is actively blended. It matches the resulting blend color, but can look disruptive if applied too far. In any case, Darken is the closest I've been able to find as a way to imitate the way colored pencils blend, for most color combinations.)
Bonus tip: for my colored pencil brushes, I've adjusted the Paint & Blend curve so it is, essentially, the reverse of the default. The Paint curve is max until around halfway (pressure-wise), then drops down to about half (pigment-wise). The Blend curve I have at 0 until around when the Paint curve starts to drop, and then it raises to a bit lower than the regular curve. (You may prefer different specifics as far as when blending starts, when/how much the Paint decreases, etc. I find that keeping the Paint curve at halfway pigment-wise allows for more quickly applying color in transparent areas, even at higher pressure. But decreasing it down to, say, just 1 box before the bottom of the curve will allow for Darken to apply to the blended area, while reducing how much the pigment will change in areas beyond the blend.)
That way, you're not blending very much** until you start pressing down hard enough to "catch" the pigment below, which I find much more intuitive/realistic for colored pencils!
* Thank you for this question and mentioning what colors you were struggling with! Testing them out, and making sure I answered thoroughly, helped me land on this thought. I just might add another specific-use brush to the set I'm working on, based on it! (I've currently got one for "layering" that's built to be able to apply color fairly quickly in transparent areas at any pen pressure, while still being able to blend semi-accurately when overlapping existing colors. (Plus a "colorless blender," for no-pigment blending with a stronger color pull.) But it could be very useful to make another one--with the decrease to the Paint curve it would need, since my "layering" one has the Paint curve only decrease halfway as I mentioned above--specifically for colorful layered blending. It wouldn't need to be able to quickly apply color in transparent areas, so a lower Paint curve could reduce light-on-dark hue changes by making it take longer to build up, and also blend smoother when the dark color is active!)
** In Rebelle 7, it actually doesn't blend colors at all while the curve is at 0, which I think is more realistic for colored pencils. In Rebelle 8, it (currently) does blend some, unless Paint is also set to 0. If you like this tip, I'm curious whether you like the current R8 behavior, or if you'd prefer that the Blend curve being at 0 would completely prevent color blending, to allow for the active color to be applied as-is.
(I made [URL='https://www.escapemotions.com/community/forum/t/44679/paint-blend-mode-blending-with-curves-at-0/']a thread[/URL] a while ago, comparing the differences between the strength of the Paint & Blend/Mix curves in R7 versus R8, which I noticed while working on my brush set. Near the bottom, Pavol responded about the how and why of it--plus a comment that they'd consider changing it so Blend curve at 0 could also prevent blending in R8. I didn't push then, 'cause I wasn't sure if it was a "just me" thing...and most folks seem to focus on the watercolor and oil brushes, which this might not be relevant for. But if you agree it'd be useful, it could be worth pinging to ask about it again!)
Username: videokid
Post Date: 2026-01-21 13:22:23
[QUOTE="Melampode, post: 31542, member: 123697"]
I've been working on making a set of colored pencil brushes (which I am almost done with/ready to share, I just need to test them out on an actual piece instead of theoretical tests, to ensure they work as intended in practice). What I've done is make an extra brush specifically intended for layering/color blending, save it so it defaults to being in Paint & Blend mode, and [B]set its Paint Blending to Darken[/B] (under the Paint tab in the Brush Creator panel). You can also just swap the blending and paint modes for your regular brush back and forth, if you prefer that over creating duplicate brushes.
(Note that Darken only works when paint is being applied, so you may need to adjust the Paint & Blend curve. From some quick testing, one easy adjustment could be to move the leftmost note of the Paint curve straight up by about 1 box, so there's always a minimum-but-notable amount of paint affecting the blend color.)
It's not perfect, as some colors will mix poorly. From my previous testing, darker colors suffer the most, as they darken each other to a fairly extreme degree. (Or, at least the red and blue I tested did.) But from what I've seen, it works pretty well with light and medium colors, with a bonus of semi-realistically imitating how light colors don't have as much effect when used over dark colors!
Note that semi-transparency, from either overall opacity or paper texture leaving "holes," will allow light colors to have a stronger effect when used over what would otherwise be darker colors. This lets you achieve a more natural-looking blend of the colors you're using than what happens with a 100% fully opaque section.
Also, when using Darken while your brush is in Paint & Blend mode, I generally recommend using the lighter of the colors as the active one. The darker color will have a stronger effect, and typically leave more obvious traces of itself beyond where active blending happens. Having the lighter color active allows for the blending itself to be the focus. Though, depending on the colors used, it may have some effect on the hue of the darker color if your brush strokes extend too far beyond where the blending itself happens.
...On the other hand, if you're willing to go back with Blend mode (or swap to the light color) to fix/smooth out any undesired excess/imperfect edges left by having the darker color active while in Paint & Blend mode...that could prevent the excess hue shifting that can result from having the light color active.*
(As another example of how Darken is not perfect: in my tests I used Cadmium Yellow Medium over Oxide of Chromium from the Oil Pigments default color set, and you can see that the yellow does shift the hue of the green to be slightly more yellow, though the effect is incredibly subtle and easy to miss/ignore. For what you mentioned, using Cadmium Orange Medium over Cobalt Green causes the teal to look notably more green beyond where the color is actively blended. It matches the resulting blend color, but can look disruptive if applied too far. In any case, Darken is the closest I've been able to find as a way to imitate the way colored pencils blend, for most color combinations.)
Bonus tip: for my colored pencil brushes, I've adjusted the Paint & Blend curve so it is, essentially, the reverse of the default. The Paint curve is max until around halfway (pressure-wise), then drops down to about half (pigment-wise). The Blend curve I have at 0 until around when the Paint curve starts to drop, and then it raises to a bit lower than the regular curve. (You may prefer different specifics as far as when blending starts, when/how much the Paint decreases, etc. I find that keeping the Paint curve at halfway pigment-wise allows for more quickly applying color in transparent areas, even at higher pressure. But decreasing it down to, say, just 1 box before the bottom of the curve will allow for Darken to apply to the blended area, while reducing how much the pigment will change in areas beyond the blend.)
That way, you're not blending very much** until you start pressing down hard enough to "catch" the pigment below, which I find much more intuitive/realistic for colored pencils!
* Thank you for this question and mentioning what colors you were struggling with! Testing them out, and making sure I answered thoroughly, helped me land on this thought. I just might add another specific-use brush to the set I'm working on, based on it! (I've currently got one for "layering" that's built to be able to apply color fairly quickly in transparent areas at any pen pressure, while still being able to blend semi-accurately when overlapping existing colors. (Plus a "colorless blender," for no-pigment blending with a stronger color pull.) But it could be very useful to make another one--with the decrease to the Paint curve it would need, since my "layering" one has the Paint curve only decrease halfway as I mentioned above--specifically for colorful layered blending. It wouldn't need to be able to quickly apply color in transparent areas, so a lower Paint curve could reduce light-on-dark hue changes by making it take longer to build up, and also blend smoother when the dark color is active!)
** In Rebelle 7, it actually doesn't blend colors at all while the curve is at 0, which I think is more realistic for colored pencils. In Rebelle 8, it (currently) does blend some, unless Paint is also set to 0. If you like this tip, I'm curious whether you like the current R8 behavior, or if you'd prefer that the Blend curve being at 0 would completely prevent color blending, to allow for the active color to be applied as-is.
(I made [URL='https://www.escapemotions.com/community/forum/t/44679/paint-blend-mode-blending-with-curves-at-0/']a thread[/URL] a while ago, comparing the differences between the strength of the Paint & Blend/Mix curves in R7 versus R8, which I noticed while working on my brush set. Near the bottom, Pavol responded about the how and why of it--plus a comment that they'd consider changing it so Blend curve at 0 could also prevent blending in R8. I didn't push then, 'cause I wasn't sure if it was a "just me" thing...and most folks seem to focus on the watercolor and oil brushes, which this might not be relevant for. But if you agree it'd be useful, it could be worth pinging to ask about it again!)
[/QUOTE]
Hi, when will your coloured pencil set be available? i am looking forward to using and testing them as i use coloured pencil a lot. Regards
Username: Melampode
Post Date: 2026-01-22 08:34:25
[QUOTE="videokid, post: 31543, member: 70521"]
Hi, when will your coloured pencil set be available? i am looking forward to using and testing them as i use coloured pencil a lot. Regards
[/QUOTE]
I can't say for certain--I had a few other projects come up, so I've not had a chance to test them out in practice yet. Once I do, I intend to post them in the Brushes thread (and Free Assets -> Brushes section of the site), along with a simple visual example of how each one looks, plus details of what type of use case I intended each for, and some details/recommendations about the settings.
If you'd like, I can tag you when I make that post with the completed brushes! And/or I can post them here right now (with shorter info about a few key settings details), with the caveat that I might adjust them further before I make the final post.
If you'd like me to post them now, I'd also love to hear any feedback you have on them! I'm building them for me and how I work, so there might be some aspects that I haven't realized would be more broadly useful with different settings. (For example, my curve settings might be "weird," based on the fact that I sometimes end up changing the curves of brushes I get from others? But I'm not certain.)
Username: Artless
Post Date: 2026-04-08 04:34:23
[QUOTE="Melampode, post: 31549, member: 123697"]
I can't say for certain--I had a few other projects come up, so I've not had a chance to test them out in practice yet. Once I do, I intend to post them in the Brushes thread (and Free Assets -> Brushes section of the site), along with a simple visual example of how each one looks, plus details of what type of use case I intended each for, and some details/recommendations about the settings.
If you'd like, I can tag you when I make that post with the completed brushes! And/or I can post them here right now (with shorter info about a few key settings details), with the caveat that I might adjust them further before I make the final post.
If you'd like me to post them now, I'd also love to hear any feedback you have on them! I'm building them for me and how I work, so there might be some aspects that I haven't realized would be more broadly useful with different settings. (For example, my curve settings might be "weird," based on the fact that I sometimes end up changing the curves of brushes I get from others? But I'm not certain.)
[/QUOTE]
Hey Melampode, is it possible you have a screen shot of the settings to give them a shot. As I was interested in trying them!
Username: Melampode
Post Date: 2026-04-08 08:44:43
[QUOTE="Artless, post: 32315, member: 103351"]
Hey Melampode, is it possible you have a screen shot of the settings to give them a shot. As I was interested in trying them!
[/QUOTE]
You've got good timing! I'm in the middle of re-adjusting the settings [S]yet again[/S] after testing them out more practically (by recoloring an old piece, thus finding some issues that I hadn't noticed with basic tests). I think I've got the R7 set sorted out pretty well,* though there's still some things I'm trying to fix for two of them in R8.
(The new brush engine in R8 lets paper texture have a stronger effect on brushes when in blend modes, which is great for everything except the "burnish" one (inspired by this thread!). There's multiple settings that can adjust that, so I'm trying to narrow down which one(s) work best. The color pull is also [I]much[/I] stronger in Paint & Blend mode. I'm trying to see if I can find a way to balance it out, because it's "flattening" color in R8 too much/too fast. If I can't find anything, I'll go ask again if the devs are willing to make an adjustment to the bottom of the curve. If it's not feasible...the R8 set will probably need to rely on stronger transparency and more layering, than the current state of the R7 set.)
* Unless any changes/corrections I make in R8 work for both, then I'll update the R7 ones again. Or if I find more issues, when I get back to that recolor. [S]Or or or...[/S]
Which version(s) of Rebelle do you have? I'm willing to share the set as it currently is, with the caveat that it's in a sort of "beta" form, and subject to changes by the time I share them properly. (I'll also include a truncated version of my notes on what's what, and key settings for this or that behavior.)
Also, as I mentioned above, I'd definitely appreciate any feedback you have on them! There could be things I've missed, or techniques I've not considered/tested yet.
Username: Artless
Post Date: 2026-04-08 14:24:42
[QUOTE="Melampode, post: 32316, member: 123697"]
You've got good timing! I'm in the middle of re-adjusting the settings [S]yet again[/S] after testing them out more practically (by recoloring an old piece, thus finding some issues that I hadn't noticed with basic tests). I think I've got the R7 set sorted out pretty well,* though there's still some things I'm trying to fix for two of them in R8.
(The new brush engine in R8 lets paper texture have a stronger effect on brushes when in blend modes, which is great for everything except the "burnish" one (inspired by this thread!). There's multiple settings that can adjust that, so I'm trying to narrow down which one(s) work best. The color pull is also [I]much[/I] stronger in Paint & Blend mode. I'm trying to see if I can find a way to balance it out, because it's "flattening" color in R8 too much/too fast. If I can't find anything, I'll go ask again if the devs are willing to make an adjustment to the bottom of the curve. If it's not feasible...the R8 set will probably need to rely on stronger transparency and more layering, than the current state of the R7 set.)
* Unless any changes/corrections I make in R8 work for both, then I'll update the R7 ones again. Or if I find more issues, when I get back to that recolor. [S]Or or or...[/S]
Which version(s) of Rebelle do you have? I'm willing to share the set as it currently is, with the caveat that it's in a sort of "beta" form, and subject to changes by the time I share them properly. (I'll also include a truncated version of my notes on what's what, and key settings for this or that behavior.)
Also, as I mentioned above, I'd definitely appreciate any feedback you have on them! There could be things I've missed, or techniques I've not considered/tested yet.
[/QUOTE]
Hello, I have Rebelle 7 and 8 to be exact. Thank you for the quick response!
Username: Melampode
Post Date: 2026-04-09 22:56:38
Excellent! You'll be able to fully see the way I intend them to work in R7, and how there's a few kinks to work out in R8, haha.
These are the versions from R7, so you can copy them into both versions of Rebelle. Since I believe saving/uploading them from the forum wipes the names, the brush names are, in order:
1. Prisma base
2. Prisma sharp
3. Prisma layer
4. Prisma burnish
5. Prisma colorless blender
6. Prisma eraser
7. Prisma texture restore
(Note: I added the "Prisma" prefix to help make sure it's clear what these brushes are, even when moved to Favorites/Recent/etc. If you keep them in their own dedicated folder(s) and have no naming overlap from other brushes, the prefix isn't strictly necessary.)
[ATTACH type="full"]2893[/ATTACH] [ATTACH type="full"]2894[/ATTACH] [ATTACH type="full"]2895[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH type="full"]2896[/ATTACH] [ATTACH type="full"]2897[/ATTACH] [ATTACH type="full"]2898[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH type="full"]2899[/ATTACH]
I built these brushes off the Charcoal 3 pencil brush, because I wanted the dust-like effect it had from its Dual Brush. (So if you'd like, you can compare them to it, to see what all I changed.)
At maximum pressure, the base, sharp, and layer brushes will have bits of loose "dust" break off occasionally. At all pressures, the burnish and colorless blender brushes instead use it to create a faint "speckled" texture within the brush stroke itself that builds up very slowly, to help combat too-perfect digital smoothness when blending. [B]If you don't like these effects, simply disable the Dual Brush on each of the brushes that include them.[/B]
Also, when you copy the brushes into R8, you will notice that shapes 3 and 4 automatically change Alpha Blending modes from Subtract to Difference. This is as it should be, due to some old bugs/corrections made between versions, and the "different" modes will behave the same. (I had discovered and reported the difference [URL='https://www.escapemotions.com/community/forums_share?params=posts/31041']in another thread[/URL] a while ago, and when I went to double-check for this thread, I ended up making a [URL='https://www.escapemotions.com/community/forum/t/45300/internal-shape-alpha-blending-mode-issues/']rudimentary comparison[/URL].)
However, due to a difference in Shape rendering from the changes made to allow larger brushes in R8 (which can cause some things to become blurry/less visible), the maximum pressure texture will appear slightly different for the sharp brush. To correct it, [B]change the Scale of Shapes 3 and 4 of the sharp brush to 50, instead of 40[/B].
You will also notice that the Paper Texture Strength curves, and the values of the Paper Texture Contrast in texture restore (and most brushes copied from R7 to R8) appear to be different. This seems to be due to a full revamp of the behavior of paper texture and how it affects brushes in the new engine, so it is also fine to leave these as-is. (R8 has a higher maximum that it can achieve for both, so most numbers/curves will appear lower than they are in R7.)
Some more info about the settings and such [S]in an expanding spoiler box, so this post isn't five miles long[/S]:
[SPOILER="Click for Further Details"]
[LIST]
[*]The Size of the brushes versus the Scale of their shapes is, admittedly, odd. I did this to balance out the scaling issue in R8 with rendering very tiny spots in brush Shapes, which is a side effect of what was done to enable larger brushes. (I reported it with some examples, and Pavol described some of the causes, [URL='https://www.escapemotions.com/community/forum/t/44621/odd-charcoal-3-dual-brush-behavior-between-r7-and-r8/']in this thread[/URL].) Changing the brush size may cause the Dual Brush in R8 to become fuzzy, or disappear entirely, just as a heads up. (I also had to make a new shape for the Dual Brush, because the Charcoal 3 one is already upscaled. So the Scale of the Dual Brush in my colored pencils is the one thing that won't compare properly to Charcoal 3's settings.)
[*]I don't like how standard low opacity settings allow for brushes to build up all the way to opaque, when you go over the same area too much in a single brush stroke. To create semi-transparency that has a limit (within a single brush stroke), I set Shapes 3 and 4 on all the brushes (except the erasers) to Subtract(/Difference) mode. That causes them to "cut into" the current brush stroke, which also adds a unique texture that is especially apparent at max pressure. Because the Shapes are inverted, it gently cuts out the outer edges of the stroke, leaving the center a bit more solid. This means that, at maximum pressure, you can see the directions of your brush strokes, no matter how many times you go over an area (within a single brush stroke). Layering multiple brush strokes will build up opacity and mask this effect.
[*]That said, I found out that opacity has a surprisingly large effect on paper texture. Because blending is less affected by paper texture in R7 than R8 (which I made an example of at the bottom of [URL='https://www.escapemotions.com/community/forums_share?params=posts/30484']this post[/URL]), I balanced it out a little by making the Opacity (in the Brush Creator window) of the layer, burnish, and colorless blender brushes 4x60 (instead of 4x96).
[*]Because the paper texture is stronger in R8, the burnish brush is currently not as effective there as it is in R7. I was planning to get at least a basic recommendation on how to fix it, but setting up the Alpha Blending mode comparison I linked above took more time than I expected, and testing out the settings to fix this is also gonna take me a while. (Generally, I'm thinking of trying to tweak some combination of Opacity, Paper Texture Strength/Contrast, and maybe Smudge on Paper Bumps. Maybe even turning off Legacy Paper Mode? I may also increase the Brightness of its Normal mode Shapes, and decrease the Paint curve, if that reduces the effect paper texture has in a way similar to R7. However, that's an opacity difference, and might allow for more color build up, so it would need careful balancing to prevent accidental overworking.)
[*]The base brush is intended to serve as initial layers, and thus doesn't have Smudge on Paper Bumps start until higher pressure (when the pencil would start smearing deeper into the paper tooth). The layer brush can also work to apply color in almost the same way to transparent areas, but has a tiny amount of SoPB at all pressures so it will look a little more "creamy" when applied over existing color (which also adds some extra semi-transparent spots for Darken mode to take advantage of).
[*]The layer and burnish brushes are set to Paint Blending mode Darken. This allows for using light colors on top of dark colors, and they'll only apply pigment where there is transparency it can fill in/cover, behaving more realistically than Default mode. From what I've tested, some colors might interact strangely (such as yellow notably changing the hue of some greens, or vivid blue causing other colors to darken too quickly). So if you need to, you can swap to the base brush, or change layering to Default mode when necessary to combat this effect. (Also, the colorless blender is set to Color Burn, because the currently active color applies to the Dual Brush "speckled" effect. If it was in Default mode, you'd end up applying the active color over everything else. This mode will allow you to use one color over any other color without changing the hue of the base colors, though a light active color will have a subtler effect than a dark one.)
[*]The Paint & Blend curve (which is the same for all the brushes but burnish) is sort of the "opposite" to the default curve. Rather than heavy pressure applying paint, and lighter pressure switching to blend, the (very slightly) stronger blend effect happens at heavier pressure, to imitate physical colored pencil behavior. The Paint curve is set to be opaque until very heavy pressure, wherein in dips about halfway to allow for the color to "mix" a bit.
[*]The color pull in R8 is much higher than it is in R7, which makes the layering brush behave very differently in R8. As explained by Pavol at the end of [URL='https://www.escapemotions.com/community/forum/t/44679/paint-blend-mode-blending-with-curves-at-0/']this thread[/URL], that's because the curve in R7 was not working as intended. However, I am finding that even having the entire Bend curve in Paint & Blend at the very bottom is causing the color pull to flatten out the paper texture applied from layering colors. (If I can't get other settings to work, maybe lower opacity from Shapes and some extra SoPB and just layering a lot in Paint mode? I plan to set up some comparisons and ask pretty please that they make it so the curve at 0 doesn't blend, and/or ideally that the bottom box of the curve would pull color much less in R8.)
[*]To a minor degree, I was able to reduce both color pull and the digital-smooth effect of blending in R7 via the combination of Backgrounds on the brushes, which still apply during blend modes. Because they add some texture, these brushes will work to some degree even on the White Simple paper (though of course, they will be most effective on fine-to-medium "toothed" textures).
[*]Most of the brushes are specifically set to Paper Texture Scratch on light texture. The eraser and texture restore brushes are set to dark texture, so they can more naturally restore the paper texture when you need to make corrections. The eraser is fully opaque, and can get a full clean erase if you need. The texture restore is very faint, and meant more for re-introducing subtle amounts of paper texture, when you accidentally layer too much and completely fill the paper tooth. It'll give you a little bit of paper flavor, without having to re-blend to fill things back in the way you'd need to with the eraser.
[/LIST]
[/SPOILER]
...I [I]meant[/I] for this to be a truncated version of they key info for the brushes. But my brain's gone fuzzy, and I can't recall if there's much of anything I've actually left out at this point (besides better organization, laying out the numbers of every setting, and providing example images). XD Anyway, enjoy! Let me know if anything's funky!
Username: Melampode
Post Date: 2026-04-10 00:32:53
That's a thing I forgot to say! As much as I could, I tried to keep settings either the same, or easily changeable, between brushes. (And between versions, for relatively easy transfer with as similar behavior as I can manage, despite the engine changes.) So for example, if you like the way the layer brush's Smudge on Paper Bumps looks, and want the base brush to be the same (or vice versa)? You only need to drag the left dot of that curve to match. Most of the settings adjustments are in solid numbers, or found in dropdowns. Wherever it was feasible, the curves are the same, or only require minor changes. There's still a fair number of settings that are different, and some of them interact with each other so it'd take some wrangling to get [I]fully[/I] identical behavior, but. The brushes should be relatively flexible, and largely function in any paint mode.
(Also you can leave the eraser in the group with all the other brushes, and/or copy it into the Eraser tool for easier access!)
Username: lolozori
Post Date: 2026-04-13 10:07:09
[QUOTE="Melampode, post: 32341, member: 123697"]
Excellent! You'll be able to fully see the way I intend them to work in R7, and how there's a few kinks to work out in R8, haha.
These are the versions from R7, so you can copy them into both versions of Rebelle. Since I believe saving/uploading them from the forum wipes the names, the brush names are, in order:
1. Prisma base
2. Prisma sharp
3. Prisma layer
4. Prisma burnish
5. Prisma colorless blender
6. Prisma eraser
7. Prisma texture restore
(Note: I added the "Prisma" prefix to help make sure it's clear what these brushes are, even when moved to Favorites/Recent/etc. If you keep them in their own dedicated folder(s) and have no naming overlap from other brushes, the prefix isn't strictly necessary.)
[/QUOTE]
Nice set Melampode, after testing I am not sure I get how to use the base + layer. I tested both in r7 and R8 and compared to irl pencils something it is a little different . Base is usualy the lighter value so I add the lighter color for with base brush first. Then I use the layer brush to add color on top. So for skin color I put a cream with base brush then I add some light pink with layer brush. In the case of your brushes all sliders like opacity and pressure are at 100. Used that way the layer brush is not transparent enough and cover most of the base layer without letting it breath a little. So my question is what s your slider /transparancy setup for your layer brush and do I use those two brushes as intended?
After further testing on my setup for the layer brush an opacity between 20-30 and a pressure between 50-60 seems to be much better for layering.
Username: Melampode
Post Date: 2026-04-13 11:44:14
Thank you for testing them out, and letting me know how they felt for you!
My intent with the layering brush was perhaps more of a back-and-forth between colors (or further along in the layering process) than you'd gotten. (And also to allow it to have a similar appearance to the base brush, if deliberately/accidentally used in a transparent area of the canvas/layer.) Because it is set to Darken mode, when going back over previous areas again with lighter colors (but before full burnishing), the lighter colors would not fully override the darker ones (the way the base brush will). It would instead fill in more paper texture (if the base layer hadn't already), and through that it'd pull on the previous colors a little, causing simultaneous lightening while blending.
However, I have since noticed [URL='https://www.escapemotions.com/community/forums_share?params=posts/32362']a bug in R7[/URL] that caused unusual behavior in blend modes under certain circumstances. This resulted in the previous color being pulled into the deeper parts of the texture, without necessarily interacting with the current color. I plan to see if I can find a way to wrangle both the layer and burnish brush settings to reduce or (ideally) avoid this issue, and some of the ideas I had for that did indeed involve potentially reducing the layer brush's opacity. (Potentially quite a lot, in combination with switching to Paint mode instead of Paint & Blend, since that currently causes unique issues in both R7 and R8. Though I'd likely do it via changing the Brightness of the Shapes, rather than using opacity sliders.) I'll keep your settings in mind when I get to adjusting the layering brush, and compare them to any other adjustments I make.
(I'll also do more rounds of testing with my physical pencils, to make sure I don't get too lost in the weeds of wrangling the digital settings, as I had personally found the opacity to be relatively close. I will also note, I did previously have the Opacity curve start much lower...but noticed that it was causing the brush to barely, or not at all, get picked up by the paper texture at the lightest pressure. I'll re-assess that, as well, since there could be a better middleground for that curve.)
In the meantime, and for some comparison if you wish, I have already done some tweaking to the burnish brush. I decreased the Paper Texture Strength curve (to match the sharp brush), and significantly moved the middle and rightmost dots of the Smudge on Paper Bumps curve up. It seems to have somewhat more consistent behavior between R7 and R8 now, but I didn't have time to do very much testing yet.
[ATTACH type="full"]2915[/ATTACH]
Username: lolozori
Post Date: 2026-04-13 19:09:11
[QUOTE="Melampode, post: 32371, member: 123697"]
Thank you for testing them out, and letting me know how they felt for you!
My intent with the layering brush was perhaps more of a back-and-forth between colors (or further along in the layering process) than you'd gotten. (And also to allow it to have a similar appearance to the base brush, if deliberately/accidentally used in a transparent area of the canvas/layer.) Because it is set to Darken mode, when going back over previous areas again with lighter colors (but before full burnishing), the lighter colors would not fully override the darker ones (the way the base brush will). It would instead fill in more paper texture (if the base layer hadn't already), and through that it'd pull on the previous colors a little, causing simultaneous lightening while blending.
However, I have since noticed [URL='https://www.escapemotions.com/community/forums_share?params=posts/32362']a bug in R7[/URL] that caused unusual behavior in blend modes under certain circumstances. This resulted in the previous color being pulled into the deeper parts of the texture, without necessarily interacting with the current color. I plan to see if I can find a way to wrangle both the layer and burnish brush settings to reduce or (ideally) avoid this issue, and some of the ideas I had for that did indeed involve potentially reducing the layer brush's opacity. (Potentially quite a lot, in combination with switching to Paint mode instead of Paint & Blend, since that currently causes unique issues in both R7 and R8. Though I'd likely do it via changing the Brightness of the Shapes, rather than using opacity sliders.) I'll keep your settings in mind when I get to adjusting the layering brush, and compare them to any other adjustments I make.
(I'll also do more rounds of testing with my physical pencils, to make sure I don't get too lost in the weeds of wrangling the digital settings, as I had personally found the opacity to be relatively close. I will also note, I did previously have the Opacity curve start much lower...but noticed that it was causing the brush to barely, or not at all, get picked up by the paper texture at the lightest pressure. I'll re-assess that, as well, since there could be a better middleground for that curve.)
In the meantime, and for some comparison if you wish, I have already done some tweaking to the burnish brush. I decreased the Paper Texture Strength curve (to match the sharp brush), and significantly moved the middle and rightmost dots of the Smudge on Paper Bumps curve up. It seems to have somewhat more consistent behavior between R7 and R8 now, but I didn't have time to do very much testing yet.
[ATTACH=full]2915[/ATTACH]
[/QUOTE]
Thanks for the answers, I did more test with this new version of the burnishing brush and somehow I really liked using it to apply ligher transparant colors with it, it almost felt like pastel using it. Not what it was intended for but it works :),
I used a combination of Brush base + brush layer with low opacity+ the new burnishing. I added slight highlight in the end with the texture brush . The hardest part for me was to draw the nostril dark parts with the brushes, it felt like I needed a very light and transparent brush for that so in the end I used the burnishing brush to paint it.
here the result :
[ATTACH type="full" alt="nose test.jpg"]2916[/ATTACH]
[MEDIA=youtube]rSIW5AdAfyM[/MEDIA]
Username: lolozori
Post Date: 2026-04-13 19:41:46
As you can maybe guess on the video at some point I started burnishing too soon and it blurred everything too quick. The main reason for this is that I had difficulties to create gradients (like Light brown to dark brown withpen pressure) using the base brush )and I though burnishing so soon would create the blend I searched but it made everything too blurry and I had to add more layer of pencil then.
Username: Melampode
Post Date: 2026-05-07 19:29:21
Oooh, that looks excellent! Thank you again for testing them out, and sharing your results and thoughts! I'm glad you had fun with the burnishing brush. (Though it's not necessarily/strictly meant just for burnishing. It was initially intended to enable having a dark color active while blending, without covering lighter colors as much as the layering brush does. "Burnish" just seemed like the best way to indicate "this will blend a fair amount without applying much color (but not [I]no[/I] color)." If you have any ideas for another term that could communicate that broader potential use better, I'm certainly willing to change the name.)
I have a couple quick questions, to get a better idea of how to approach some adjustments:
[LIST]
[*]Did you use R7 or R8 for this?
[*]When you were struggling to get the gradient from light to dark brown, do you remember which brush(es) and mode(s) you were using?
[*](Bonus: when you work traditionally with colored pencils, do you use Prismacolors and/or a different brand?)
[/LIST]
I ask because if, for example, part of the issue was something like how the first chunk of layering peach over the dark brown was too strong (partway through 7 seconds, doing frame-by-frame to study more closely), and you were using Paint & Blend mode in R8? It may have been because the level of color pull is very high and can "flatten" colors very quickly on fine paper tooth, which is something the devs would have to adjust. (Alternatively, I might recommend using the layering brush for the dark brown, then the base brush to re-lighten, so the darker smudged (on paper bumps) areas remain around the edges and prevent the area from becoming lighter all at once.)
If it was a different step and/or settings that gave you trouble, I can try to pinpoint the what and why, then see if I can balance it out. (It could be as simple as re-lowering the start of the Opacity curve* for at least the layering brush. Or if it turns out, after some more physical tests, the brush(es) [I]do[/I] overall need to be less opaque than I thought, then adjusting the Shape Brightnesses might be sufficient.)
*(I had noticed that adjusting the Opacity slider in the brush settings panel (the one above Opacity Jitter) surprisingly had a large impact on the way it interacted with paper texture. Lower opacity acted like I'd raised the Paper Texture Strength, to the point that (when low enough) it could result in no pigment being applied at lower pressure. That might have been part of why I raised the start of the Opacity curve...though I'll have to test to make sure, because I can't recall.)
Whatever the issue/whichever order of color layering (light -> dark, or dark -> light) was giving you issues, this gives me an excellent example to try testing myself (both digitally and physically) to compare with refine with!
I also asked the bonus question because I'm trying to narrow down whether there might be a personal observation/skill difference, or if it might have to do with relative pencil hardness. (I feel like my Prismacolors are relatively opaque, but maybe I've just not yet managed to observe more fine differences in color, or have too heavy a touch.)
On that note, while I was looking around at reviews of colored pencils to try to gauge from others' observations whether any of those things might be a factor, I found another brand/set that caught my eye. (Faber-Castell Black Edition are apparently comparatively smooth like Prismacolor, quite affordable, and work notably well on black paper [S]plus they look cool[/S].) So I ordered those and another small set that was on a big sale (Koh-I-Noor*), so I can do a couple comparisons of different physical pencils to have more info to work with.
*(Dick Blick is handling the liquidation sale for another distributor that went out of business, so the Polycolor 12 pack is $8 USD right now, instead of $38. From what I hear, they're not the hardest colored pencils, but they should be harder than the other two. So hopefully they should help give me some idea of whether that's a factor...and maybe even glean whether there's any easy settings ajustments I can recommend to make these brushes act like a harder brand.)
Username: lolozori
Post Date: 2026-05-15 16:45:41
[QUOTE="Melampode, post: 32595, member: 123697"]
Oooh, that looks excellent! Thank you again for testing them out, and sharing your results and thoughts! I'm glad you had fun with the burnishing brush. (Though it's not necessarily/strictly meant just for burnishing. It was initially intended to enable having a dark color active while blending, without covering lighter colors as much as the layering brush does. "Burnish" just seemed like the best way to indicate "this will blend a fair amount without applying much color (but not [I]no[/I] color)." If you have any ideas for another term that could communicate that broader potential use better, I'm certainly willing to change the name.)
I have a couple quick questions, to get a better idea of how to approach some adjustments:
[LIST]
[*]Did you use R7 or R8 for this?
[*]When you were struggling to get the gradient from light to dark brown, do you remember which brush(es) and mode(s) you were using?
[*](Bonus: when you work traditionally with colored pencils, do you use Prismacolors and/or a different brand?)
[/LIST]
I ask because if, for example, part of the issue was something like how the first chunk of layering peach over the dark brown was too strong (partway through 7 seconds, doing frame-by-frame to study more closely), and you were using Paint & Blend mode in R8? It may have been because the level of color pull is very high and can "flatten" colors very quickly on fine paper tooth, which is something the devs would have to adjust. (Alternatively, I might recommend using the layering brush for the dark brown, then the base brush to re-lighten, so the darker smudged (on paper bumps) areas remain around the edges and prevent the area from becoming lighter all at once.)
If it was a different step and/or settings that gave you trouble, I can try to pinpoint the what and why, then see if I can balance it out. (It could be as simple as re-lowering the start of the Opacity curve* for at least the layering brush. Or if it turns out, after some more physical tests, the brush(es) [I]do[/I] overall need to be less opaque than I thought, then adjusting the Shape Brightnesses might be sufficient.)
*(I had noticed that adjusting the Opacity slider in the brush settings panel (the one above Opacity Jitter) surprisingly had a large impact on the way it interacted with paper texture. Lower opacity acted like I'd raised the Paper Texture Strength, to the point that (when low enough) it could result in no pigment being applied at lower pressure. That might have been part of why I raised the start of the Opacity curve...though I'll have to test to make sure, because I can't recall.)
Whatever the issue/whichever order of color layering (light -> dark, or dark -> light) was giving you issues, this gives me an excellent example to try testing myself (both digitally and physically) to compare with refine with!
I also asked the bonus question because I'm trying to narrow down whether there might be a personal observation/skill difference, or if it might have to do with relative pencil hardness. (I feel like my Prismacolors are relatively opaque, but maybe I've just not yet managed to observe more fine differences in color, or have too heavy a touch.)
On that note, while I was looking around at reviews of colored pencils to try to gauge from others' observations whether any of those things might be a factor, I found another brand/set that caught my eye. (Faber-Castell Black Edition are apparently comparatively smooth like Prismacolor, quite affordable, and work notably well on black paper [S]plus they look cool[/S].) So I ordered those and another small set that was on a big sale (Koh-I-Noor*), so I can do a couple comparisons of different physical pencils to have more info to work with.
*(Dick Blick is handling the liquidation sale for another distributor that went out of business, so the Polycolor 12 pack is $8 USD right now, instead of $38. From what I hear, they're not the hardest colored pencils, but they should be harder than the other two. So hopefully they should help give me some idea of whether that's a factor...and maybe even glean whether there's any easy settings ajustments I can recommend to make these brushes act like a harder brand.)
[/QUOTE]
Sorry for the late reply.
First I want to say thanks you again for sharing the brushes and taking time to answer. I also know we all draw and paint differently so my opinion on how a colored pencil work in my hand might be way different than yours or others.
To answer about my experience with your brushes, I was using R8 and my main difficulties compared on how I use IRL prisma pencils :
With the base brush, one "problem" I had is that the strokes erase themselves if you make multiple pass at high pressure on the same spot when the pencil is all the time on the paper ,like in this video:
[MEDIA=youtube]Awg9GTC9R0E[/MEDIA]
After the test I realised I need to raise the pencil from the cintiq when wanting to do a gradient because i can never get the darkest colors if I just keep pressing ,wich is not the way I usualy work with IRL pencils I am not saying it is bad but it is surprising the first time you use the brush (and the video was really the first serious test at drawing something with them I ve done).
another problem is the brushes grab too much on othe tooth of the paper, the paper texture is a little too strong.
After few weeks using them, It s not really a problem anymore I got used to it .
for my use of IRL color pencils, I combine prismacolor and polychromos together. I always start the base layer with polychromos .
Talking about other fabercastel pencils, the goldfaber while it is only a 48 set max, they are a middle ground between polychromos and prismacolor and I recommand them.
[MEDIA=youtube]gKUbpFYHW_8[/MEDIA]
In this exemple the tester is saying that she do not know how lightfast they are however in this test here :
[MEDIA=youtube]AAN7o0vQjUc[/MEDIA]
it seems they are pretty close to the lightfastness of polychromos.
One account,
many possibilities