I wanted to take the time to write a full tutorial that highlights some of our strongest features of Silhouette Studio® and Mint Studio™. I recently got married and am still in the full fledged honeymoon stage and love crafting with my wedding photos. I sure wish that I would have had the Mint when I sent out my wedding thank you cards last spring because it would have been so fun to stamp our faces all over our envelopes!

So let’s get started. Mint Studio™ has some really fun filters that you can use to turn a photo into a stamp, but if you are looking to manipulate your image to make it exactly how you want it, you can use your Silhouette Studio® in conjunction with Mint Studio™ to do just that.

Step One: Preparing the Design

1. Open up Silhouette Studio® and drag in your image that you want to turn into a stamp.

2. I only wanted a portion of the image to be turned into a stamp, specifically the image constrained inside of the red circle below.

3. Highlight a circle and your photo and click on the Modify window. Choose the “Crop” option. This will delete all of the areas of shapes obscured by other shapes. Our photo is now a perfect circle. Oh, Silhouette Studio®, how I love you!

4. If you haven’t used the trace function in Silhouette Studio®, prepared to be amazed! Select the Trace window, and then choose “Select Trace Area” to highlight the image you would like to trace. Once it is highlighted, you can adjust the filters, threshold, and scale. The area that is highlighted yellow will be traced. Once you are satisfied with your traced area, click “Trace.”

5. Red lines will now appear over your image where it was traced.

6. Delete your original image to reveal only your trace lines. You can then choose the fill color and line color of your image to get a preview of what your stamp will look like! If you want to delete small details you don’t want to keep in your design, use the Eraser tool.

7. Play around with adding text, shapes, designs, etc., to make your stamp completely custom.

8. You can even double-click on your text and drag it on top of a shape to allow the text to curve to the path. Watch this video to find out more about how to curve text in Silhouette Studio®.

9. Save your Silhouette Studio® file.

Step Two: Printing Your Stamp

1. Open your design in Mint Studio™ and resize it to the stamp size of your choosing.

2. By clicking “Send to Mint,” Mint Studio™ will automatically flip your image and prepare the file to be printed!

3. Unwrap your stamp sheet from its packaging. DO NOT remove the plastic layer covering the rubber.

4. Insert the stamp sheet through the back slot of the Mint arrow first. You will feel the stamp catch inside the machine.

5. In Mint Studio™,  click “Start Mint” and watch the magic happen. Pull out your stamp once it has finished printing.

6. Assemble your block by sliding the top into place.

7. Remove the lid from the block. Pull off the brown protective sheet to reveal the adhesive mat.

8. Take your 3D relief in hand, peel off the plastic, and remove the cardboard surrounding it. There are perforated lines across the cardboard that help make removing the stamp easier.

9. The back of your 3D relief is coated with a sticky adhesive for easy application. Stick your stamp to the interchangeable base.

10. Using Mint Inks, apply ink directly to the stamp. The inner reservoir on the stamps will absorb the ink only where the stamp is printed. Using this method of applying the ink directly to the stamp, the color goes only where you place it. After you apply the ink, wait 5–7 minutes before stamping.

11. The first couple of times you use your stamp, the design will be blurry. The excess ink just needs to be stamped off. Use a scrap piece of paper and stamp repeatedly. When the excess ink blots off, your stamp will be crisp and clear.

12. Don’t forget to stamp the stamp label to put on your block so that you can tell which stamp is which.

13. You can stamp 50+ times with your custom stamp before the stamp needs to be reinked.

How fun is that? I can see custom photo stamps used on Save the Dates, wedding invitations, birthday party stationery, favors—my mind is spinning. This is a total game changer, and the possibilities are endless with the Mint!

If you want to play around with our free Mint Studio™ Software before you purchase a Mint machine, you can download that here!

What photo are you going to turn into a stamp?!