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The Two Types of Sheets

© Amy E. Badurina

When you're talking artistamps, there are two different kinds: singles, or individual stamps that are complete unto themselves, or sheets, which are a grouping of stamps on the same page that follow a common theme (usually). Of the two, singles seem to be the easier to make, as you can just come up with an idea, put it together, and it's done. The sheet form, on the other hand, takes a little more planning and work.

Sheets appeal to many artists for different reasons. Some believe that since regular postage stamps come in books or sheets, that putting together a collection along a theme is more authentic. Some think that it's more aesthetically pleasing. And, of course, there's also the idea that perforating a group of stamps is much easier than trying to perforate just one. (In fact, perforating just one stamp to a page is pretty much a waste of paper.)

So if you've decided to make sheets, there are two different kinds that you can choose from (and more if your creativity demands it...as with all things artistamp, it's up to you if you want to change convention.): the repeat and the pictoral.

THE REPEAT: This is extremely easy, if you've got a computer with a printer and a graphics program. Just make an individual stamp and select it in your graphics program. Hit "copy" and then paste it over and over again until it fills the entire sheet with your work. Some programs also have a "tile" function, which will automatically take your image and repeat it over the whole page, which is easier still. You can also do this with a group of stamps -- a line of five different images, for example, repeated five times on a page, or the same image in different colorations. Just make the stamps, copy and paste them like normal.

THE PICTORAL: These, I have to say from personal experience, are both a) more challenging and b) more fun. This is the type where the sheet is an actual picture in and of itself, with certain parts being designated as individual stamps.

For instance, if you want to do a set of stamps dealing with space travel, you would draw, collage, or paint a "space" image -- for example's sake, let's say a rocketship and some planets in the background, and a bright star in the lower right. Play with it until you've got a pleasing (to you) image. When you've got your basic image, then select CERTAIN PARTS of the image to be stamps. Maybe the nose of the rocket or the bright star in the lower right. Select four or five parts of your basic image, and perforate around the sections you want to be a stamp, or if you're not using perforations, put a border around that section of the image. (In Photoshop, for instance, you just select the stamp image, hit edit -->stroke, and you can paint in a border that's always an exact rectangle.) When you print your sheets, the borders will set off your stamp as an individual stamp, but will retain the image as a whole, as well.