Canadian Philately - The Stamps and Postal History of Canada 1851 to Present by Brixton Chrome

Today's post continues my examination of shades on this issue, and features two of my favourite stamps for the range of colour exhibited: the 10c Jack Pine and 15c Bylot Island stamps. It is almost impossible to exhibit the full range of shades that can be found without doing a detailed study of used examples, but I will attempt to show a representative selection of the shades that can be found on these stamps in this post, and will add other examples as they come to my attention.

8c Slate - Parliamentary Library

The basic catalogue description for this stamp is slate, but there is variation in terms of the amount of blue, green, and the amount of black, or grey that is present in the mix. Generally, the earlier printings with dex gum and many of the booklet stamps are found in a slate that is more bluish, while the later PVA gum printings tend to be a slate that contains much more grey.

With the exception of the coils, which were printed only by CBN, all the stamps were printed b…

Today's post continues with where I left off last week: the shades of the low value centennial stamps as they appear in ordinary light. Last week I dealt with the 1c, 2c, 3c and 4c values. This week, I will look at the 5c through 7c values.

5c Blue - Fishing Village

Of the four stamps I am examining today, this one exhibits the widest range of shades, ranging from deep violet blue, all the way to a deep bright blue. The range does not seem to be confined to either the dex gum or PVA gum stamps showing similar ranges of colour. However, I have not seen the deep indigo shade on the PVA gum stamps. The BABN booklet stamps do not show a range however, with all the booklet stamps I have come across being more or less the same shade. For this stamp, I find the best parts of the design to focus on in comparing shades is either the Queen's hair or the lower left corner.

Dex Gum Stamps - All CBN



Of all the stamps printed of this value, it is the sheet stamps with dex gum that show the w…

Today's post will delve into another aspect of the Centennial issue, that I feel has received less attention than it should: the printing inks. Apart from the fluorescent orange ink variety of the 6c orange, scarcely any attention is given in Unitrade to the immense variations in ink that can be found on this issue. In discussing the inks used, it is necessary to distinguish between how the inks will appear in normal light, and how they appear under ultraviolet light. In Canadian philately, the long-wave ultraviolet light (UV) is used to study modern issues, as it is this end of the spectrum to which the inks and tagging react the most. This is the safer wavelength of ultraviolet light as well, and is commonly referred to by laypeople as "black light". It is possible that two inks that appear the same in normal light or long wave ultraviolet light, might appear different under short-wave ultraviolet light. However, due to the dangerous nature of this type of light and t…