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The latest from the Stencil Maker

  • Customizing Your Stencil

    Customizing Your Stencil

    Is your stencil working for you, or is it just frustrating you? We ship non-overlapping stencils by default, but I’m here to tell you that if you want an overlapping stencil (where the surface is painted twice or more, on subsequent passes) it’s often just a few cuts away. We’ll look at a specific example…

  • How To Work With the Surface Color

    How To Work With the Surface Color

    You may remember that we often want to leave out one of the layers of a stencil in order to let the surface show through and to keep our stencil work from looking like a giant post card. In this post we ask the question, ‘How do you work with the surface you have?’ We’ll…

  • Stenciling Three Layers is Better Than Five Layers

    Stenciling Three Layers is Better Than Five Layers

    I love three-tone (light, mid-tone, dark) stencil portraits. They capture light and shadow really well, if the original photograph is good. Most people seem to opt for more layers because the preview looks better. But it’s advisable to tune your upload until the three-layer stencil captures the detail you want, and go with that. This…

  • How to Stencil a QR Code

    How to Stencil a QR Code

    QR codes are an excellent way to add a modern touch to any project. QR codes are capable of holding a variety of information such as web links, plain text, and even business cards. Why would I want to paint a QR code? Some of the reasons you might want to stencil a QR code…

  • Stencil Tessellations Cover a Surface

    Stencil Tessellations Cover a Surface

    A tessellation is just an arrangement of shapes that cover an entire surface in a repeating pattern without any gaps. The most common example of a tessellation is just repeating squares. In fact, you can use Artificial Intelligence to generate a repeating tile that works great as a wall stencil. You’ve also seen hexagons used…

  • What Are Registration Marks, And How Do You Use Them With Stencils?

    What Are Registration Marks, And How Do You Use Them With Stencils?

    When we talk about registration, we’re not talking about signing up for class. We’re talking about making sure that one stencil layer lines up on top of another stencil layer so that you don’t get muddy stencils. When do I need to use registration marks? There are many stencils that you don’t need to register…

  • Making a Wall of Faces

    Making a Wall of Faces

    Make a wall of faces for your organization. It’s not as hard as it looks! Start with a blank wall. It’s probably easiest if the surface is white or nearly white. For each person, You will only paint the mid-tone and dark layers for each face. For each face, isolate the person’s face and features…

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