- 0. Carving Menu
- 1. Materials
- 2. Finding Images
- 3. Transfer Image
- 4. Carving the Stamp
- 5. Mounting
- 6. Samples
Stamp Carving 101
Finding Images: How to Search Online for Legal, Free Images to Carve
"But I can't draw!" is a familiar refrain. But you don't have to draw... there are millions of images out there that other people have already created that can be transferred to your carving block, and they're all just an Internet search away! If you're great at drawing your own images—on a computer or on paper—go for it. If you're like most of us, though, you'll need help.
Before I go on any further, I should mention that most images online do have copyright protections. While carving a stamp of Mickey Mouse may seem harmless for a letterbox, and you could even argue it's free publicity for Disney, they still have the right to sue you for copyright infringement. But logically, it seems absolutely absurd that Disney will hunt you down and sue because you carved a stamp of Mickey Mouse. You aren't profiting from using their image, you aren't mass-producing it and even if the Disney corporation somehow discovered that you carved a personal stamp of Mickey Mouse, they probably aren't going to care. Probably. Technically, if you want to make sure you're in good legal standing, though, you'd have to ask permission to use it—assuming there's nowhere on the website that gives you permission already.
The Internet has countless free images without copyright protections, though, so let's find some of those.
To increase the chances of finding images that are legal to use, try searching for 'turtle free', 'turtle royalty free' or something to that effect. This will not guarantee you will find free, legal images, but it might slant the search results in that direction.
If you want to modify an image, you'll need to use one of the options that allow modifications (or those that are in the public domain).
One caveat: These results are automated and to make certain your use of an image is 100% legal, you'll still have to check the website it came from to verify that the license Bing thinks applies to an image is the correct one.
If you want to insure that your use of the image is legal, click through to the website with the image for a terms of use page or contact information for permission.
I, for one, think turtles with bowties are cool, so I saved a copy of it locally to my computer.
Another option to modify the drawing is to add text. If you're carving a signature stamp, add your trailname to the stamp. If you're planting a letterbox somewhere, include the name of the park where you'll be hiding it. It'll give your stamp that extra wow factor and let people know that it's truly a 1-of-a-kind stamp!
For my drawing, I added a sombrero because what self-respecting tortuga wouldn't be wearing a sombrero? And a flashy trailname because a turtle with a sombrero should be nothing if not flashy!
I found the image of the sombrero just like I did with the turtle then merged the two images, and then added the text.
For your first stamps, you should stay far away from anything with text—even large, simple fonts are surprisingly difficult to do well.