While printmaking, intaglio, silk screening, and all of their second cousins are the most fun ever, the materials needed to successfully reproduce can be expensive, space-consuming, and messy. A printing press bed usually starts at $350 or so. You can always DIY one, but then you have to find room for the thing. Don't forget your plates, acids, waxes, felts and that ink with the consistency of condensed milk (but messier, and not nearly as sweet.)
A silk screening light table has the same cost and space issues as the printing press, and with silk screening, you'll need bulky-framed screens, more gooey ink, clamps, a pressure washer, solvents, messy, stinky fluids....ugh.
Enter stamp carving:
Grody, much-used stamps
Carving your own stamps is economical; a linoleum cutter with interchangeable blades, an exacto knife, stamp rubber, ink pads, paper, some paper towels, and a little water to rinse everything off--you'll have a smart little setup for less than $40. And the materials needed take up less than half a drawer's worth of room (depending on the size of your drawers, of course. You're s.o.l. if you're using one of those old telephone tables as a desk.)
The plastic lino cutter, though not as classy as wood, opens to hold blades when not in use.
Your creations won't have the finesse of an Albrecht Dürer, but you can't have everything.
I bet Albrecht would approve of my use of these glorious new mediums I have at my disposal.
My stamps have seen better days--many of them are broken and/or gouged. It's time to make a new batch, but I've made one last repeat of this shocked clown (with a little help from the computer.) As you can see, there's a some damage to his nose. Or maybe it's a nostril.
If you make a mistake, you can always carve on the other side--as seen here.
Hope nobody has a problem with clowns.
And now for the fun part: carving more stamps. That can be a little messy, with the bits of exhumed rubber collecting around and under your chair, but it's a dry mess. With the exception of styrofoam bits, I'll certainly take dry mess over wet mess.