Gradient-like brush?

Not sure how to do this: I would like to set up a brush which
would produce strokes close to white in the center, grading to
color of choice (say, cyan) and then fading to background color
(say, black) toward the edges. A halo-like effect. I can do it in
several steps but I wonder if it could be done all at once. Not
that familiar with the more arcane mysteries of Photoshop, and
would appreciate any advice.

jxro... DeleteThis @yahoo.com wrote:
> Not sure how to do this: I would like to set up a brush which
> would produce strokes close to white in the center, grading to
> color of choice (say, cyan) and then fading to background color
> (say, black) toward the edges. A halo-like effect. I can do it in
> several steps but I wonder if it could be done all at once. Not
> that familiar with the more arcane mysteries of Photoshop, and
> would appreciate any advice.

Hi,

Here is one possibility:

Create new empty layer.
Select the ellipse tool and set the options to circle - or not if you
want them in perspective.
Place circles or ellipses everywhere you want there to be halos.
Stroke the paths with a brush shape you want the halos to look like -
it doesn't matter what color you choose.
Select the styles for that layer.
Set the fill opacity to zero.
Set the color overlay to the middle halo color.
Set the outer and inner glow blend modes to normal.
Use the color, spread and size settings of outer and inner glow to
control halo distribution and color.
Use the quality settings and choke, spread, size to define a falloff
profile.

This method give you a middle color (color overlay) and two outer
colors (inner and outer glow).
I'm not happy with the method but someone else will probably have a
better way. If I had more time to play around with it I think I could
come up with something better.

Good luck with your project,
Ron