Lightroom Brush Presets: How To Install Them

by Gavin Seim: With the introduction of Lightroom2, we now have localized corrections with brushes, for neat things like exposure, brightness, clarity etc. I made some pre-designed brushes for Burn, Dodge, Skin Soft ect. Nothing fancy, just simple functional brushes.

~Download my FREE brush presets on my effects blog~

  • Here’s How to install them…
    Adobe has not made a really simple way to import the brushes, but it’s not that hard. Just follow these directions. This is a bit of a workaround. I’ll update it when Adobe makes an easier way. I’m on a Mac, but it will be basically the same for you Win users. Shortcuts are in parenthesis, and remember you can click any image for a big view.

Step 1:
Go to your “Develop”  module (D) and open your presets panel on the left. Right click on one of your develop presets. This will bring up the contextual menu and from there click “Show In Finder” or on a Windows machine it should say something like “Show In My Computer”.

install lr brush presets2 Lightroom Brush Presets: How To Install Them

Alternatively, you can get to the presets storage folder by simply going to Lightroom Preferences (Settings) then to the preset tab. Click the button that says “Show Lightroom Presets Folder” (see image below).

prefs Lightroom Brush Presets: How To Install Them

Step 2:
Now you’ve brought up the folder that contains your develop presets. Now that we need to back out of that folder to it’s parent folder. In the parent folder you should find the “Local Adjustment Presets” folder. Simply drag, or paste your brush presets into the “Local Adjustment Presets” folder, then restart Lightroom.

install lr brush presets3 Lightroom Brush Presets: How To Install Them

install lr brush presets4 Lightroom Brush Presets: How To Install Them

Step 3:
When your back in Lightroom you can simply go to the “Develop”  module (D) and select the “Adjustment Brush” (K) Click the the “Effect:” menu/drop-down. You’ll get the brushes drop-down and inside you’ll see a few defaults, as well as the new brushes you just added.

install lr brush presets5 Lightroom Brush Presets: How To Install Them

install lr brush presets6 Lightroom Brush Presets: How To Install Them

It’s that simple, using this method you can download and install brush presets to your hearts content. You can also save your own brush presets from the same menu.

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4 Responses to “Lightroom Brush Presets: How To Install Them”


  1. 1 Muriel

    I followed the steps to install your LR Brush Presets and only Soften Skin showed up. It seems the others might be corrupted? Or, is it because I am using LR2.2?

  2. 2 prophotoshow

    Well these are general install instructions for brush presets, but they work for the free presets I have on Seim Effects as well.

    I have 2.2 and the same presets are working fine. I would check the folder LR stores them in and make sure their in there. It’s also possible something went wrong unzipping and you corrupted them, but other than that you must have another bug and they seem to be working fine for people.

    Good luck getting it pinned down… Gav

  3. 3 Char

    I had the same problem. Turned out the extension .lrtemplate was clipped on unzipping. So used file rename to complete the extension – lrtemplate

  4. 4 Terry Fiell

    I am haveing the same problem of getting only the soft skin preset for light room. I cannot find as to why. Any other Ideas. I am useing Light Room 2.3

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