The best way for me would be to use brushes with the layer set to multiply or darken.

Quote - "Hello all; Im trying to get more into Photoshop, right now I only know how to size a picture use the brightness/contrast tool crop tool and apply filters to the overall picture. I would like to learn how to apply brushes and have them fit in to the picture so that they look as part of the piece not something pasted on to it. Can some of you send me links to tut's that will help me learn? Thanks much Steel "

I don't know of any links but I can tell you that when you are applying the brushes always experiment with the later adjustments, specifically "color burn, color dodge, overlay and softlight". Those seem to help better with blending the brushes in with the image that you are creating.

Off topic, your photography is gorgeous nattarious, beautiful work!

I'm so glad I came across this post. I've had this exact problem for a long time now and couldn't figure it out. I followed these exact steps and everything is perfect. Thanks so much for sharing!

Thanks Deb!

These were among some of my favorites - 2D: http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=606&ShowQuestion=19261 http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=606&ShowQuestion=19208 http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=606&ShowQuestion=19193 http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=606&ShowQuestion=18798 http://www.renderosity.com/contest.ez?contest_id=606&ShowQuestion=18722

This happens to me as well with Photoshop 7 and CS. I read here - http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=123320 - that my monitor might need calibrating so I tried that with still no luck.

I think I know what you might be looking for. There is a tutorial just like what you described here - http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/11629793/ I hope that helps!