Hello! Are you looking to make your own custom handmade stickers? Great! Let’s learn how to make the iconic white border that stickers have.
I will be using Photoshop today, but you should have similar options on other photo-editing/drawing programs.
Step 1: Open a sticker design with a transparent background.
Open your sticker design file. Today I’ll be using this cat I made as a part of my CyberKitty Cat Sticker Collection. Make sure your sticker design has a transparent background and a clean outline (no rough edges or sketch marks, etc.)
Step 2: Expand your canvas to make room for the border.
Make sure your canvas has enough room for the die-cut border. Here, I expand my canvas by 500×500 pixels so I have extra room to work with.
Step 3: Select your sticker layer with CTRL + Left Click.
Go to your layers and select your entire sticker. This is done easily on Photoshop by CTRL + Left Clicking on the thumbnail of the sticker layer. If this doesn’t work on your program, you can try selecting the background with the Magic Wand Tool and then inversing the selection. I put a temporary grey background behind my sticker layer so I can see the selection and border more easily.
Step 4: Expand your selection.
Now that your sticker is selected, go to Select > Modify > Expand. This will allow you to expand your selection. I am going to expand my selection by 40 pixels. However, play around with the amount to your liking. Remember that once you print out your sticker, the border will be significantly smaller than how it appears on your large screen. So don’t be afraid to add a few extra pixels, especially if you’re hand-cutting your stickers like I do.
Step 5: Make a new layer.
After you expand your selection, make a new layer below your sticker layer.
Step 6: Fill in your layer with white.
Fill your selection with white. You can use the bucket tool or manually fill it in. Make sure you like the thickness of your border! I would adjust my border here and make it a bit thicker, but for the sake of the example, let’s move on.
Step 7: Smooth out your border
Check for sharp angles in your border. Around the headphone spikes, I take a hard round brush and smooth out the indents of the border so that it’ll be easier to cut out. I also smooth out some of the bumps around the border to make everything look more uniform. This step is optional, but it can be a great way to make your sticker look cleaner and make it easier to cut, especially when you hand-cut stickers.
And that’s all there is to it! Make sure to turn off your grey background layer if you made one and save a copy of your sticker with its die-cut border. Now it’s ready to print and become a real sticker!
