Frequently Asked Questions
answered by a sarcastic prick

q: Whats The Best Way To Cut Out The More Complex Designs? (for faq example purposes: say Leftover Crack's shoot the kids at school)
a: in cases like that, all you can really do is choose what you want for the final print and what you dont want. i personally hate cutting out stencils, but its a necessary thing if you are going to make a shirt or a patch for cheap. you dont have to cut out all those little dots all over the place, or you can just take a fork or a dart and jab the cardstock. its really up to you.

q: hey, can i donate stencils that ive made to your site? why dont you set up a user-created stencil upload feature for the site?
a: yes, we do accept stencil donations. send us a message through the 'suggestion box' form about what you have to donate and we'll reply from the email address you can send stencils to. we would review you stencils to pick and choose which ones we would want on the site. the stencils would need to be large, clean, and strong enough. otherwise, we would give you tips on what to edit in the stencil or we would do it ourselves. credit would be given for every stencil you would want to donate and if you wanted to donate on a regular basis, we can work something out to make you apart of our 'team'.' as for a user-created submission feature, thats far too complex for our time and it would bypass the entire process of making sure the stencils are of a certain quality.

q: I think you guys should make a forum so we could exchange ideas and stencils and tips on how to be better and stuff i know i would join and so would some of my friends.
a: forums are a great way of exchanging craft tips and tutorials, but we're not gonna make one. there are hundreds of stencil and craft forums out there so you're better off on one of them. why dont we make one? its too much hassle to set it up, then have to maintain it, get messages when people are being douches on it, too much headache. here are a few links to forums where other people deal with those headaches: sputnik forums, crafster, stencil_swap livejournal community; onelegout.com has a detailed tutorial as well

q: (can i get some stencils for) Choking Victim. I haven't checked for Leftover Crack yet, but defifnitely need some Choking Victim. I have a wicked boner for them.
a: "czech" the site first before making requests. [the site has been revamped since i got this email. leftover crack/choking victim were originally categorized under the "ska" page, as were almost any other ska/punk band. you wouldnt believe how many emails i got like this]

q: you have a design for Combat 84, and their lead singer Chris "Chubby" Henderson was a long-time neo-Nazi activist. Whats the deal with that mate? Whats the deal?
a: There isn't any racism in any of Combat84's songs. Reguardless, its in the skinhead/oi! section because its just that. Music for skinheads & Oi! music. Your personal views on the lead singer and his influence in the music aside, the band isn't WP. The skinhead/oi! section isn't specifically anti-fascist. There is an anti-fascist section for people that want those stencils. there are other sides to this story. some say there are recorded videos of the band live where people at the shows ask (when a fight broke out) why people were fighting, "we're all white". believe what you want. i was hanging out with socialist and anti-fascist skins in central pa, and they had combat 84 on. i remarked that it was ironic that they were listening to them, and my friend driving (who put the cd in) explained to me that the singer isnt actually racist or was ever a nazi. it is a rumor spread about the internet to discredit the band, and that the lead singer of the band lives in thailand with a thai wife and their child. believe what you want. in the end, the music aint bad, and the stencil is staying up. (the answer to this question was written when the question was asked. there is no longer a skinhead/oi section, but rather bands all listed alphabetically. the answer is still valid to the question though)

q: why dont you guys register stencilpunks.com so i dont have to type out .mattrunningnaked after your site name?
a: this site is called stencil punks. alot of people think its called stencilpunks.com and we know that because we have a tracker on the site and thousands of people google stencilpunks.com trying to find this site. truth is, a company by the name of texas international property associates registered stencilpunks.com and we cant take it. TIPA registers domain names that have growing popularity as well as typo domainnames like yahooo.com and post ads. im currently in negotiations with TIPA and their lawyer to transfer ownership of this domain name. well eventually get it. dont worry.

q: How do you use stencils on leather jackets/can i use that freezer paper printing method on my black leather jacket?
a: i get messages like this constantly. at first, i replied to each one individually, but in the end, i just started copying/pasting the same response email to everyone. heres the last time im going to explain it: I'm not confident how well freezer paper would adhere to leather. i havn't tried it so I couldnt tell you. whenever I get a message about leather-jacket printing, i suggest people to paint by hand. i used to have a leather (back in the day when i had a 7in boston style mohawk and a bad attitude) and i hand painted a ska-related design my friend drew up on the left shoulder, that was hard enough as it was to do because i didnt want to mess it up. if you did do it with a stencil, there may be some underspray/blotching of paint and that doesnt seem suitable for a permanent design on a jacket. take your time, draw the outline of the design out on the jacket with pencil a or white acrylic marker, and then take your time painting it in. use varying sizes of paintbrushes, some wider ones for areas you can cover quickly and easily, and smaller ones for smaller areas with full detail. as for paint/ink, i used id find myself some good leather-safe acrylic paint, or "airbrush ink" to use on your jacket. ask around at your local craft store, for non-water soluble acrylic paint that is good for leather, a paint that wont crack off. id take my time with it so i wouldnt fuck up a perfectly good leather. say you wanted a design off this website, and you were going to hand paint it, you dont have to limit yourself to the bridges i apply over these designs. you can paint over the bridge in an A that i put in to make it stencil ready with a normal paintbrush. if you want a band design on your jacket, check out their myspace or google their merch to see what the original design looked like in order to find out where to paint in the bridges.

q: whats your connection with Stencilry[.org]? i see alot of your stuff on her site and hers on yours. what gives?
a: andie (the woman who runs stencilry) have an unpublicised agreement to share one anothers stencils. originally, we were just stealing each others shit and then when i got requests for stencils i didnt want to post on my site, i sent them to her. ive done it a few times now. for example: all of her anti-flag stencils were made by me. when people ask for stencils i have already made, i tell them to check out my "sister site" stencilry. she plugs me and i plug her. we post on the same livejournal stencil communities, i just focus on upping the punks more.

q: whats the deal with the anti communist and anti anarchist stencils on this site? this is an anarchist/communist site.
a: no it isnt. this site has no specific political agenda. we have never claimed anarchism or claimed communism or claimed to be anti either. some people that have plugged our site around the net (most specifically whoever originally submitted stencilpunks for stumbleupon.com) labeled this site as being anarchist. its not. this site is about diy more than anything else. we have our views but each person that works on this site has different views from every other. we keep it on the level. the stencils on this site are here by request and like it or not, for however many commies and anarchists out there there are, there are still others that dont feel that those political movements are the right way to go about making change. these stencils are for those people. the anti commie/anti anarko stencils are staying up. weve had anarchist stencils on this site, because people have requested them, for years now. its been only a month since we posted an anti-anarchism stencil and we have gotten so many emails about on stencil. let it go.

q: can i get anti-flag, afi, my chemical romance, etc... stencils
a: check out stencilry.org

q: hey man how do you make these stencils? how can i?
a: making a stencil is a bit complicated to describe to someone that has no idea what they're doing. there are image programs out there, like photoshop, paint shop pro that are more advanced that you can use, but you can also use general programs like microsoft word and microsoft paint, if you know how to use them. (for instance: the capitalists_selloutpunx.gif stencil was made with no other program than microsoft paint, from a full color photograph) generally you desaturate an image, up the brightness and contrast, and then add bridges in certain areas to make it stencil-ready. photoshop and psp are generally expensive but you can download full versions off of illegal filesharing programs. its up to you if you want to try to get files that way, im not naming any filesharing program's names, you can ask around elsewhere for that. stencilry.org has several tutorials. if you're in a bind, send me over the file and i can let you know if i can help you with it. otherwise check out http://stencil_swap.livejournal.com: its a livejournal community that was made to help people out with their stencil needs, in an attempt to open up some creativity so you can make your own stencils. watch out though, theres a couple douchebags on there that will give you shit if you ask for stencils for lame topics like crappy rappers.

q: why do you make this site? you do it for free, dont ask money for anything, dont put ads on the page like other stencil sites, why?
a: im only doing what im told here man. i was told to up the punks and thats what im doing. if i dont, im gonna go down in rank in the Casualties Army. do you want General Jorge after you? no, of course you dont. "up the punks" is not a polite suggestion, it is a fucking command. actually, if you asked me to answer you honestly, i'm not really sure why i run this site. i suppose i came up in the punk scene, it partially made me who i am. i learned from it coming into the scene, learned from it when i left. the term diy is used in many different ways, for me it was making my own clothes and patches without my friends and family thinking i was a homosexual, since most punk-diy sites on the net are filled with 16 year old girls making purses and shit. i was making mixed-plaid upstart bondage pants and tight-fitting black cigarette pants so i didnt have to pay $50+ on them from angry young and poor. hopefully people out there are printing up patches for their friends and family, designing there own stuff from there, and moving on to bigger projects like it seems only natural to do.