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Refilling the brush

The owner, after painting with it: "I think we need to rethink the idea of needing to refill the brush; it does not feel intuitive."

How it works today

Choosing a colour loads the brush. Every stroke lays some of that paint, and a long stroke runs dry: it stops adding paint and starts dragging what is already down, which is the dry-brush look (Brushes). To keep going, the painter taps the colour well for more. Paint picked up from the canvas stays on the brush and joins the next load.

Why it doesn't feel right:

  • It is a chore with nothing to decide. A painter dips without thinking about it; here it is a separate tap that has to be remembered, every few strokes.
  • Running out is hard to see coming. The well's outline shows how much paint is left, but it is small and the eye is on the painting, so a stroke simply goes faint, and a faint stroke reads as a fault, not as a brush that needs paint.
  • No other painting app asks for it (below).

How other apps do it

Taken from each app's manual as quoted in search results (the manuals themselves couldn't be opened from here).

App Getting paint on the brush Running dry Paint left on the brush
Adobe Fresco (live oils) A Reload color setting loads fresh paint before every stroke Not stated Not stated
Photoshop (Mixer Brush) Load the brush after each stroke, a toggle beside the colour; off, you load by hand Load sets how far a stroke goes Clean the brush after each stroke, a second toggle; guides recommend it on
ArtRage (oils) Loading is how much paint each stroke starts with, and so how long it runs The manual says the canvas texture shows best as the paint runs out Auto Clean on cleans after each stroke; off, mixed colours stay until you tap the water glass
Corel Painter Resaturation: how much colour is replenished during a stroke Dryout: how many pixels before the brush is empty Dirty Mode: paint left at the end of a stroke mixes with the paint loaded for the next
Rebelle Loading, per brush Can switch to blending by itself once the paint runs out (a preference) Dirty Brush: the colour you ended on is on the tip at the start of the next stroke
Procreate (wet mix) Charge: how much paint the brush holds At 0 it runs out very fast Not stated

Whether Procreate refills at every new stroke wasn't stated in what could be read; it is likely, not confirmed.

What they share:

  1. Nobody asks the painter to refill. Lifting the finger is the dip. The one manual refill, Photoshop's with auto-load off, is the setting its own guides tell you to change.
  2. Running dry is a property of the brush, inside one stroke, set by a slider (Loading, Dryout, Charge), not a supply the painter manages. ArtRage and Painter both treat the running-out end of a stroke as where the best texture is.
  3. Whether the brush stays dirty is a separate choice, usually a toggle: clean every stroke, or carry what's left into the next load (Painter, Rebelle, ArtRage with Auto Clean off).

The options

Eight ways a brush could get its paint, including today's.

  • A. Fresh paint at every touch, and what's left carries over. Touching down is the dip. The new load joins the paint still on the bristles, so after smearing through another colour the next stroke or two are tinted by it, then clean up. Running dry stays, within a long stroke. Painter's Dirty Mode, Rebelle's Dirty Brush, ArtRage with Auto Clean off.
  • B. Fresh paint at every touch, clean every time. Each stroke starts with exactly the chosen colour. Running dry stays, within a stroke; picking up the colour below still happens during a stroke, but it is gone at the next. Photoshop with both toggles on, ArtRage with Auto Clean on; Fresco reloads every stroke.
  • C. Paint that never runs out. Every stroke is fully loaded to its end; dry-brush becomes its own brush, or a light touch. Most drawing apps' ordinary brushes.
  • D. Paint fed in continuously. The brush refills a little as it goes, so a stroke thins toward a floor instead of running out. Painter's Resaturation against Dryout.
  • E. Topped up when nearly empty. No action; the app refills the brush partway through a stroke once it is low. No app found does this.
  • F. Refilled after a pause. Lifting briefly carries on with what's left; resting about a second refills it. No app found does this.
  • G. Dip on a palette. Tap a pile of paint to load, the way a painter does. Real painting; this app's own palette bar before the corners (Design history).
  • H. Tap for more (today). Load by hand when the brush runs low. Photoshop with auto-load off.

Ranked for ease of use and intuitiveness

Ease of use: how little the painter has to do or remember (5 = nothing). Intuitiveness: whether someone would predict what happens, and see why (5 = no surprises). Ties go to the more intuitive option.

Rank Option Ease Intuitive What the painter does What it costs the paint
1 B. Fresh paint every touch, clean every time 5 5 Nothing; each stroke is the colour chosen The brush forgets: no colour carried from one stroke to the next
2 A. Fresh paint every touch, what's left carries over 5 4 Nothing; a stroke after smearing is briefly tinted Nothing lost; the one surprise is that tint
3 C. Paint that never runs out 4 4 Nothing, until they want dry-brush and must find it Running dry, which the brief counts as part of paint being a substance
4 D. Paint fed in continuously 5 3 Nothing; strokes thin and recover by a rule they can't see Running out, mostly
5 G. Dip on a palette 2 4 A trip to the palette for every load; the palette takes screen Nothing
6 E. Topped up when nearly empty 4 2 Nothing; a stroke brightens partway for no visible reason Running dry, mostly
7 F. Refilled after a pause 4 1 Wait, without being told to or for how long Nothing
8 H. Tap for more (today) 2 2 Notice, remember and tap, every few strokes Nothing

Reading it:

  • B and A are the clear pair, and the only ones that are both effortless and predictable. They are what every app above does. On ease and intuitiveness alone, B wins: the colour on the brush is always the colour chosen.
  • A costs one small surprise and keeps what makes oil feel like oil: a brush that remembers the wet paint it went through, the way Brushes and the Kubelka–Munk mixing say it should. The surprise can be made small by clearing the carried paint within a stroke or two.
  • C is as easy, but moves the problem: dry-brush becomes a separate thing to find.
  • Today's tap comes last. It is the only option that is both work and a surprise.

Decided: A (2026-09-28)

The owner chose fresh paint at every touch, with what's left carrying over. What changed in the app:

  • Every stroke with the brush or the knife starts freshly loaded with the selected mix. The new paint joins what the bristles still carry and the total is capped, so a colour picked up from the canvas makes up less of the load with each stroke and is gone within two or three.
  • A long stroke still runs dry along its length, as before.
  • The finger is not reloaded. It is for smudging and blending, and a finger that laid fresh paint at every touch couldn't blend.
  • A tap on the colour well opens the colour rings, like the other corners. It no longer picks up paint; there is nothing to pick up.
  • Tapping the selected mix again cleans the brush: wiped, then loaded with just that mix. B's clean start, on demand.
  • The gauge went too (the owner: "we hide the circles while drawing … we do not need the black ring that runs out as users draw"). The well shows the mix the next stroke will carry, not what's left on the brush.
  • The touch test checks it: a long stroke leaves about 6% of the paint, and the next touch starts with over 90% again.

Sources

Written 2026-09-28. Kept as it was written; the app may have moved on since.