Anyone with an inkjet printer at home can create personalized edible cake toppers with images of favorite TV or movie characters, photographs or names. A number of companies sell edible ink cartridges and printable edible paper sheets. Once you decide to start printing edible cake toppers, you will want to use a separate printer for regular printing because you can't go back and forth between edible and nonedible inks without risking contamination.
Use up the old nonedible ink in your inkjet printer. Clean the cartridge heads thoroughly, or replace them with new heads as specified in the printer manual. Install edible ink cartridges the same way you would install nonedible cartridges.
Select the image you want to use for your cake topper. Load an edible paper icing sheet the same way you would normally feed regular paper into your printer. Print the image onto the edible paper.
Remove any paper backing from the edible paper. Carefully place the edible paper onto the cake. Gently tap the paper down onto the cake, starting in the center of the paper and working your way to the edges to secure it in place and release any air trapped between the paper and the cake that may cause the image to bubble. Do not rub the paper when tapping it.