Applying An Image To The Stamp Blank

Before you can carve an image onto your rubber stamp, you need to imprint a copy of that image onto the surface of the rubber to use as a guide.  And it needs to be mirror-imaged as you look at the rubber, so that it comes out correct when stamped.

There are several ways to put the image onto the rubber.  The most obvious, perhaps, is to simply draw it on the rubber in the first place.  This will work, but only with the most simplistic of image designs.  Even those pretty good with a pencil are likely to find drawing backwards on a rubber surface to be less than ideal.

The next idea is only slightly more complicated, but it works ever so much better.  Draw your image on paper with a No. 2 pencil, then lay the paper face down on the rubber and rub the back side.  This will transfer enough of the graphite to the rubber to make a clear image for carving.  Among other advantages, you're drawing oriented correctly, not mirror-imaged, because the rubber ends up with the necessary mirror-image orientation after rubbing.

And another idea follows logically from that one: using any image on paper, just carefully trace over that image with a No. 2 pencil, then transfer it onto the rubber.  This method opens up a world of opportunities, since pretty much any image you can find can be traced with a pencil and then rubbed onto rubber. 

In the specific example of images found in a newspaper, there's no need to trace.  Newspaper ink will transfer onto the rubber just fine.

If you're dealing with a digital image on a computer, you can edit it and scale it to whatever size is needed before printing and tracing.  The option of making an image whatever size you wish may alone be enough to warrant scanning the image and then printing it rather than working with the original.  The fact that you can mess up a couple of times and just print the image out again is another.

Once you have the image on the computer in digital format, it seems a waste to have to trace the printed image with a low-tech No. 2 pencil just to be able to transfer it.  And the quality of the image transferred to the rubber is dependent on how good you are at tracing, but it will inherently never be as accurate and detailed as the original.  The computer is doing an excellent job of applying the ink in exactly the right places; wouldn't it be a better idea to figure out how to get it to apply that ink to the rubber?

It turns out to be quite possible, and works well.  However, whether you're working with an inkjet printer or a laser printer makes a world of difference here.  The methods of transferring the image that work with one will not work with the other.  So, read whichever section of the following applies to you:


LASER PRINTERS

A laser printer works by depositing a very fine black plastic powder (toner) onto paper and then heating it enough to cause the plastic to melt into the paper.  There are two general ways to get the toner from the paper onto the surface of the rubber: solvents and heat.

The most common solvent used here is acetone, which dissolves plastic like gangbusters.  One idea is to simply lay the paper with the printed image face down on the rubber and soak the paper with a bit of acetone, and the toner will quickly dissolve and be deposited onto the rubber.  The acetone will also dissolve the rubber if applied too liberally or left too long, so be careful.  After exposure to acetone, some people complain that the rubber becomes sticky, but if you just set it aside for a while the acetone will usually evaporate back out of the rubber and all will be well.  Some also suggest rinsing the rubber with water, since acetone is miscible in water and will be rinsed away.

 Reportedly a better choice for solvent is xylene from a "blender pen", available at crafts stores.  Carburetor cleaner has also been suggested.

Some have found the acetone dissolves the toner too well when applied to the paper, so they suggest another method:  Perform the "acetone scrub" on the surface of the rubber as described on the Stamp Blank page, then -- quickly -- press the printed image onto the rubber while it's still soft from the acetone.  The acetone diffused in the rubber itself will be enough to cause some of the toner to dissolve and stick to the rubber.

The other possibility involves laying the paper with the printed image on the rubber and heating the back side with an iron.  The toner is designed to melt; you're just remelting it.  Obviously you want to be careful not to melt the rubber.

The problem with the ironing method is that it works better with some toners than others; in general, the older toners (for older printers and copiers) work well, the newer toners for full-color machines not so well.  This is because the newer toners are designed not only to melt but to "set", once melted they don't easily melt again.  With these toners, an iron simply won't work; you'd have to get it hot enough to melt the rubber itself, and then the paper sticks to the rubber and you have a mess to clean up.

If you don't have a suitable laser printer but want to try these transfer methods, just run your printed image through a Xerox machine and use the copy.  A copier works exactly the same way as a laser printer.  It's usually not too difficult to find a copier that uses the old-style toner that can be remelted with an iron.



INKJET PRINTERS

Once inkjet ink soaks into paper, it doesn't want to come back out.  Reportedly the carburetor cleaner might work.  Acetone definitely does not.

Alternatively, print the image onto something that the ink cannot soak into.  One possibility is the clear plastic sheets intended for printing overhead transparencies.  The sheets intended for inkjet printers have a coating on one side to make the ink stick; print your design on the other side by putting the sheet into the paper tray upside down.  Alternatively, buy the clear sheets intended for laser printers, as they are smooth on both sides.

One problem with transparency sheets is that they are expensive and often come in a box of a zillion.  What may work better is to buy one of those report folders with a clear plastic front cover, and just cut the clear plastic front cover off and use that.  It'll be smooth on both sides.

Another suggestion is to get a sheet of peel-and-stick labels, peel all the labels off of it, and print onto that slick backing that normally just gets thrown away.

One more possibility: you can take a piece of clear packing tape and stick it down on a sheet of paper and run that through the printer.  You must be careful that the image prints onto the tape, obviously.  The easy way might be to run a draft print on paper first, put the tape over the image, then print again without changing any of the print location or size settings.

Inkjet printing on smooth plastic is problematic, so you may need to make some trials to see what works best for you with your printer.  Sometimes printing in black doesn't work well, because the inkjet just spits it onto the plastic and it blobs into a mess.  What may work better is to alter the file so it's not black but really close, like very dark blue.  That forces the inkjet printer to print in color mode instead of B&W so it slowly and carefully applies one row of ink dots at a time to form the image.  This can make a world of difference.  If your inkjet printer can be forced into a "photo quality mode", try that.

In other cases, problems occur because the inkjet simply applies too much ink, it ends up a blob.  In this case, you might try putting the printer into "draft" mode so it applies only a light dusting of ink.  Another idea is to edit the image to make it gray rather than black, which is another way to get it to apply less black ink; it may help to direct your printer to print it using black ink only, because sometimes the printer will try to put gray together using colored inks.

Even when the ink is applied uniformly, you may watch in frustration as the ink migrates around on the surface of the plastic until it coagulates into globs before it dries.  The problem is the smooth surface of the plastic.  Ideally what you'd like is a "frosted" or matte surface rather than shiny, something that the ink would stay in place on.  Using some very fine sandpaper or perhaps abrasive cleanser, go over one side of your cellophane as uniformly as possible, using motions in various directions.  Hold the cellophane up to see the reflection to check the finish.

When you've done it right, the image will appear perfectly clear and distinct on the cellophane with no blobbiness or other mess.  If it's not right, just wipe the ink off the cellophane and try again.  The ink will come right off with a bit of household spray cleaner, even from the cellophane sheet that you have buffed up.

After printing, lay the sheet aside for a few minutes to dry.

Once dry, just "stamp" the rubber onto the cellophane sheet and the image will transfer onto the rubber.  You can do this either upside down or right side up.  If you do it upside down, you can see the rubber through the cellophane so you can line it up right.  You'll need to apply pressure uniformly, though, so use a block or something to press the cellophane onto the rubber.  It also helps to set the unused portion of the cellophane on something the same thickness as the stamp so it sits flat as you stamp it.

Lining it up when stamping right side up is more challenging.  Draw some guidelines on a sheet of white paper, perhaps the outline of the blank.  Lay the plastic sheet with the image printed on it over this piece of paper, line up the image so it's properly positioned within the guidelines and hold the sheets in position with a clipboard.  Carefully line up your stamp blank over the image on the clear plastic sheet and stamp it.

If it gets messed up, wipe all the ink off of both the plastic sheet and the rubber (use some household spray cleaner to get it off), print the image on the plastic sheet again, and try it again.  You can keep trying over and over until you get it right.  If you plan to screw up a lot, you can print the image a half dozen times on the plastic sheet to begin with.

Sometimes the colored inkjet ink works better than the black ink for this transfer step.  In fact, if you print the image with both black and colored inks (no reason not to, any color will work to show you where to carve!), you may find the colored areas transferred fine while the black did not.

If you have trouble getting all the ink off the rubber between attempts, put a little acetone on a paper towel and wipe it.  This will take all the ink off instantly, but note that the acetone will also dissolve the rubber itself if you leave it in contact for any length of time.  Just wiped quickly, though, this solvent action is a good thing; it dissolves only the surface of the rubber and then evaporates quickly whereupon the rubber surface solidifies again, leaving the surface perfectly smooth and ready for work.

When you do it right, pressing the rubber onto the image on the plastic sheet will leave a mirror-image print on the rubber -- which, after you cut it out, will make a non-mirror-image print when you stamp it.  Then you can then wipe all the remaining ink off the plastic sheet so you can use the same plastic sheet over and over.

If you are using the outline idea for your image, you might consider hand-coloring in the image on the rubber with a marker to make it more apparent which areas need to be cut away when carving.






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