Crafts by Carolyn - Stamping with Colour

Introduction to Rubber Stamping - stamping with colour
Continuing the beginners guide to stamping, here is a quick guide to stamping with colour. Once you have mastered the art of stamping there are loads of different places that have advanced techniques, I love to view the Hero Arts blog and they often have videos. I have put a selection of images on this page to give you more ideas The stamping section on the forum has lots of advice on techniques: rubber stamping forum
So now you have learnt to stamp, I thought I would give a few tips on stamping without it being too complicated, just to get your confidence. But at the same time produce something a little bit different.... you just need to use a different colour ink pad. Check out this page for some more information about different types of ink pads. The Vintage Style I enjoy using ‘vintage’ style stamps on ivory card and using a brown ink pad. You can make lovely cards if you select you stamps carefully - just finish them with some embellishments, just maybe ink the edges in brown and then mount it with suitable papers or coloured card. I used Sepia from the Ranger archival.
	OR Any colour will do So still very vintage but using a copper/pink tone pad - this was only a little cube. The lace completes the vintage theme - we bought this via the forum as a bulk buy and shared it! The shading was with Distress inks, but chalks or other inks would work too, or just stamped on ivory card would have taken the harshness of the white away. The little cubes or cats eyes ink pads are absolutely fine to use with stamps and can give you access to a range of colours at a better price. Just try and keep them as level as possible, and tap lightly. If your stamps are large you may prefer to use larger pads.
	<--So still with a 'vintage ' stamp but bringing it up to date with a bright pink dye ink pad. This one is Raspberry from the Adirondack range. The papers are in the free download section. Or how about this lovely sailboat stamped in blue to match the water theme? This is another Adirondack dye based ink 'Stonewashed' --->
Stamping on Coloured Card As your first purchase is probably a black ink pad you can add another dimension by using coloured card, I have simply mounted this deckchair onto another piece of coloured card. Also I have stamped the flip flops onto patterned paper and cut around the image - sometimes people refer to this as paper piecing - choose a simply shaped image for ease of cutting .
Same stamp - more than once If you only have one stamp - make it go further by using it more than once - seen here on coloured card.		Give it a go I hope that this has given you some inspiration to have a go with limited supplies...once you have mastered the art I am sure you will be keen to learn more.