How to Emboss with Rubber Stamps

Rubber stamping is a great craft hobby that is fun and easy to do. A wonderful way to enhance your rubber stamping projects is to emboss your stamped images, which will give your images a raised texture and a shiny appearance. Embossing is a fairly simple process. But be careful! It is very addictive!

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Rubber stamp
• Cardstock
• Pigment ink pad
• Embossing powder
• Craft heat tool
• Piece of scratch paper

1. Ink your rubber stamp with the pigment ink pad by holding the stamp with the image facing up and lightly tapping the ink pad on the stamp until the image has been inked evenly and completely.

2. Place your cardstock on top of your scratch paper. This scratch paper will catch your excess embossing powder so that you don't waste the powder.

3. Position your stamp above the cardstock where you would like the image to be placed and press the stamp on the cardstock applying firm and even pressure.

4. Lift the stamp straight up to remove it from the cardstock and reveal your stamped image.

5. Immediately pour the embossing powder over your stamped image. Very lightly and carefully shake the card so that the embossing powder spreads over the entire image. Then tilt the card so that the excess powder falls off the card and onto your scratch piece of paper. Lightly tap the card to remove any powder that might be clinging to your cardstock.

6. Place your card off to the side before using the heat tool. Fold your scratch piece of paper and funnel your excess embossing powder back into its container so as not to waste it!

7. On a heat resistant surface, turn on your heat gun and aim the heated air at your embossed image to melt the embossing powder and give your image that raised texture. Hold the heat gun at an angle a few inches away from the paper. Sweep it back and forth slowly to melt all of the embossing powder.

8. Once all the embossing powder has melted (it will look shiny), turn off the heat gun and let your card cool. You now have an embossed image!

Tips & Warnings

• Be sure to use PIGMENT ink when embossing. Pigment ink stays moist longer so that you can apply the embossing powder to the image before the ink dries. Dye based inks dry too quickly to be able to emboss.
• Both the inks and embossing powder comes in a variety of colors. It is better to use colored inks with clear embossing powder so that you don't end up with stray bits of colored embossing powder getting melted on areas where you don't want it.
• Use something like a bone folder or a ruler to hold down your cardstock while you're applying heat so that you don't burn your hands.
• If you don't have a heat gun, you can use your toaster or oven to melt the embossing powder. Don't turn the heat any higher than 250 degrees or you risk burning your paper as well.
• The heat tool gets very hot. So be careful when using the heat tool.