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Stipple brushes for rubber stamping projects come in several shapes and sizes, but we have found that shaving brushes work best. They have a very large, thick plume of bristles that make stippling smoother and faster - get them at your local drug store.
Using brushes in combination with simple masking techniques, you can control the application of color to a very precise degree. Add a modicum of patience and you will achieve intense, vibrant colors with just your average, everyday ink pads.
To get started, you should have about six brushes - one for each of the main color groups in your palette. Your "reds brush" will always be for reds, your "blues brush" is just for shades of blue and so on. You will never have to wash your brushes out or wait for them to dry (they ARE washable), and your ink pads will remain unsoiled. Any kind of dye ink pad, permanent or not, will work (avoid pigments), and make sure your pads are juicy.
Since rubber stamp ink is translucent, you always want to begin coloring with lighter colors such as yellow, and work your way to the darker hues. Also, in most circumstances you will want to apply not one, but two, or even three or more colors to an area. This will give your work a depth and complexity that is comparable to a fine wine - instead of, say, Grape Knee-hi.
To apply color with a shaving brush, tap the brush straight down onto your ink pad several times in rapid succession. Then immediately do the same only with the brush tapping on paper - make sure you move the brush around slightly as you tap, so you don't get too much ink in one spot. You can tap the brush up to ten or twelve times before re-inking. Now here's the secret: keep on re-inking and tapping, re-inking and tapping, until the color is as intense as you want it to be. This is the part that takes patience, but it is also the most important part. Be bold!
If you want a gradated color - such as a dark blue sky that gradually gets lighter toward the horizon - always begin at the top and work your way down as the brush runs out of ink. If you have several different shades of blue, use them all. Or, throw in some purple, a few reds, whatever works!
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Click Images to Enlarge
Color gets more intense with longer Tickling.
Yellow ink all by itself.
This is the same yellow as above, with red added.
The same again, only with the addition of blue. You can even make "black" , and it will look a lot more interesting than using a black ink pad. Be sure to click on this example to take a close look!
Skin is Tickled with yellow, orange, red and brown. Sky is Tickled with yellow, red, blue, purple and black. Water is stamped in blue, then Tickled in blue and light blue. Sand is stamped in brown, then Tickled in yellow and brown. The cloth was masked the whole time so as not to get any color.
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