I really want to marry Geometry Nodes with an output to brush texture and brush mask texture as well as for stencils for Mask tool. It seems only logical that we could use GN to make brush tips and work up complicated textures that would be mathematically akin to smart materials. I might be dreaming though, but it is a nice dream.
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Well we can get attributes into shader nodes so it is not too far fetched to want to get them into texture nodes. I am pretty sure the everything nodes thing will slowly grow like weeds!
When I think of how Blender has progressed since 2.4 (when I started) I see a bright future, lets hope that texture paint is not left till last.
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Heck yeah.
Also, I posted up a legacy style addon called āSave Plusā to address at least the saving/packing of image paintings when saving the file. If you get a minute, could you try it out and give me feedback? Itās not too complicated, but I wonder if it is better or if itr creates more problems.
Have downloaded and I will give it a try, although I am very good at saving images before closing (due to having fallen down in the past). 
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I tried to install the addon but I can not see it in my addon list. It is in the addon folder alongside Brick Tricks but does not show up in the addon list.
I also treid the drag and drop method, I got the message ādo you want to installā and left checked activate after installation but no joy either.
I think it does not install properly (4.3) it should be listed.
Is there a menu or something from it I should see UI?
Just in case, I also tried texpainting saving the file (but not the image and ā¦ Image lost.
My fault. The main file inside the folder should be named init.py if it is to be installed by zip as legacy, but the easier way is to unzip it and install from save_plus.py. Iāll fix it when I get back home.
That sounds like painting with gradient set to multiple color stops. I do that in D2P with an operator to create gradient from palette, and I have an opposite one to create palette from gradient stops. Set a gradient and use pressure to change colors.
Iām glad this thread was created.
I believe the most urgent need is to support 3D brushes that are only available in sculpt mode. Image paint, vertex paint, and weight paint all rely solely on a simple projection method. This was the most surprising aspect when I switched to Blender. It was the first program I encountered that only had projection-based brushes. Iāve been using Blender for over two years, but this area feels the most lacking.
I sincerely hope that development related to painting will be revitalized.
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Yes, the code exists and quite possibly can be used for an approach like that.
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https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/issues/109820
It has some amazing plans laid out, but they have been left untouched for over a year. Compared to the dazzling advancements in other areas, the painting field seems to be lagging behind and hasnāt received much attention yet. I look forward to the day when all the checkboxes on this page are filled. 
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There had been a plan on making a brush engine where you could make live adjustments and see the brush stroke update in the preview engine, but that didnāt materialize so far. I think something like that could be built on geo nodes, but that would take some effort to connect to a brush like the texture editor is/was.
I need to look at that list and see what else is there.
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Texture painting + Layered Textures + Texture Nodes + Baking would be lovely.
As much as Ucupaint is nice, I feel every add-on built on top of what exists currently is terribly limited by Blenderās underlying structure.
I guess the right order to make this all work would be to focus first on on one hand bringing 3d brushes to painting mode; on the other, introducing layered textures in order to have a native, performant solution for managing multiple layers and baking them.
Then, once these are done, weād need texture nodes to create filters, brushes and proper procedural textures, plus generators for masking with things like ambient occlusion, edge masking, etc.
One can dream.
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One of the big things to come from having Brush Assets is that now the Paint Gradient on your brush is unique as a property and not shared across all brushes!
In 4.2 and previous, every brush shares the same gradient data so making two brushes with āuse gradientā and trying to set individual gradients wouldnāt work - that was why I always copied and pasted them into colorramp nodes. Still do.
In 4.3, I open a brush and set a gradient to the brush color and use pressure only for the gradient and have some fun with random colors from the stops as I vary pressure. Then I go to a new brush asset and there you go, a default black to white gradient waiting for me to make new color stops and not affecting the previous brush!!
I am excited for the future!
Just a heads-up: thereās an official Blender survey with questions on what BF should focus on:
I did my part 
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Stupid addons section only looks at a few lines of the exte4nsions and nothing legacy and no way to include my own. Oh well.
edit: had to do a find and replace to remove all the ābl_ext.blender_org.ā so there would be enough characters available
Ok it installs now and works, hit save+ and automatically packs or saves to saved image location.
My thoughts on it are that you have to remember to use save+ which is similar to remembering to save the image in the first place (or taking notice of the āunsaved Imageā warning).
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Yes, I guess unless I commandeer the actual save and replace it with save+, there is little difference other than a convenience for those that remember to use it. If enough people express an interest in this being default behavior (maybe modified to only work on Fake User images) then maybe someone above in the Dev community might think to change Save to do this as well.
Iām not that high level of a power user yet.
I suspect that this has already been discussed by the devs and they decided on the āunsaved imageā warning as the compromise.
Many new users fall down on not saving their images until they get used to it but I can see a problem if Blender were to save things by default.
For example you open a file a do a doodle on your image texture that you do not like, then you do some important edits on geometry and save the file, your image texture has been overwritten with the doodle you did not want to save.
So if Blender automatically saves images you would probably need a counter warning āBlender is about to overwrite your image texture, are you sure you want to save that silly doodle?ā
Either way the user needs to be conscious of what they are saving in terms of image textures.
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That is why I just use my Save/Pack All operator after having initially saved the start canvas to disk, and I still feel that new users coming from Photoshop or Illustrator need to get used to the separation of File of 3d scene properties versus image properties. They want to save a file and nothing else, butā¦ yeah.
Well, at least now maybe we can say to them āif you must, hereās a way. Youāll change your mind, thoughā.
The performance of the brushes in 4.3 feels better, even when I set up procedural brush mask textures and add image textures to the brush. The only weird thing is somewhere along the timeline in the past, we lost access to the angle of the occlusion - I could swear a long time ago I could adjust angle to help the brush paint through when the Backface Culling and Occlusion were off. Paint through Sauzanne and her cheeks stop the brush but the line does coninue after a break.
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I decided to feel like a Blender ādeveloperā and did it:
This was my second attempt to write something in Blender, and again I realized that I understood almost nothing.
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