I know I do. There are so many different Photoshop brushes that can catch your eye. There’s a brush that matches whatever artistic mood you’re in. You’re feeling dark and gloomy, then use a grunge brush, and if you’re in the mood for love, then use a heart brush. Brushes can take your graphic artworks and designs to another level. Like I said yesterday, there are probably a few of you that are wondering what the heck I am talking about, so let me explain.
Photoshop brushes are images, such as photographs, scanned images, and drawings that are color adjusted to make sure that parts of the image are transparent and opaque when it’s converted to grayscale as it is saved as an .abr file, which is a Photoshop brush file. That tells you what it consist of, but I know you’re wondering how it is used. Well all you do is load them into Photoshop’s brush palette and use them in your artworks or designs.
To put this in plain english, a Photoshop brush is like a rubber stamp. Instead of placing a rubber stamp in ink and then pressing it on a piece of paper, you click on the brush tool in Photoshop and make sure your brushes are loaded. Next, you choose the brush you want to use, click on it, and choose the size you want your brush to be. Then you move your mouse pointer that now looks like a dotted outline of the brush you just chose and you find the spot on your image or blank page you want to place the brush. After you do that, you click the mouse button and wallah, you now have some Photoshop brush happiness on your image or blank page. You can also use a Photoshop brush like a real life paint brush. Instead of stamping it on a page like a stamp, you can drag it across the page and create painterly effects. Are Photoshop brushes sounding even cooler to you now?
If they are, then let me list some websites where you can find some cool Photoshop brushes. I go to these websites almost every week. What can I say, I am a hardcore Photoshop brush addict. lol Maybe you’ll become one too after checking out these brushes. I must ask you to stay in your seat at all times and to buckle up, because we are about to go on a rollercoaster ride through Photoshop brush land! lol

Ladies and gentleman, the ride is now over, you may exit the ride and go to the nearest trash can to spew or open up Photoshop and start having fun with some of these brushes. If you know of any Photoshop brushes, other Photoshop goodies, or any digital art tools that will knock our socks off, then feel free to tell us about them. We may make you Photoshop King or Queen for the day if they’re really good. lol Well it’s that time again guys and gals. It’s time for me to ride off into my Photoshop manufactured sunset. lol Tomorrow, I am going to talk about textures and patterns. They’re not just for fabric and your grandma’s wallpaper anymore. Let me get going. Stay beautiful people!
The Photoshop addict is outta here! Peace!
- Denesia

Denesia- lovin your blog. I know there is more to come but had to give just a quick shout out to make sure you see the latest and perhaps most unusual episode to date.

The outtake below is priceless.

Also gotta say a big congrats to Conzi from Italy, our HP Laptop winner this week!

Next blog is from Denesia- throwing it back to her.

XOXO
SuPak

First, I would like to thank SuChin, MTV Engine Room, and the MTV Engine Room bloggers for this opportunity! I will do my best to keep you all entertained and I hope to get a few of you hooked on Photoshop along the way.
Up until two years ago, I was doing all my effects myself or using plug-ins in Photoshop. Then one day, I thought there has to be an easier way to add some pizzazz to my graphic artworks. That’s when I stumbled upon Photoshop brushes, actions, styles, gradients, and etc. My graphic design professors never told me about that stuff. I was so clueless. lol
Now, I feel like a wizard with magical powers, my powers being my Photoshop goodies. I can bring a blank Photoshop page to life by using my art skills and magical powers. All this week, I am going to be talking about these magical powers, oh I mean Photoshop goodies and the websites I like to visit. I know there’s a ton of lists online showing you where to get Photoshop stuff, but I think my Photoshop goody lists will introduce you to a few websites you have never been to before. (more…)

First off - YES! Denesia, you should be the first ever ER guest blogger! It’s good to have you back. We missed you! Email everything you want to post to engineroom@mtvu.com.

So, I think this week’s challenge is one of the more technically difficult ones of the season. Stop motion graphics and animation takes a lot of time, it’s tedious and did I mention that it takes a lot of TIME…which is never a good thing on a show where your work lives and dies by the clock. With that said, I think though, that a lot of our cast is really excited about a medium many of them are familiar with and you’ll see after this episode, some hidden talents from some of the more quiet members of the ER (ahem…Slim and Jae). Here it is, our 5th episode and it looks like Europe really needs a win…will they pull it off?

Meanwhile a big congrats to Jennifer Doung of Canada who won this week’s HP Laptop! Check out her portfolio. It rocks.

XOXO
SuPak
PS I love that you guys are leaving encouraging and competitive notes on the team pages…if you don’t mind, copy and paste the shout outs here, the more the merrier!

So, post your pitches here on our comments page! Just a simple one or two sentence pitch on what you’d be blogging about and we’ll pick the one we’d like to see…every week! Remember, if you get chosen to blog, your blog can be in text or video form…so be creative!

XOXO
SuCHin

This week - We Are Scientists! Check out the new episode, and see how the teams crammed a month worth of work into 2 and a half days designing a website for the chance for it to be the official new website of indie rockers We Are Scientists. Stills from the teams sites are here if you wanna take a closer look.

TEAM ASIA PACIFIC
TEAM EUROPE
TEAM LATIN AMERICA
TEAM NORTH AMERICA

Meanwhile, don’t forget to see the Bonus footage to see Max laugh his head off. Good times there in the ole’ Engine Room.

And of course congrats to Archan Nair from India, who won this week’s HP Notebook!!!

XOXO
SuChin

In our constant effort to spotlight your work, check out Daeun Jung, who hit the mtvU airwaves this week. Have you seen the new featured portfolios? Whattya think?

New episode is live and goes out to all you audiofiles out there. Yes, the first challenge didn’t leave much time for audio polish, yes the contestants have more expertise (in general) with visual art than audio and yes as Kizza, as you point out, the audio world needs it’s share of Engine Room love… SO here it is. (and Kizza aka Kieran was being a little coy by the way, because what he was keeping a surprise is that HE APPEARS IN THIS EPISODE along with some other of you audio masters and mavens from our ER family!)

So hear the work in their portfolios of your fellow bloggers who were standing by around the world to help out their teams. Thanks Brandice, Kieran, Woody and Luis.

This ep also features music from 4 bands from mtvU’s bestmusiconcampus.com. Check out these rising stars - Aston, The Rocketeers, Rudy and the Rhetoric and Stella By Starlight and see why they are causing such a stir on campuses across the country.

Check out the Episode 3 Bonus Clips:



And let’s not forget to congratulate Rodrigo Bastos Didier from Brazil, who is this week’s winner of an HP Notebook!

Remember you can view and listen to each of the Engine Room team’s final projects each week on their specific team page (as opposed to them being on the episodes page). There’s not enough time in each episode to show the whole projects, if you haven’t figured that out yet.

Turn this episode up loud! We had a blast mixing it up.

XOXOX
SuPak