Creating Digital Stamps

In this post I am going to run through the process of how I prepare my own digital stamps from a scanned image in Photoshop CS4.

The images which I use are always in the public domain and scanned from my own collection of antique children's books. The one which I am going to run through today is an image from "Password to Fairyland" by Elizabeth Southwart and illustrated by Florence Mary Anderson.

This process can be applied to any scanned black and white image of which you own the rights to.

The images below are not shown at full size.

Step 1:

Scan the original image at a minimum of 300dpi. For this image, I also enlarged it by making the scan at 150%.

Original Scan of a Fairy in Password to Fairyland

As you can see, it came out very grey and in the wrong alignment.

Step 2:

Rotate the image 90 degrees clockwise. To do this click Image > Image Rotation > 90°

Step 3:

Use the crop tool to get rid of the title or any other surrounding bits which you don't want.

Cropped fairy for adjusting

As you can see from the image above, I was left with a few flowers at the top. These are easy to get rid of with the eraser tool. I used a hard brush. The size will depend on your own image. Use one where you can comfortably cover the bits you don't want without erasing the image you want to keep.

Fairy image after using the eraser tool in Photoshop CS4

Step 4:

Make sure everything is deselected by clicking Select > Deselect from the menu then click Select > Color Range. Use the default settings and place the dropper onto the background area. This will select all of the color which you don't want. Use the delete key to get rid of it. If your num lock is on, you'll have to press Shift Del. You should be left with something similar to the image below.

Step 5:

The final step is to make the image stand out more. Some of the lines are a bit pale. To do this, click Image > Adjustments. This brings up the screen shown below.

Final step in using the adjustment curves tool

Move the black arrow to the right until the strokes of the image become clear. The further to the right, the darker the black areas of the image.

You should then have a clear image which can be saved as a jpg, or bmp etc. For printing you need to make sure the image is saved at a minimum of 300dpi.

My next post will be on ideas where you can use your digital stamp.  The stamp which I used for this example can be purchased on my Etsy shop.