Help with Stamps?

I am trying to make a stamp. I have figured out what I want to put on it but can not figure out how to set this up for printing on the laser. I am going mad trying to find any information and I am not Inkscape smart nor AI. I can link my file to here is anyone can help explain it for me and also help. Thankyou!

Linking the file would be helpful, but here’s a couple of tips:

Remember to reverse your image after you’ve finished with it.
You will have to do some testing, but for this stuff from inventables I think I did full Pro power, full speed, 3 passes and had good results.
Typically, you’ll want to invert your image as well. That will laser away the parts you don’t want and leave the parts you do nice and untouched so they show up in your stamp.
Reverse your image.

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Hi! Stamps can be a little fiddly but, There are several examples in the forums.

My settings and source for making stamps from laserable rubber are here:

I just made another similar one in the last couple days with the same material and settings.

You likely want a bitmap rather than vector art. It would be an engrave with grayscale set to “vary power.”

You want the parts to be cut away to be black and the parts you want to keep to be white in the bitmap you engrave. This is usually the inverse of your original artwork.

You might also want to transition with a gradient between the black and white to create a slope to support the raised areas better, as described here:

We would probably need to see your design and know what you will be lasering (linoleum, rubber, craft foam, etc.) to give more specific advice.

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stamp_test2

The problem I am running into is trying to just get the laser to not laser it all. I am having the issue where the Red box is being engraved completely and the rest of it right after or if I ignore the rest of it all I am left with is a burned rectangle.

Yes, any fill color in a vector engrave will be lasered. You would need to subtract out the black parts of the design and leave only the red parts. You would do this in your design software - Illustrator or Inkscape.

I have been fighting with inkscape trying to subtract the logo and other stuff. I do not know what I am doing wrong to do it.

That’s a very complex image for a stamp - scribbles might look really cool, but they aren’t going to translate well into a stamp - the little bits will break off or smear easily.

This one is also a very advanced manipulation. Text has it’s own issues, and has to be handled in stages, and the scribble has to be combined and simplified before the subtraction…

You might be better off changing all of the black text and scribbles to white fill, and then just rasterizing the image. Add a cutline around it and it will do what you want it to do without having to create the vector equivalent.

(You can practice using the subtraction tools on something a little easier at first, and see what happens when you start having to deal with complex compound paths. I’m not that familiar with Inkscape so can’t give you anything more specific.) :neutral_face:

And…since I’m running a 6 hour print in stages ( and was bored), I ran up a vector version that might work (in Illustrator). I’m not sure the interface can handle it, or if it will work as a stamp, but you can give it a try.

Custom Designs Stamp.zip (288.5 KB)

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Thank you! I’ll give it a try when I get home.

I just realized it uploaded wrong to the forums Let me try to put it in a zip

stamp_test2.zip (654.2 KB)

Sorry :frowning:

It should read Vida Custom Designs

I don’t know anything about AI, but I made some progress in Inkscape. The good news is the Custom Designs text is perfect. Select the red box with the Edit Nodes by Path tool and then Shift+Click the Custom Designs text. Go to Path->Difference. The Custom Designs text should turn white.

The VIDA is not text, but symbols. Select the A with the Edit Nodes by Path tool then go to Edit->Clone->Unlink Clone. Do the same thing with the D, the I and the V. Just like with the Custom Design text, select the red box and then select a letter and go to Path->Difference. The letter should turn white. Do it for the remaining three letters.

Save it. At this point you can engrave a Stamp that says VIDA Custom Designs, but without the big V or the QR Code.

The stylized V has too many nodes for the computer I am using. If I try and select it to do a difference like with the text my Inkscape crashes. I’ve crashed it about six times. You may need to make an outline of it or use a pretty powerful computer.

The QR code is a bunch of small boxes. I don’t have the time, and probably won’t, to figure out how to convert them to something that can be used with the difference tool. If you can figure out how to turn the boxes into paths then it will work.

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Thank you!!! I’ll give it a shot.