Capturing the essence of a feather digitally is no easy feat. Whether it’s the soft texture, distinct thinness, or curved strands, a single feather can be deceivingly complex. And even if you’re up for the challenge, time won’t always be on your side. That’s where ready-made resources can make all the difference. Here are 10 fantastic assets and tools to help you achieve impressive feathers digitally both in 2D and 3D:

Photoshop Feather Brushes

If you’re a 2D artist who specializes in animals, these feather brushes will help you streamline your bird drawings. The pack contains a number of organic and realistic painting brushes that will help you attain seamless feather textures. 

The brush set consists of:

• 8 feather brushes for Photoshop

Note: These brushes are only compatible with Photoshop.

Procreate Feather Brushes

These curated feather brushes were made specifically for Procreate. Similar to the Photoshop pack, this set will simplify the process of drawing digital feathers.

This pack includes:

• 10 feather brushes for Procreate

Note: These brushes are only compatible with Procreate for the iPad and the Apple Pencil.

Shrineheart's Birds of a Feather Pack - 20 Brushes

This Shrineheart set is a stylized collection of feather brushes. These were made specifically for Manga Studio and Clip Studio Paint, and help you capture the airiness of digital feathers

This brush kit contains:

• 20 feather brushes for Manga Studio or Clip studio Paint

Tashiro Freebie Feathers

These versatile feather images are created for use in multiple applications, such as Photoshop, Procreate, Illustrator, Affinity Design, and more. Each is distinct and can be layered on top of feather textures created with brushes to create a unique finish.

With this set, you’ll receive:

• 11 cut-out feather PNGs

Stylized Feather Brushes for ZBrush

For 3D artists learning how to draw feather texture, creating a feather from scratch can be an even greater challenge than for 2D. This ready-to-go set of feathers can give you an assist. These stylized feathers were curated for the Harbinger of Death project, and can be used in ZBrush to create a nuanced model.

The bundle includes:

• 1 IMM 9-feather brush
• 1 VDM 5-feather brush
• 1 Zbrush file
• 1 FBX file for previous versions of Zbrush

IMM Curve Feather Brush Bundle

This discounted bundle contains stylized IMM curve feather brushes that you can use in ZBrush. The models are made of meshes that consist of quad polygons and triangles so that you can easily subdivide them if necessary.

This set contains:

• Stylized feather brushes
• 12 meshes for ZBrush (.ztl)

IMM Feathers Brushes

This bundle is another series of IMM feather brushes for ZBrush. As a user-friendly tool, brushes can be directly dragged and dropped onto any surface in ZBrush.

The kit consists of:

• 1 IMM feather brush
• 1 multi-feather brush
• 1 single feather brush
• 5 feather reference images

64 VDM Feather Brushes for ZBrush

This comprehensive brush set for ZBrush contains 64 feather brushes within a single multi-mesh, low-poly-mesh brush. With embedded settings, this brush is just as easy to use as the others—artists can simply drag and drop onto the surface they desire.

This feather set contains:

• 1 IMM multi-VDM brush
• 13 images of the brushes
• 6 images of applied textures

Note: These brushes are compatible with ZBrush 2018 and later.

Bird Feather

This feather mesh, measuring 4 cm in height, consists of 159,706 triangular faces. The mesh contains no holes, inverted faces, or contiguous edges, meaning it’s ready to 3D print if needed.

In this kit, you’ll receive:

• Print-ready feather mesh (.blend, .stl., obj., .fbx)

Good Feather

This second feather mesh measures 3.7cm in height and therefore has a slightly lower poly-count, made up of 141,524 triangular faces. The mesh also doesn’t consist of any holes, inverted faces, or contiguous edges, making it ready to print.

This pack includes:

• Print-ready feather mesh (.blend, .stl., obj., .fbx)

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