Your BrushOrbit studio — v3.3

Start with a canvas, choose a painting type, pick a tool and make a mark. Everything stays on this device. You do not need an account.

1. Make your first painting

1. Click New canvas. Choose a name, size and surface. Linen has a woven texture, cold-press paper is rougher, and smooth paper is less textured. Download your current project first if you want to keep it.
2. Choose Oil, Acrylic or Watercolour in the top row. These are painting types, also called media.
3. Pick Round brush in the left sidebar. Every tool has a name below its icon, and related tools share a labelled box.
4. Click a Quick colour below the right sidebar. Change Size and Opacity in the top row.
5. Drag on the canvas to paint. A mouse or trackpad works; a compatible pen adds pressure. Click Undo to undo a mistake.
6. Use Download → PNG for a picture, or Editable project to keep working with your layers and wet paint later.

Detail view faces the canvas directly. Focus hides the sidebars. Space-drag moves the view, and scrolling zooms. The fit button between − and + resets the view.

2. Find your way around

Changing between Settings, Colour and Layers only changes what you are looking at. It does not change your painting action. Clicking a physical tool returns to Paint. Choosing Shapes keeps the physical tool in your hand for its outline.

The right sidebar has one scrolling body. On very short windows, actions and working context join that scrolling body so settings keep enough room; selection, confirmation and quick colours remain outside it. Its action buttons, working context and quick colours stay within reach. Selection status and Apply/Cancel appear outside that body when needed. On smaller screens, Tools & settings opens or closes the right panel. Close panel and Escape also close it. The left tool list scrolls independently.

3. Choose a painting type

These are artistic approximations. Changing painting type changes new paint; it does not convert existing marks. Each physical tool remembers its size, opacity and physical settings separately for each medium. Colour is shared. Stroke smoothing and Drying pace are global settings.

4. Pick a tool from the left sidebar

All tools use Size and Opacity during free painting. Size changes the working footprint. Opacity controls how strongly new marks or effects are applied. Settings only shows additional values that matter for the chosen tool.

Paint behaviour groups Water/fluidity, Paint load and Spread where they apply. Tool options holds grade, sleeve, edge and angle. Airbrush and sponge do not offer Spread because that value has no effect on those tools in the current engine.

5. Understand brush settings

Size and tool Opacity keep their place in the top row. They become unavailable when the current editing action does not use them, with an explanation in Settings. Their stored values stay intact.

Brush presets contains twelve built-in starting points and your saved setups. Click a preset to return to Paint with its tool, medium and physical settings. Your colour and intentional selection stay the same. Star favourites; Save new stores a personal setup. Update, Rename and Delete manage selected personal presets. Up to 24 personal presets are supported. A modified label means you changed the selected setup. Personal presets stay on this device and travel in editable projects.

Symmetry repeats drawing and erasing. Choose Off, Vertical mirror, Horizontal mirror, Both axes, or Radial with 2–8 sectors. Set the centre with X/Y percentages or Place centre on canvas. Show guides displays the axes. Water and smudging stay manual. Selections, fills and transforms remain single edits. Higher sector counts with broad brushes do more work.

6. Edit and construct

Choose an action directly above the inspector. Its settings appear in Settings. Transform, gradient, shapes and colour adjustments use a preview: the committed painting stays safe until Apply. Cancel removes the preview. Enter applies; Escape cancels. When a button has keyboard focus, Enter/Space activates that button, so Enter on Cancel cancels.

During a preview, resolve it before changing tools, colours, layers or documents. You can browse the other tabs or open Studio settings. Apply/Cancel stays visible. Painting time pauses until the preview ends.

Paint

Draw freely with the physical tool in your hand. An intentional selection still limits where you can paint. Selection active and Deselect remain visible from every tab. Use Deselect or Ctrl D to paint beyond it. Alpha lock and clipping can also limit visible marks; the working context identifies them.

Select

A selection chooses an area to work inside; it does not paint a shape.

• Rectangle / Ellipse / Lasso / Colour: drag a geometric selection, draw a freehand loop, or click a connected colour region.
• Replace / Add / Subtract: replace the old area, add to it, or cut a part out. Shift adds and Alt subtracts while selecting.
• Feather px: softens the selection edge, up to 32 canvas pixels.
• Dim outside selection: darkens the outside as a viewing aid.
• All / Invert / Deselect: select everything, swap inside and outside, or remove the boundary.

Colour selection also shows the boundary reference, tolerance, expansion and connected-area controls explained under Fill. The selection persists across tools, media and presets until you remove it. Wet spread on the active layer is also constrained while selected; drying elsewhere continues. A constructed rectangle does not create a selection.

Transform

Moves selected paint on the active layer, or that layer's painted content if there is no selection. Drag inside to move, corners to scale, or the round handle above the box to rotate.

• Move X / Y: horizontal and vertical movement in canvas pixels.
• Width / Height %: scales the content; 100% keeps its original size.
• Angle: rotation in degrees.
• Keep proportions: ties the width and height percentages together.
• Flip ↔ / Flip ↕: mirrors horizontally or vertically.
• Duplicate onto a new layer: keeps the source and puts the transformed result on a new layer.

Apply crops anything beyond the canvas edges. Undo restores it. Colour, transparency, material, relief and remaining workability move together. There is no perspective warp or multi-layer transform.

Fill

Click an enclosed area to deposit colour on the active layer.

• Boundary reference: Visible layers lets line art on another layer guide the fill; Active layer uses only this layer.
• Tolerance: higher values include less similar colours.
• Expand px: slightly grows the detected area to help cover small edge gaps.
• Connected area only: fills the clicked connected region. Turn it off to include similar regions elsewhere.

Medium and tool Opacity set the new paint. Brush Size is not used. Fill respects selections and alpha lock, and commits one undoable edit. It cannot automatically repair arbitrary gaps in line art.

Gradient

Choose Linear for a straight fade or Radial for a circular fade. Choose Transparent to fade the selected colour out, or Second colour to reveal another colour picker. Drag on the canvas, adjust the endpoint handles, then Apply. Medium and Opacity set the new paint before the preview begins.

Shapes

Choose Line, Curve, Rectangle, Ellipse or Polygon, then Stroke, Fill or Both. Stroke means the outline and uses the tool in your hand, including its Size and relevant settings. Fill uses uniform selected-medium colour. Lines and curves always use a stroke.

Drag to construct a shape. Hold Shift to constrain angles or proportions. For a curve, drag endpoints, then move its two control handles. For a polygon, click at least three corners and press Enter to finish. Adjust the preview, then Apply. Smudge and water stay manual. Applied shapes become ordinary raster paint and can be transformed or undone later.

Adjust

Previews colour changes on the active layer, inside the selection if there is one.

• Brightness makes it lighter or darker; Contrast changes the difference between light and dark.
• Hue shifts the colour family; Saturation changes its intensity.
• Levels → Black / White / Midtone sets the dark endpoint, light endpoint and middle-value balance.
• Reset adjustments returns these values to their defaults.

Apply creates one undoable change. It preserves transparency, wetness, material and relief, and does not rewet dry paint. Tool Size and Opacity do not control adjustments.

7. Choose and mix colours

Click a quick swatch to load a colour without leaving Settings or Layers. Mix colours opens Colour. The quick strip uses the same saved colours and recent mixtures as the full palette; it does not store a separate palette.

In Colour, click a saved blob on the wooden palette, use the colour picker, or enter a hex colour such as #b95d43. + saves the current colour as a swatch, up to twelve. Right-click a saved swatch, or focus it and press Delete, to remove it.

Shift-click a swatch, or drag it into the mixing well, to add it. Mix strength controls how much the next added colour influences the mixture. Click the well to load the resulting colour. Reset well empties the mixture. Recent mixes keeps the last eight deliberately loaded mixtures; click one to reuse it or Shift-click to mix again. Shift-clicking a quick colour also opens Colour. Graphite and charcoal keep their neutral colours even when you load a coloured swatch.

8. Build a painting with layers

Think of layers as transparent sheets stacked over one another. New marks go on the active sheet. Click a layer to work on it, use + to add one, or click its eye to hide/show it. A hidden layer still stores its paint. The working context always names the active layer.

Layer appearance holds Layer opacity and Blend. Layer opacity fades the whole sheet, including old marks; tool Opacity controls your next marks. Blend changes how a layer combines with the ones below: Normal, Multiply, Screen, Overlay, Soft Light, Darken, Lighten, Difference, Colour and Luminosity. Try Multiply for shading or Screen for light.

Paint boundaries holds Lock alpha and Clip to base below. Lock alpha recolours existing coverage without changing its silhouette, including soft edges. It prevents erasing; unlock an empty layer to start painting. Clipping uses the first unclipped layer below as a visible boundary. Its name appears below the checkbox. A hidden or empty base hides the clipped paint. Outside pixels remain stored, so disabling clipping may reveal them.

Layer actions holds Rename, Move up/down, Merge down, Merge clip group, Merge visible, Dry this layer, Clear layer and Delete. Reordering changes what is above or below, including the clipping base. Merge clip group combines a base and its clipped children while preserving their appearance; show the whole group first. Merge visible combines visible layers and retains hidden ones. Some dependent blend combinations need Merge visible instead of Merge down. Merges are undoable within the history budget.

Dry this layer keeps the marks and ends their wetness. Clear layer empties its marks. Delete removes the whole layer. Clear and Delete have confirmation dialogs. These actions remain undoable within the history budget. Physical pickup and mixing happen within the active layer.

9. Understand wet and dry paint

Wet paint can mix or move. Dry paint has finished setting. Oil stays workable longest, acrylic sets sooner, and watercolour sets fastest but can be rewetted. Dry graphite, charcoal and pastel can still be smudged.

Watercolour on prewetted paper can spread more softly. Use the water brush on blank paper before a wash, or over watercolour to rewet it. Dry acrylic resists water and smudging. Paint pickup uses compatible material on the active layer; it is separate from picking a colour from the visible picture with Alt-click.

Change global Drying pace in Settings → Wet paint. Drying uses foreground painting time and pauses when you leave the browser tab, through a suspension gap, and during editing previews. Merely looking at Colour or Layers does not pause it. Dry this layer in Layers ends wetness immediately, and Undo restores it. Editable projects retain the remaining paint workability.

10. Set up the room and graphics

Open Studio settings below the inspector. Daylight, Minimal and Evening change the room around the canvas. Graphics offers Auto · comfortable, Detailed and Lightweight. Auto reduces room effects when busy and preserves painting resolution. Tool animations and Tool sounds control decoration and optional sound. Reduced-motion preferences are respected.

Sound is opt-in and continuous during a physical stroke. Speed, pressure and tool type change it. Spray and airbrush hiss while held; friction tools fade when still. Tool sound volume sets the level and stays on this browser.

Opening Studio settings keeps the current action, preview, inspector tab and scroll position. If 3D is unavailable, the app opens its flat studio; painting, layers, saving and downloads still work. Restore 3D retries the graphics view.

References, saving and recovery

Open or drop a PNG, JPEG or WebP to pin a local reference beside the canvas. Move, resize, collapse or remove its card. It stays out of the PNG and travels with editable projects. Sources are limited to 12 MB and 40 megapixels and downscaled to a 1600-pixel longest side.

Wait for Saved on this device before leaving when possible. Refresh restores the last completed local save and a bounded recent undo/redo tail. The newest unfinished write or preview may not survive an abrupt reload. Very large edits can consume the recent-history budget; recovering the picture does not guarantee every prior undo step. A damaged history tail does not invalidate a good artwork checkpoint.

Download a PNG for the full-resolution picture, or an editable .brushorbit project for layers, material state, selection, clipping, blend modes and presets. Manual projects omit the local undo history. V3 opens projects from earlier delivered versions. Earlier apps reject v3 files rather than display them without their effects.

Local storage belongs to this site address, browser profile and device. Clearing browser data, private browsing or changing domain can remove or separate recovery. Keep editable downloads for portable backups. Close other studio tabs if local saving reports another owner or an upgrade blocker. Errors remain visible; download a project if storage is unavailable.

Keyboard shortcuts

Command equivalents use Cmd on macOS. Shortcuts respect text fields and open dialogs. Tool-change animations are nonblocking and reduced-motion preferences are respected.

Moving to brushorbit.art

Before switching site addresses, download an editable project for every painting you want to keep, then open it on the new domain. Browser saves belong to an origin and do not automatically transfer to another domain. New project downloads use .brushorbit; prior editable project files still open.