Has anyone ever tried to carve a wooden stamp? I was just wondering if it would work. Would you use a different kind of ink or prime the surface to accept the usual inks?
Anyone who knows some ins and outs of this, I would appreciate some information.

't'
dtandfambly

I know of a box which had a stamp that was originally carved in wood. Eventually, they also put a rubber version in. Having had the experience to use both, the wood one inked up awful, the rubber one like you would expect.

I have no idea if you could treat the wood, but the only one I've ever used looked pretty bad.

I'm looking forward to other replies to this. I'd also like to know if carving the wood block linoleum that comes with some sets of speedballs works for carving stamps. My thoughts on this was that you'd probably have to lay the page on the stamp, rather than vice versa

Mr. Yuk of Team KPI

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Has anyone ever tried to carve a wooden stamp? I was just wondering if it would work. Would you use a different kind of ink or prime the surface to accept the usual inks?

I haven't carved any, but I have found a few... I personally have a very difficult time getting a good image in my logbook. Unfortunately, on the trail, I am limited as to which inks I carry, etc. One time, we could not get a good image at all, and ended up just taking a picture of the stamp!

If you are going to plant a wooden stamp, I would suggest noting it in the clues, so at least seekers might be able to bring another type of ink.

~SHH :-)

Ideally, I would like to figure out a way to make one work with regular inks, either the ink pads or markers.

't'
dtandfambly

what about carving a very simple image and then painting over it with that plastic stuff you dip tool handles in? That would give the stamp a rubberey surface... I think that stuff might come in a spray, too...not sure.

night writer

I've only found one wooden stamp, and my experience has been similar to that of KPI--it was a great looking stamp, but just would not ink up and transfer well.

One of the things to keep in mind, if you do decide to try this, is that wood is probably going warp a bit when out in the outdoors because of weather conditions. That being the case, the wood is likely to have an uneven surface with which to stamp.

If you do manage to figure out how to get the stamp to transfer properly, I think I'd leave instructions on how you accomplished the feat. Like the suggestion about pressing the paper to the stamp instead of the usual method, if that happens to work.

It was pretty frustrating for me when we found the stamp that didn't transfer well. As I said, the carving itself looked great, and I wish the image in my logbook could have reflected that.

Pied Piper

Re: the linoleum: horrible, horrible stuff for stamps. I carved our first stamps on this. It's incredibly hard to carve, requiring a lot of leverage, which makes it easy to skip along and make mistakes. And the images are pretty crummy, too, especially with stamp-pad ink (as opposed to print-making ink or paint).

Re: wood stamps. I think one way you could facilitate better-image-getting would be to include in the box a piece of neoprene (like wetsuit material or part of a mouse pad), and people could place that UNDER the paper, then stamp onto that. It would be a uniform, firm-yet-giving surface with which to get the stamp. But then keeping the neoprene from getting water-logged would create another obstacle. Sorry, just thinking out loud. Good luck with it. It's definitely worth messing about with if you've got the time and interest.

daofdxm

Thanks for all of your ideas/suggestions. There is a lot to think about and probably a good reason rubber makes good stamps. It's fun to mess around with carving once you get into this. But leaving a stamp outdoor over time also creates the warping issue, something I hadn't thought of.
Is there ANYONE out there at all who has had a good experience with a wooden stamp in the field? If so, what do you think made that stamp different?

't'
dtandfambly

I asked the same question sometime back. The general opinion was that you needed an ink that was thicker/pasty/gooey...you get the idea. That's the kind of ink that newspapers are printed with. I think that wood stamps are workable but not the same as rubber. Afterall that's what news papers were printed with years ago.

Shiloh

When I was teaching crafting classes, I acquired two antique stamps that were carved from wood. They were made to imprint patterns on fabric.

I've used them on walls and to leave impressions in handmade paper. The only time I used them to print on paper, I had to use a brayer and printing ink, laying the paper on the stamps and using a mouse pad to apply pressure. It came out pretty cool though and we did a few sheets to share with others who were attending the scrapbooking event. We let others play with it and some of them liked the hit and miss patterns created with stamping inks.

If you put this in the field, (someone else already suggested this) you could cut a piece of mouse pad just bigger than your image and include that in your box. The finder can put this under the page in their book and should be able to get an image from the stamp. Smaller is better as there is less room for uneven pressure to be a problem.

Just my two cents,
Tee

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Re: wood stamps. I think one way you could facilitate better-image-getting would be to include in the box a piece of neoprene (like wetsuit material or part of a mouse pad), and people could place that UNDER the paper, then stamp onto that. It would be a uniform, firm-yet-giving surface with which to get the stamp. But then keeping the neoprene from getting water-logged would create another obstacle. Sorry, just thinking out loud. Good luck with it. It's definitely worth messing about with if you've got the time and interest.

Craft foam works great as well. I now keep a piece in my log book for wood stamps, wood backed stamps, or just hard to get a good image stamps.

Maiden

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Craft foam works great as well. I now keep a piece in my log book for wood stamps, wood backed stamps, or just hard to get a good image stamps.

Gee, that's a really good idea....

Sheba

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Is there ANYONE out there at all who has had a good experience with a wooden stamp in the field? If so, what do you think made that stamp different?

Well the only thing good about it was that it was different. It stamped-up horribly, though. See:

http://www.atlasquest.com/boards/message.html?gMsgId=55553