Creating custom brushes

The Freehand & Brush Tool and Line Gallery contain a range of default brush effects (such as airbrushes). You can extend the range of these default brushes by adding your own.

To create a custom brush

1. Draw the object or objects you want to use as the brush (see Tips).

2. If necessary select your brush design - see Selecting objects.

3. Select the Freehand & Brush Tool.

4. Click Create Brush.

5. Give the brush a name so you can identify it in the future. You can use any unique name.

6. Click OK to create the brush.

See Changing the brush stroke for details of using your new brush.

Alternatively you can edit an existing brush - see Changing brush stroke properties.

Xara LX saves only brushes used in the document. It discards unused brushes when you quit the program. To ensure a brush always gets saved, draw a line in the gray pasteboard area and apply the brush to that line. (Items in the pasteboard area are non-printing.)

You can add custom brushes to the default set of brushes - more details.

Movies (not working in this version)

Creating a new Brush

Tips

Complicated brush designs can be slow to redraw, especially on thin lines. Make the brush as simple as possible.

Creating a brush from several objects:

To keep the objects in the same relative positions group them before creating the brush .

To create a brush where the objects appear in sequence, do not group them.

You can use both named colors and local colors in your brush design. When editing the brush, you have the option of allowing changes to none of the colors, all the colors or only named colors.

You can also use an existing brush as the basis for your new brush. Right-click on the brush in the Line Gallery. Select Copy brush graphic to clipboard then paste the shapes into your document.

You can use brushes to "paint" with bitmaps - more details.

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