Stamping Ink on Polymer Clay

Stamping Ink on Polymer Clay

There are a lot of tutorials for stamping on polymer clay on the web all using various techniques and inclusions, for this post I'm going to be covering a simply tutorial by Sculpey for the Asian Bead Bracelet, this tutorial is for a simple technique of stamping ink onto polymer clay beads.

I have tried stamping ink on polymer clay previously though unsuccessfully I might add.  This could have been due to the fact I was using an ink pad I had simply picked up in a local craft shop, as it would never dry and my work would always end up smudged. I later discovered that for clay it is better to use a solvent type ink as they are permanent on porous surfaces such as clay and they dry quite quickly.

Staz on ink pad and musical note themed stamp

The ink I am using for this project is Staz On, not the easiet to get hold of here in the UK, as it seemed to be sold out everywhere.  I am also using a new musical stamp (rather than an asian stamp) for this tutoiral as I have some future plans for this theme.

The clay is prepared and the beads bases are covered in white ready for my project and stamp application.

 Once the beads are prepped and ready, I stamp the musical stamp onto the beads by following the project instuctuions of inking the stamp and placing the bead onto the stamp as you can see the transference of the inked stamp was not totally successful for me using this method, some beads have become blurred and yet some faded.







As I was'nt have'nt much success with this method I decided to to ink the area of the stamp I wanted to use and carefully press it onto my beads, which produced a much better result in the stamping.

As mentioned above I have some ideas for this stamp so I stamped a sheet of clay also, here the top stamped area was pressed lightly with my fingers, the second stamp area was pressed using a slightly heavier object.

I honestly thought this would be an easy project, but trying to the get a decent print from the stamp can be quite tricky, which personally I found frustrating as I hate to waste clay.  It definitely takes some careful application of your stamp to the clay to get decent and usable results.  I also wonder now if maybe the music stamp was maybe slightly too busy for working with clay, but I'm really pleased with the Staz On ink pad as it dried very quickly.

The beads are now being cooked and the finished results will be added soon.

Updated (a little later)

Here is my finished bracelet from my project, I think a little more practice is needed with the stamped application and maybe some different shaped beads for a future project would work well.

Polymer Clay Bracelet Stamped Inks on Clay

And what happened with my clay sheet

Polymer Clay Charms with stamped Ink on Clay

Well for a future project I created these little round stamped musical charms and a pendant with the remaining sheet.

Part of Handmade Monday with Handmade Harbour

Resources

• The tutorial used for this project was Asian Bead Bracelet by Sculpey