The most realistic Photoshop and Procreate brushes?

If you’re looking for high quality Photoshop brushes, Procreate brushes or realistic paper textures, then you’ll definitely need to check out Grutbrushes.com. Why? In 2017 we did a short review of Grutbrushes and gave it a whopping 4.5 out of 5 stars for its high quality brushes and value for money.

We wanted to check in and see if that was still the case. Additionally, we also wanted to look more closely at the potential advantages of these advanced brushes. We found that one of the most interesting changes is the addition of Procreate brushes! So take your time and give our updated Grutbrushes review a read.

What is Grutbrushes?

Grutbrushes is a set of high-quality Photoshop and Procreate brushes designed to help you create amazing digital art. The brushes are created by Nicolai Grut to provide you with the highest quality and most realistic brushes available. With Grutbrushes, you can create stunning artwork, illustrations, and graphics with ease and speed. The brushes come in various shapes and sizes so you can choose the perfect brush for your project. Grutbrushes also offers a range of tutorials and resources to help you get started with digital art. Whether you’re a beginner or a professional digital artist, Grutbrushes has something for everyone.

Grutbrushes.com is owned by by Nicolai Grut. Grutbrushes is specialized in creating brushes for Photoshop and Procreate. The brushes are created by Nicolai Grut. Additionally you can also purchase excellent Paper Textures, that work great in combination with these brushes. The concept is quite simple. You can either buy the brushes separately or you buy them as a bundle.

We would always recommend to buy the bundle, because you get over 500 brushes and art surfaces and more for only $69. Since most brushes cost $1 each, the math is quite simple. It would cost you hundreds of dollars if you would buy them one by one.

Is Grutbrushes legit?

Yes, 100%. Before we did either of the reviews we have purchased brushes at Grutbrushes. The more than 450 brushes for Photoshop were everything we expected.

Find your Photoshop and Procreate brushes at Grutbrushes?

If you’re passionate about digital painting, then you’ll know that one can never have too many brushes. Grutbrushes recognizes this, so every week a new brush is released. Yes… every… single… week. Back in 2017 there were about 300 brushes available. Now, their collection is made up of almost 400 Photoshop brushes.

Procreate Brushes are the latest addition. There’s about 50 Procreate brushes available now, with new brushes added every week.

Another thing that you can find at Grutbrushes are Paper textures. These incredible textures are perfect for creating authentic, realistic looking artwork.

Can you use the Photoshop Grutbrushes in Procreate?

Yet, but not instantly. You will need to convert the Photoshop ABR brush to a format that Procreate can read first.
This might seem complex, but it’s quite simple. Grutbrushes doesn’t recommend converting the Photoshop brushes to Procreate, because it’s always better to use the native Procreate brush format.

Nicolai has created an excellent guided video instruction on how to convert the Grutbrushes Photoshop brushes to Procreate.

Photoshop Brushes

As I mentioned earlier, there are about 400 brushes available. What stands out most is both the quality and realism of the brushes. They are incredibly realistic, especially when combined together with realistic, textured canvases. It’s important to note that none of the brush strokes are identical, each stroke being completely unique. You are likely to achieve best results with the use of a pressure sensitive pen.

The brushes cover a number of styles:

• Pencil Brushes
• Ink Brushes
• Natural Media Brushes
• Watercolor Brushes
• Oil Brushes
• Oil Impasto Brushes
• Charcoal Brushes
• Gouache Brushes
• Cross Hatching Brushes
• Pointillist Brushes
• Specialty Brushes
• Cloud Brushes

Most brushes can be bought as a single brush, but collections are also available. For example; the 350 Photoshop brushes collection includes unlimited downloads and updates for 6 months. All brushes can be used for both personal or commercial projects – no need to pay extra for licences.

Let’s take a closer look at some of the brushes and how they perform.

Pencil and Ink brushes

This is the Vintners Quill Photoshop Ink Brush.

You can see how each stroke is unique, how the ink flows and how it’s particularly resemblant of an ink pen.

The Tight Paw Ink Brush has a different feel, as the strokes seem to be made by a brush that has been dipped in ink.

If you like to work with pencils, then definitely take a look at the collection of 42 Pencil Brushes. There’s undoubtedly a pencil for any type of work. The collection includes hard pencil brushes, shader brushes and soft pencil brushes to name a few.

Here you can see the Borrowed Pencil in action.

Natural Media Brushes & Watercolor Brushes

In my experience, it can be quite difficult to find good quality watercolor brushes for Photoshop. Usually, you’ll find brushes that are scans of watercolor strokes, which don’t often feel like you are actually painting with watercolor brushes- but these do. The watercolor brushes from Grutbrushes are nothing you’ve ever seen in Photoshop. They actually feel like you’re creating a watercolor illustration.

Let’s take a look at a few of them. First, the Creamsicle Photoshop Watercolor Brush. This brush is a wet, saturated brush with lots of visible paper flaws. It also includes speckles of dry paint flakes on a rippled waterlogged background.

This brush is the Faint Smatter Photoshop Watercolor Brush. It has a grainy touch, a wide range in opacity but a narrower ranging width. When light pressure is applied it appears creamy and dirty, but with added pressure it produces a  strong opaque coverage with a wild edging

The last watercolor brush we’re taking a look at is the Moth Wing Watercolor Photoshop Brush. This is a light watercolor brush that comes with a subtly textured fill, resemblant of a technique where the painter didn’t use enough water. The edges are relatively rough, giving it a natural look. The medium to low contrast fill is very responsive and easily controlled. This brush is best suited for tone work.

Grutbrushes also offer a wide range of natural media brushes that come in a variety of styles. Let’s take a look at two of them to give you an impression. First, the Skew Brindle Photoshop Natural Media Brush. This brush gives the look and feel of a sticky paint roller.

If you’re looking for a charcoal brush then the Burnt Toast Natural Media Brush is the one for you! This brush has a great pressure response, and can covers surfaces with either a sprinkling light tone or a deep rich fill.

Oil Brushes & Oil Impasto Brushes

Finding oil brushes for Photoshop is almost as hard as finding good watercolor brushes. However, the oil and oil impasto brushes from Grutbrushes are doing an excellent job in simulating them.

This brush is the Butter Bits Photoshop Impasto Oil Brush.

Like all the other brushes covered, it has a realistic media appearance, looks and feels organic and is pressure responsive. This particular Impasto Brush has soft round edges and a body that is medium textured.

The following brush is the Kin Cane Photoshop Impasto Oil Brush. This brush is much thinker and appears more creamy at high pressure. The texture of this brush is incredible, giving a great impression of thickly layered paint.

The last oil brush we’re going to look at is the Lowly Hill Photoshop Oil Brush.

Gouache and other specialty brushes

Grutbrushes offers Gouache Brushes, Cross Hatching Brushes, Pointillist Brushes and
Specialty Brushes. In this section we’re highlighting a few of them.

Starting off with some Gouache Brushes for Photoshop. This one is called the Resolver Photoshop Gouache Brush– it has prominent whistle features and quite a broad handprint. This brush is perfect for cases in which you want your strokes to be visible.

The second Gouache Brush is the Lappy Sandle Photoshop Gouache Brush. This Photoshop Gouache brush has a soft dry brush texture that is variable in width. With added pressure the brush works as a wetter cover brush.

The hatch brushes have a number of different variations. There’s about 15 different types of them. In the image below, you can see an illustration done using the Photoshop Tag Shy Cross Hatch Brush.

A pressure responsive variable size version of the Hatch Tag brush.
This is a natural and dynamic cross hatching Photoshop brush that responds to both direction and pressure of your tablet pen.

Cloud Brushes

Grutbrushes offer a cloud brush bundle containing 52 Photoshop Cloud Brushes. Perfect for the digital painting of landscapes, this set makes a perfect addition to your brush collection. The image below shows an overview of all the cloud brushes.

This collection of brushes also comes with 10 cloud erasers. The erasers are best suited for any fine tuning you may need to do.  

The video below shows how easy it is to use the brushes.

Procreate Brushes

The procreate brushes can only be purchased in a bundle of 50. The brushes have the same look and feel as Photoshop Brushes we covered earlier.

Luckily, you can download a few free samples!

The Soft Shoe Brush for Procreate:

The Gulf Stream Brush for Procreate:

The Pack Sack Brush for Procreate:

The Low Pearly Brush for Procreate:

The Inkyleaks 01 Brush for Procreate:

The Carny Yarn Brush for Procreate:

Even though the set only includes 50 brushes, this is merely a starting point. New brushes are added each month.

Paper Textures

It’s important to note that high quality brushes are nothing without a great art surface. Sometimes it can feel like there is nothing is more uninspiring than staring at a plain, white screen. Incorporating both a realistic paper-like surface with a specialized brush that reacts to that specific paper texture can be both satisfying and inspirational!

Grutbrushes offers a little over 20 paper textures for you to choose from. Also, it wouldn’t be Grutbrushes if there wasn’t some added benefits!

• The textures are seamless
• They have a 2048 x 2048 @ 300dpi resolution (infinite canvas)
• Tileable (best of all: Auto Tiling)
• 8 Smart Surface Styles

The Smart Surface Styles settings define how the ink reacts with the paper. The image below shows you what happens when one of the settings is applied.

The paper you are seeing here is the Rentender Art Surface Paper Texture. It has a rough look and feel, and is perfect when paired with watercolor brushes.

This one is the Brinnley Art Surface Paper Texture – it has a smoother and more refined texture.

The last one we’re taking a look at is the Kensington Art Surface Paper Texture – this is the perfect paper for watercolour illustrations.

Check out all these high quality Art Surface Paper Textures available here.

Conclusion

Grutbrushes has grown a lot in the past year. They have added many new brushes, paper textures and even Procreate brushes. Grutbrushes responds very quickly to questions and strives to offer the best quality possible. Providing a good customer experience is crucial.

So, whether you’re looking for Photoshop Brushes, Procreate Brushes or Art Surface Paper Textures, Grutbrushes is the place for you.

And don’t forget the added benefit of free samples downloads for you to try out!