Retouching Tools: History Brush Tool

The art history brush tool lets you paint with stylized strokes, using the source data from a specified history state or snapshot. By experimenting with different paint style, size, and tolerance options, you can simulate the texture of painting with different colors and artistic styles.

Like the history brush, the art history brush uses a specified history state or snapshot as the source data. The history brush, however, paints by recreating the specified source data, while the art history brush uses that data along with the options you set to create different colors and artistic styles.

The often overlooked, versatile History Brush is easy to use. Use the History Brush to selectively restore color, detail, smoothness, saturation, or any other image attribute from an earlier point in a picture's history. Once you get the hang of it, you'll use it often and wonder how you got along without it

The most popular use of the history brush tool is to take a color picture, convert it to black & white, then brush the original color back into a particular feature. The artistic effect can be striking.