TIPsy Tuesday - Selecting the right ink

Have you ever had an acrylic stamp or a rubber stamp for that matter that just wouldn't ink up very well? When I received the Whoo Loves You? set last week, I just had to put it work right away. My first image though didn't show up that great. I tried again with another type of ink and got a wonderful image. I did more experimenting and here is what I learned:

1. New acrylic stamps may have some residue left from manufacture that needs to be cleaned off. It will wear off in time but to speed up the process use a clean pencil eraser over the stamps. Papertrey Ink had suggested this in their instructions but I actually found it more necessary on the another companies set.

2. When stamping with this new stamp before using the eraser, Papertrey's Hybrid Ink worked the best. Stampin' Up's Craft Ink was the next best in adhering to acrylic. Dye inks like SU!'s Classic Ink pads performed the poorest. (I have also found Stazon Ink to work great on Acrylic but because it stains my stamps and has a limited color selection, it is not my first choice.) Dye inks, such as Stampin' Up! classic and Ranger, are great for distressing.

3. To get dye ink to adhere to acrylic, stamp first in Versamark and then in dye ink. The Versamark gives the dye ink something to cling to. I can't remember where I heard that wonderful tip but it works. In this photo, the card on the left was my first stamp from this set. The one on the right was made using this technique. Both are stamped in SU!'s Riding Hood Red classic ink on the same cardstock. You will always get better results with SU! products on their whisper white or very vanilla cardstocks than on colored cardstock.

4. For the card above with the cloud of hearts design, I used Fluid Chalk Ink from Clearsnap (Colorbox). This cat's eye style palette has several shades of reds and pinks together in small easy to use applicators. You can also buy these individually. I've often read on-line or heard in videos about how great chalk ink was for stamping and I'm certainly a believer after trying this out on the tree and the heart cloud above. The heart cloud had never been used nor had I gone over the surface with an eraser. I just inked it up in chalk ink and got great results. The only downside I found to chalk is that it takes a little more effort to clean off the stamp.

I used Papertrey's Hybrid ink for the greeting. It was a little fuzzy in the chalk ink.

5. Also, place something soft under your paper when stamping with acrylic stamps. Wood mounted rubber stamps have a cushion layer built into them. Acrylic on acrylic blocks do not. One of my stamper friends, Betsy, recommends using that white thin foam that comes in packaging. I had some that my Cricut was wrapped in. Place a couple layers of this under your papers when stamping.


These are just my experiences with a few acrylic stamps. I plan to continue my experiments to decide which type of ink I want to invest in future. Also, I want to do more experimenting on a variety of surfaces. Pigment Ink, such as Stampin' Up! craft, has proven very good on a variety of surface in the past. I'd like to try the fluid chalk and hybrid ink's as well.

Summary of benefits:

Dye Ink such as SU! classic and Ranger distressing inks - great for detailed images such as greetings, dries immediately, distressing ink

Pigment Ink such as SU! craft - works on a wide range of surfaces, allows easy embossing (so you don't have to buy a lot of separate embossing powders)

Hybrid Ink such as Papertrey ink - great coverage on both acrylic and rubber. Can do embossing if you work very quickly.

Fluid Chalk Ink such as Colorbox by Clearsnap - great coverage on both acrylic and rubber. dries quickly.

Ingredients: Stamps: Whoo Loves You? by Hampton Art

Ink: Scarlet Jewel, Aqua Mist by PTI; Riding Hood Red, Rose Red and Cameo Coral by SU!; Cat's Eye by Colorbox in

Paper: Aqua Mist by PTI; Chocolate Chip, Whisper White by SU!

DSP: Garden Green by SU!