How to use wood clay stamps. Wood stamps are used while the clay is still soft, before the "leather hard" stage of drying.   While you will need to experiment with the best time to impress the stamp for a crisp mark, in general you will want the clay to dry for an hour or more before you use the stamp.   Some people use cooking oil on the stamp to improve the release from the clay, however this is not required if the design is not too complex and the clay is at the correct stage of drying.   Like all aspects of working with clay, skill will improve with use of this technique.
	The most common use for clay stamps, is as maker's marks.   Maker's marks are used to "sign" a works of art and are common in metal working and ceramic artist work shops.   An individual's marker's mark can be used for a lifetime or can be changed for each series of works.   Many maker's marks also include a date code to allow collectors to later date the works and the artist using just the mark as a reference.   Of course, it helps to also keep a journal of what types of marks you use and what the date codes mean in your system.   Other artist's just use a separate date stamp or none at all, and let the maker's mark stand alone on the piece.
	Another use for clay stamp tools is to decorate the surface of the piece with specific symbols or texture patterns.   With sets of tools, that all have a related design theme, a very complex group of symbols can be combined.   See some of the examples we have posted that use combinations of symbols from many stamps to create patterns over the entire surface of a piece.   This is the reason we provide stock designs in sets of tools rather than just one.   You will find that a set of tools will allow combinations that go beyond what a single stamp can achieve. Addition of color can enhance the embossed images on the clay surface.   One technique is to brush on a glaze or oxide wash over the whole surface and then wipe away the color from the surface using a stiff sponge or cloth and leaving the color behind the lower areas of the stamped images.   See the example of the violin to the left, the rune symbols were colored using this technique.