Tutorial: Creating a Digital Stamp Brush from a Photo

[SteinwaysMom]

One fun thing you can do in Photoshop is create a brush that turns a photograph into a 'rubber stamp'. I love the look of rubber stamp art so doing it digitally is really fun.

Click here for the tutorial (http://www.scrapartist.com/ctm/tutorial/PST_DigitalStampFromPhoto.pdf).

Here are a couple examples:

Grandma Wedding (Stamp image on lower right) (http://www.scrapartist.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=10516&cat=500&ppuser=2520)
Betty Blue (Stamp image on tag) (http://www.scrapartist.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=10334&cat=500&ppuser=2520)
Timeless Beauty (http://www.scrapartist.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=9978&cat=500&ppuser=2520)

Let me know if this was helpful & clear. Thanks!:)

[Vania16]

Looks great to me! What a fun technique! Thanks for sharing :)

[happyrobyn]

Great tut Debra!

[angleigh]

What a great tutorial..thanks!

[kygirl]

This is so much fun. Now, I'm stamping everything. Thanks for sharing.

[jezleave]

OMG, I am sooo impressed with myself, lol! :D I thought making brushes would be really hard, but this was so simple. While I was on a cruise, I took pictures of some really beautiful art they were selling on board. I took out the background on one and made it into a brush/stamp. It turned out, soooo beautiful.

Now, when I learn how to post my work :rolleyes:, I will show it to you. ;)

[DragonFly]

Great tutorial but...I can't DO IT...=(

Do you have to resize your photo first...when I went to put it on a new document my photo was WAY bigger...HELP!

I am just starting to do more in PSCS 8 (I believe) so not to familiar with the tools etc.

TIA for all the help!

ETA: I have made a brush from a photo in PSP 7.04 be4 so I know it is similar to that but PSCS is way confusing right now for me..=P

[happyrobyn]

Karon - once you get the hang of it, it's not too hard. Make sure both of your canvases are in the same dpi. And if you need to re-size the stamped image because it is too large, you can do this right in the brush tip properties. Just slide the slider over to the size (in pixels) that you want the stamped image to be.

I hope this helps a little. Once you get the hang of it, it is pretty easy.

[DragonFly]

Thanks Robyn...will try this out this weekend when Kai is out with his Dad...=P

[happyrobyn]

Just lemme know if you have questions.

[UnDecided]

this is great -- definitely want to try this one out!

[cellomom]

:eek: OK...this may be juice for another thread, but can you scan a rubber stamped image (a real stamped image) and manipulate it into a .png or an .abr? Basically I need to do baby shower invites and now it's getting late, so e-mailed ones would be great. But of course my original is stamped. Does any of this make sense (getting over a fever...brain not functioning well today!!)

(Even worse, after I typed all of this, I realized I could just scan the original and send that...duh!!!) But i'm still curious if you can change a rubber stamped image into a .png or an .abr...

TIA!

[Belles]

Cello mom you should be able to do that ok but I don't know how with the program you are using as I use mostly PSP9.

It is interesting how the different programs have different names for the same sort of thing.

In PSP9 to do what you have done here Debra I would make a mask from the photo and then I would merge the layers and copy and paste it and use it with a level of transparency in the layout of my choice.

PSP doesn't appear to allow brushes any bigger than 500 x 500 pixels to be made and saved so if I need to make a brush or anything akin to that I have to do it by making a mask.

I don't want to highjack your tutorial thread here Debra so I hope you don't mind -- I have a mask tutorial for PSP7 & 9 at the following site if anyone is interested.

http://groups.msn.com/BellesBeautyTuts/makingmasks.msnw

[steppedonalego]

This is fantastic.. thanks SO much.. you RAWK! :D

[20birds]

:( i cant get the link to tutorial to work

[DesignsByDiva]

I didn't get to see the tutorial because it gave me an error but I wanted to add that one thing to keep in mind while making photo brushes is that if you retain the original size the brush itself will be quite large in "weight" i.e. instead of the brush being a few KB they end up being many megs. Photoshop loads it's brushes as soon as you start the program. Having tons of brushes that are large will slow down the loading of the program and will slow it again each time you access any brush.

I do suggest you save your special brushes and only load them when you need them that way the program uses less resources.

If you like making brushes you should try making shapes! I have created shapes for all my standard elements like tags etc. The process is similiar but only can be created with items that are black and white, no grayscale at all. You pretty much follow the same process as creating a brush except you'll find that if it is only solid black and white without the grayscale you will have the option to turn the item into a shape.

Lastly, instead of creating brushes you also can create textures. You'll notice when you get ready to create your brush you'll see an option to define texture. Creating textures is great when you have a texture or otherwise that you want repeated evenly or to use as a fill.

There's very concise instructions on how to do either of them in the Photoshop's help system.

Barbie

[paintchip]

Bummer - I can't get the link to work either. :confused:

[digigal]

Is it possible to get this link (tut for stamps) to work? Thanks!

[SteinwaysMom]

:eek: OK...this may be juice for another thread, but can you scan a rubber stamped image (a real stamped image) and manipulate it into a .png or an .abr? Basically I need to do baby shower invites and now it's getting late, so e-mailed ones would be great. But of course my original is stamped. Does any of this make sense (getting over a fever...brain not functioning well today!!)

(Even worse, after I typed all of this, I realized I could just scan the original and send that...duh!!!) But i'm still curious if you can change a rubber stamped image into a .png or an .abr...

TIA!

Any image on a transparent BKD in Photoshop can be saved as a .PNg - just use SAVE AS in PHotoshop and use the .PNG option. PNGs are like JPGS with transparent bkds.

Or to save it as a brush, just use Edit-->Define Brush. I think you have to highlight the area you want saved as .ABR w/Rectangular marquee.