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Posted on 21/09/18 1:29:39 PM
DavidMac
Director of Photoshop
Posts: 4903

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Brushes failing
I am having an odd problem with Photoshop. I am using CS6 X on a Mac Pro under El Capitan.

After I have been working for a while all the brushes stop working. The cursors show and I can brush with them but nothing happens. Closing and opening Photoshop will cure it immediately …….. until they give up again ……..

It can take anything from ten minutes to one hour to appear. It doesn’t seem to relate to image size or complexity. It happened twice this morning on the ‘pump’ challenge image with about twelve layers. That’s not exactly what you would call demanding. On both occasions PS efficiency showed 100%, free memory about 18GB, and swap disc (a fast SSD) 168GB. The video card is quite high end with 2GB of VRAM. I have run tech tests on it and it works perfectly. So it doesn’t seem to be resource or machine related. All other apps work perfectly and PS works perfectly aside from this one problem.

Any ideas anyone?


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The subtlety and conviction of any Photoshop effect is invariably inversely proportional to the number of knobs on it .......

Posted on 21/09/18 3:17:42 PM
Steve Caplin
Administrator
Posts: 6825

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Re: Brushes failing
Bizarre. Are you using a tablet? Does this happen with all brushes? Next time it happens, can you post a screenshot with panels open?

Posted on 21/09/18 5:20:47 PM
DavidMac
Director of Photoshop
Posts: 4903

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Re: Brushes failing
I'll do my best. Problem is which panels. It happens with ALL brush tools even the non 'brushing' ones like Quick Selection.

I hadn't thought about Wacom problems. They are legion with some Adobe products. Next time I'll try mousing see if that works.

Problem is I can't provoke the problem I have to simply wait until it seemingly randomly pops its head over the parapet.

_________________
The subtlety and conviction of any Photoshop effect is invariably inversely proportional to the number of knobs on it .......

Posted on 01/10/18 09:33:03 AM
DavidMac
Director of Photoshop
Posts: 4903

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Re: Brushes failing
I have been double checking everything. Panels show everything as it should be. I think there is a deeper malaise than photoshop. My machine is a late 2008 Mac Pro. So even with updated drives and video card it's getting a bit long in the tooth, although full tech tests show nothing untoward. I cannot run any OS above El Captian and of course CS6 compatibly with newer OS's is also an issue. I am starting to notice oddities elsewhere. I think in the next few weeks I will bite the bullet on a complete re-format and install everything OS included from scratch.

But something tells me it's time for a replacement .........

Not a happy bunny.

_________________
The subtlety and conviction of any Photoshop effect is invariably inversely proportional to the number of knobs on it .......

Posted on 01/10/18 09:42:55 AM
DavidMac
Director of Photoshop
Posts: 4903

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Re: Brushes failing
I forgot to mention that when the brushes stop working they stop for mouse and tablet so it doesn't look to be tablet specific.

_________________
The subtlety and conviction of any Photoshop effect is invariably inversely proportional to the number of knobs on it .......

Posted on 01/10/18 09:43:08 AM
DavidMac
Director of Photoshop
Posts: 4903

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Re: Brushes failing
I forgot to mention that when the brushes stop working they stop for mouse and tablet so it doesn't look to be tablet specific.

_________________
The subtlety and conviction of any Photoshop effect is invariably inversely proportional to the number of knobs on it .......

Posted on 01/10/18 10:52:44 AM
GKB
Magical Montagist
Posts: 3704

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Re: Brushes failing
Hi David

I see that you are using a 2008 machine. Have you just upgraded to El Kapitan? If you have then that might be the cause of your problems.
As Apple, Microsoft and others ‘update’ their Operating Systems older software stops working.

You may remember that, recently, I was having big problems when After Effects CS4 suddenly stopped working on my PC for no apparent reason. To this day it refuses to re-install and it has not worked since. I now suspect that this was due to an automatic Windows update rendering After Effects useless. Not a problem now as it caused me to look for an alternative in Hit Film which I cannot recommend too highly.

Your issue with plan ‘B’ of buying a new MAC will be whether or not Photoshop CS6 will run on the latest MAC OS so check it out carefully or make the full transition to Affinity Photo.

FYI my MAC is a year old and running OS 10.12.4 and Photoshop CS 6 runs perfectly on it. But I won’t be upgrading the OS again just in case.

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Posted on 01/10/18 5:47:29 PM
DavidMac
Director of Photoshop
Posts: 4903

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Re: Brushes failing
Hi Gordon

I have had El Capitan since it came out and no problems. This has developed since.

No one knows hows long PS 6 will remain viable and Adobe's certainly not saying!

As you know I was one of the first, if not the first, to go the Affinity Photo route and I used it from the very start. It had some very irritating aspects which I hoped they would remove in future releases but many remain and now they are focused on Publisher (which looks very good) and I have no idea what may happen to Photo in the foreseeable future.

About six months ago I stopped using it entirely and went back to CS6. I also tried the latest CC. It's excellent but very little better than CS6 in terms of basic usability. The changes, and Adobe's focus, are all about cloud integration but frankly that has little to interest me so the heftier price tag doesn't seem justified.

On the other hand, because of constantly having to restart Photoshop to get the brushes to work, I did this week's challenge in Affinity again. It damn near drove me crazy. It's so good and yet lacks so many of the tiny things we take for granted in Photoshop that make it so quick and easy.

I work in Affinity at half the speed. Initially when I first started using it I accepted that because I thought it was because I was still getting used to it but now I am familiar with I find that it's quite simply rather clunky and irritating. It's far better than the CC I tried for photo corrections and HDR, panoramas, etc. But I don't need them really. I am a very basic photographer. My work is almost exclusively compositing and transforming and Affinity really isn't as good for that as Photoshop.

Ho hum .............

_________________
The subtlety and conviction of any Photoshop effect is invariably inversely proportional to the number of knobs on it .......

Posted on 10/10/18 08:41:07 AM
DavidMac
Director of Photoshop
Posts: 4903

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Re: Brushes failing
After much diddling and re-installing it looks to be Wacom related. CS6 always had problems with certain Wacoms. I have the Adobe 'WhiteWindowWorkaround' plug in installed which is supposed to cure many Wacom problems.

Sometimes when the brush stops working it stops for mouse and tablet and I have to restart PS, but sometimes the mouse will still work. In this instance a few strokes with the mouse will often restore tablet function.

My brain hurts ...............

_________________
The subtlety and conviction of any Photoshop effect is invariably inversely proportional to the number of knobs on it .......

Posted on 10/10/18 08:46:41 AM
GKB
Magical Montagist
Posts: 3704

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Re: Brushes failing
Try updating the Wacom drivers?

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