CS3 and brushes
 

Hi - I hope this is the right forum. I've just spent a couple of hours with a friend who has CS3, XP home and sp3. On a seemingly random basis, some of the tools don't work, namely the brush section - brushes, healing/patch, clone, smudge, although the eraser worked for us tonight.

He says he can be using a tool on one picture, then when he goes to use it again - nothing. We've uninstalled/reinstalled/repaired, reset the tools and I can't think of anything else. It's probably something so simple, but does anyone have any ideas, please?

Thanks

exdragon, I have had that problem from time to time, don't know why, mine is usually the cursor disappearing so all I see is a cross hair with no idea on its size. Hopefully someone with more knowledge will be along soon who can help you out, it can be very frustrating when you are in the middle of doing something and you lose the function of the brushes.

Not sure but could very well be due to your low real or virtual memory.

Try to increase your RAM if you can. Even if this issue is not taken care off, you still will see a lot of improvement on PS function that is a really memory hungry software.

Make sure your hard drive has adequate free space (At least 10 GB or so) that is where your temporary files get collected and it is so easy to fill it up with PS.
Cleaning your Temp (Temporary files) also help a lot. If you are a window user, click on Start, then Run and type exactly:
%temp%
When the list appears (All junks taking your hard drive space in Temp folder) select all and delete all. Warning! Well if something very bad happened to you, Of course I take no responsibility what so ever and don't run after me for liability... So do everything at your own risk.

Reduce the number of History for your picture post processing work, under the setting in PS.

Try to save less on PS format as it really takes up huge amount of HD space, that is unless if you save your files on an external drive or likewise that doesn't cause any shrinkage of your valuable, badly needed primary Hard drive.

Report back if none worked to see what else can be done.

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Christine: Wasn't that the activated "Cap lock" that kept you in that special mode?
Turn the Cap lock off and hopefully you have your curser back.

Thank you - I've forwarded your message on! He has 4GB of memory and I deleted the %temp% files, but I don't know the state of his hard driive etc. I'm waiting for him to let me know and then we can try again.

saphire, when the cursor disappears and you just get a cross hair, hit the caps lock key, this toggles the cursor between the brush and a cross hair

Thanks Dan, I thought it was something simple. I like your avatar.