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I am wanting to replace all my old dried up mix matched ink pads and invest in good quality new ones!!
Problem? Well, there are so many out there now it makes my head spin?? I looked through a couple pages of threads in the forum and didn't find anything and thought it would be faster to just post a new thread asking for help. If there is already a post somewhere that discusses all the different inks, what they are best used for and their quality and cost rating and in general what most people are relying on these days, please send me a link. Otherwise, please let me know your opinion on which stamp pad to invest in.
Here is some info about what I need from them and what I will be using them for;
>I do both card making and scrapbooking
>I have discovered I do NOT like the little tiny pads - takes forever on big stamps and ink to paper projects.
>I would like to be able to "refill" them.
>I am also slowly increasing my Copic inventory. I will be using those alot! I love to stamp an image and then color it in with Copics. I am having some issues with the black smearing and bleeding if I get too close.
>I also like to try different techniques like blending and water stamping (maybe I have to have two different sets of inks???)
I guess that's it. If I left something out that would be important in the decision process - ask away!!!
Thanks in advance for all your help and advise! I know I can count on everyone here! I haven't been a member long but I learned very quickly how AWESOME everyone here is and how helpful you all are!!! So happy to have found this place and to call it home!!
Thanks again,
__________________ Stacy
Shabby Jo Designs Fan Club Member My Gallery / My Blog
Memento Tuxedo Black is the best for Copics..dries fast and does not smear.
Stazon is for watercoloring, but not copics.
Versafine is a beautiful ink for detailed stamps..nice clear black image...I think it has to be dried for copic use and watercolor.
__________________ Marilyn
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Memento Tuxedo Black is the best for Copics..dries fast and does not smear.
Stazon is for watercoloring, but not copics.
Versafine is a beautiful ink for detailed stamps..nice clear black image...I think it has to be dried for copic use and watercolor.
Thank you so much - that's exactly the kind of info I was looking for!!! Man I love SCS!!! Now I have an excellent starting line!!
__________________ Stacy
Shabby Jo Designs Fan Club Member My Gallery / My Blog
Versafine is a beautiful ink for detailed stamps..nice clear black image...I think it has to be dried for copic use and watercolor.
I've never had any luck at all with Versafine and Copics, no matter how dry it is it smears. Versafine is an oil-based ink and is my favourite for everything that I'm not going to colour with Copics. Because it's oil-based it's an excellent choice if you're going to watercolour. The one drawback with Versafine is that only the Onyx Black and Vintage Sepia are available as reinkers. Mind you, it's extremely long-lasting and I haven't needed to reink even my black pad so far and I use it a lot!
For dye-based ink I love the Adirondack line by Ranger. Fantastic range of colours, stamps well, sponges well, brayers well, I can use it with Copics and pencils/OMS. Reinkers are available for all the Adirondack colours.
I'm also a fan of Distress ink because it is so useful as a colouring medium as well as for stamping, sponging and brayering (it won't ever break down into its consitutent colours like some dye inks will when you add water).
Well the only inks I know of that work with Copics are Memento and Adirondack. Here's what I would do: Have brown/black/grey inkpads in either Memento or Adirondack for stamps you are going to color with Copics (after all, how many times are you going to use lettuce green to stamp an outline?).
The rest would be colored inks from Impress or Amuse Studios. Their quick dry pigment inks are absolutely, hands down, fantastic for all kinds of stamps and paper! I use a combination of clear and rubber stamps, and always had trouble with inks for clear stamps. But Fresh Inks and Amuse inks give me crisp, clear, vibrant impression all the time. I love 'em and when I get ALL the colors eventually, I'm tossing all my other dye inks.
HTH
Well the only inks I know of that work with Copics are Memento and Adirondack. Here's what I would do: Have brown/black/grey inkpads in either Memento or Adirondack for stamps you are going to color with Copics (after all, how many times are you going to use lettuce green to stamp an outline?).
The rest would be colored inks from Impress or Amuse Studios. Their quick dry pigment inks are absolutely, hands down, fantastic for all kinds of stamps and paper! I use a combination of clear and rubber stamps, and always had trouble with inks for clear stamps. But Fresh Inks and Amuse inks give me crisp, clear, vibrant impression all the time. I love 'em and when I get ALL the colors eventually, I'm tossing all my other dye inks.
HTH
I like to apply inks to the edges of my layers to add depth and softness - would pigment ink do well for this application? I've never tried a pigment ink for that yet... never occurred to me!! I have only used pigment inks for use with embossing powders.
__________________ Stacy
Shabby Jo Designs Fan Club Member My Gallery / My Blog
I like to apply inks to the edges of my layers to add depth and softness - would pigment ink do well for this application? I've never tried a pigment ink for that yet... never occurred to me!! I have only used pigment inks for use with embossing powders.
I have not used Amuse or Fresh inks yet but my experience with inking edges with pigment inks is they do smear and will leave marks if you lay them on your card surface before they are dry...I learned that the hard way. After a marathon day of making cards I had smeared almost half of them accidentally with my pigment inks:(:( After that epic fail I switched to dye inks and haven't had a problem with smearing. Now I will say that not all my clear stamps take dye ink very well. I'm interested in trying Fresh inks to see if they really do dry quickly.
Ahh, but these are not your regular pigment inks, they are quick dry pigment inks! They dry on papers like Bazzill, SU, or PTI within seconds. If it's a heavy ink application, I'll zap it with my heat gun for 15 sec. just to make sure it's good and dry. Otherwise, I have never had them smear on me.
Ahh, but these are not your regular pigment inks, they are quick dry pigment inks! They dry on papers like Bazzill, SU, or PTI within seconds. If it's a heavy ink application, I'll zap it with my heat gun for 15 sec. just to make sure it's good and dry. Otherwise, I have never had them smear on me.
I do so need to at least order one of these inks to try out, Katarina, you make them sound so wonderful!!! Thanks for keeping us informed
I really like the new Hero Arts shadow and Midtone inks. They have gorgeous colors and they match Hero's papers. They also have some great chalk inks that match their papers too. New Hero Arts Shadow Mid-Tone Inks - YouTube
IMHO, I am in love with Memento for most stamping. I have all sorts of inks but those are my go to now. I do like Distress Inks for a lot of things too. They are all refillable.
I have given away all my Adirondacks, Distress and other odds and ends to Newbies in our stamping group. I loved the colors and thy worked fine, but since I totally love SU card stock and also love things to match/coordinate, I found I didn't use them much and always use the SU pads, inks, markers. However since they have changed the formula, I will no longer purchase any new paper or colors. I'm tired of adjusting to "new improved" products that don't works as well for me as the tried and true. (Case in point, the flip lid on the pads that are a pain in the neck and sink in the center almost from the get-go.) For black ink that so far has worked for me in every situation-except for embossing, (even on acetate and non-porous surfaces better than Staz-on) is Memories Black. That being said, I don't use Copics and don't plan to as I find "watercoloring" with reinkers and blending with standard markers works well for me in the limited amounts I do. So I can't speak to the color matching or compatibility of those. I have found it almost freeing to have limited my choices and plan to do it with other materials as well. Good luck in your search. I agree with you about SCS being the absolute best!!!
I normally use the Memento inks, Tuxido Black or London Fog (grey) for outline stamping when I'm colouring with Copic markers but I have also use Stampin Up ink pads with excellent results. I always heat set (hold your heat gun over the image for about 30 seconds) the Stampin Up inks before I start colouring.
I also use quite a few digital images and heat set the ink from the printer (our printer is a HP ink jet, if you have a lazer printer you don't have to heat set)
Cheers
imho for water stamping, distress is the best, especially the brighter colours. The colours lift with the water beautifully. If you are watercolouring the best ink I have found is India Ink black by Stewart Superior. It is made especially for watercolour stamping and colouring. I'm sorry I can't help you with copics...I don't own any.
Memories chalks are lovely to work with, nice and juicy and are great for soft finish in stamping and work well for blending. Hope this helps.
I have given away all my Adirondacks, Distress and other odds and ends to Newbies in our stamping group. I loved the colors and thy worked fine, but since I totally love SU card stock and also love things to match/coordinate, I found I didn't use them much and always use the SU pads, inks, markers. However since they have changed the formula, I will no longer purchase any new paper or colors. I'm tired of adjusting to "new improved" products that don't works as well for me as the tried and true. (Case in point, the flip lid on the pads that are a pain in the neck and sink in the center almost from the get-go.) For black ink that so far has worked for me in every situation-except for embossing, (even on acetate and non-porous surfaces better than Staz-on) is Memories Black. That being said, I don't use Copics and don't plan to as I find "watercoloring" with reinkers and blending with standard markers works well for me in the limited amounts I do. So I can't speak to the color matching or compatibility of those. I have found it almost freeing to have limited my choices and plan to do it with other materials as well. Good luck in your search. I agree with you about SCS being the absolute best!!!
I gave away all my ink pads too and now only have SU. I like SU's color palette. That is my only reason for using SU. Oh, I do like the size of the ink pads too. I have all the flip top ink pads from SU. I bought them all used for a good price. I don't want to upgrade.
I make my own Distress, pigment and chalk inks.
Black Inks- I use Tsukineko Versafine Onyx Black for my line art.
Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black for my alcohol inks. I don't like it though. I think the color is an off gray. A personal pet peeve. The ink pad is excellent though and well made. I wish they had a deeper black.
Staz-On Black for my stamping that is not for paper like acetate.
Tsukineko Brilliance Graphite Black for vellum stamping.
I also love the Studio G inks. The only problem with Studio G are no refills. I make my own batches of reinkers and refill the ink pads.
I mainly use my brush tip markers to color my stamps. I also paint with my reinkers. I am not a big alcohol marker user. I mainly use my markers for illustration work and not stamping.
I think there are as many ideas about what you like as there are people. I have a lot of colors from CTMH and I've always loved them. I started picking the Distress Inks a few years ago and I like them too. It took me awhile to get used to their "juiciness", but there are things I can do with them that I couldn't with the faster drying time of CTMH. It seems like no matter what color of paper I'm using, I have an ink that is such a close match that I don't worry about having the "matching paper and ink".
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Dye ink with re-inkers
I use SU Classic (dye-based) inks for all my stamping. I have all the colors and reinkers to match. I never buy an ink pad without buying the re-inker to match.I, too, like that you can match them to all their papers, markers, embellishments, etc. I've found that the color range of SU inks work with most other companies products (with very few exceptions). The old pads work just fine but I will slowly replace them with the new ones because they are so much better for fine detail stamping. I like the cover for two reasons: you can "mash" the center to get a pool of ink in the lid for water-coloring and, with them closed, they keep the ink on top of the ink pad so that it is ready to use all the time and re-inking is not needed as often as other pads. For black, I always use StazOn and this also works well for water-coloring with markers and any other technique that calls for moisture-proof outlines. If I want the black to blend/bleed (like a white image with gray shadowing) I use SU Classic. I have a few Copics but I get the coloring results I want with SU markers and an aqua painter or blender pen so I don't have any experience using them with the inks I have.
Jo, I did what you are wanting to do several years ago. First of all I went thru the inks that I had and I stamped with them all, using different stamps and papers, testing what I liked and what I didn't. During this process I discovered that I really, really liked water based dye ink pads the best. Thats not to say they are the best ever, just the best for me. I love trying techniques and I found these types of inks to be the most versatile to me. My final choise, based on accessability to actually buy the product at the time, was SU! and Distress (for very much the same reasons as Kristy Tyra I chose two very similar products). Having chose these inks as my mainstay I then stuck with rubber for my stamps.
I don't use Copics so I have no personal experience with them, but from all that I've read here at SCS, Memento is a top choise. And since Memento is also waterbased it should be useful for doing a variety of techniques.
I have since sold off all the other odds and ends of ink pads, and have a neat and tidy ink pad collection that I use all the time. A few months ago I branched out and added Archival by Ranger, as my permanent ink of choise, so now I have three ink collections. All inks come with reinkers.
Good luck with finding your preferred brand. It'll be worth the effort and expense to find your perfect match.
I gave away all my ink pads too and now only have SU. I like SU's color palette. That is my only reason for using SU. Oh, I do like the size of the ink pads too. I have all the flip top ink pads from SU. I bought them all used for a good price. I don't want to upgrade.
I make my own Distress, pigment and chalk inks.
Black Inks- I use Tsukineko Versafine Onyx Black for my line art.
Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black for my alcohol inks. I don't like it though. I think the color is an off gray. A personal pet peeve. The ink pad is excellent though and well made. I wish they had a deeper black.
Staz-On Black for my stamping that is not for paper like acetate.
Tsukineko Brilliance Graphite Black for vellum stamping.
I also love the Studio G inks. The only problem with Studio G are no refills. I make my own batches of reinkers and refill the ink pads.
I mainly use my brush tip markers to color my stamps. I also paint with my reinkers. I am not a big alcohol marker user. I mainly use my markers for illustration work and not stamping.
I am sorry I wrote it wrong. I don't make my own reinkers. I meant to write I make my own custom color palettes with reinkers and reink my pads. I have been fighting migraines & sinus headaches for over a week now. I am writing goofier than usual. Sorry for the confusion.
I am sorry I wrote it wrong. I don't make my own reinkers. I meant to write I make my own custom color palettes with reinkers and reink my pads. I have been fighting migraines & sinus headaches for over a week now. I am writing goofier than usual. Sorry for the confusion.
LOVE the idea of custom colors!
(Sorry about the headaches! Have you tried a gluten free, dairy free diet? My wholistic counselor suggests DesBio SmartSilver for sinus/allergy issues (PM me if you want to know how to use it) and Dews Pancran Extra and Metagenics CandiBactin-AR supplements during allergy season. Something for you to consider and research...)
I've been stamping for over 20 years and have lots of ink pads from many different companies.
I use Prismacolor pencils and Gamsol for blending - a lot! so I've tried many brands of black dye inks to find one that won't smear on the fine grain paper that I use with Prismas. I found that Mementos works the best for that. I have a few colors of Distress inks that I like to use with water on a non-stick craft mat. The backgrounds are sooo pretty.
Last year I fell completely in love with Stampin' Up's card stock colors and the thickness of the paper. Then this spring I used some of their new stamp pads at a friend's house and was hooked. I LOVE LOVE the way the inks and paper colors match. At first I didn't think all that matchiness was necessary, I thought a couple different shades of green complimented each other just fine. After spending a couple days at my friend's house I found how beautiful it was to create cards with inks and papers that were the same colors... and the ribbons match too. I now have several Stampin Up ink pads and I'm sold. The pads are similar to the construction of Ancient Page which I'd always loved. The colors are sooo yummy! I became such a believer in their products and customer service that I became an SU demonstrator.
(Sorry about the headaches! Have you tried a gluten free, dairy free diet? My wholistic counselor suggests DesBio SmartSilver for sinus/allergy issues (PM me if you want to know how to use it) and Dews Pancran Extra and Metagenics CandiBactin-AR supplements during allergy season. Something for you to consider and research...)
Thank you! I live in a State that has about all the varieties of mold. Even though we are in a drought the mold counts are super high this year. I am highly allergic to mold. I know I am so lucky. :( I can't wait to move out of State, lol.
Sampin' Up! ink pads are THE BEST! The new firm foam ink pads are incredible. I love the fabulous ink coverage and the service with SU! is always awesome. Every colour ink pad has a re-inker too, a major bonus and money saver in the long run. You'll love them!
You ladies totally ROCK!!! I am a little overwhelmed but so grateful to be that way because of all the replies I received. I think I am going to take the suggestion of Misstreez and get a few samples of all the inks from all of your suggestions and have one heck of a stamping party one weekend and try them out!! At least I have it narrowed down a lot - thanks to all of you!!! Thank you tons and keep 'em coming, I love that I am not the only one benefiting from this thread!!
__________________ Stacy
Shabby Jo Designs Fan Club Member My Gallery / My Blog
A friend has some of the new SU! Pads and loves all of them except the new black one. She said the black pad is super juicey and the ink doesn't dry even after 2 hours.
Ink Pad Brand suggestions/advise
