|
The 5c and 20c Weather Watch and the 25c Intelsat stamps are shown in the photographs above. The colours are: 5c, yellow, light blue, dark blue, orange; 20c, dark blue, black, white, orange; 25c, blue-green, grey, blue, black. The colours are quoted in the order of printing in each case.
The use of white as a printing colour is unusual; normally white is an absence of colour, white areas in a design being made by the white paper. In both Weather Watch stamps, Mr. Mason (the designer) used circles to signify radio signals; in the 5c design the circles are all formed from the yellow print, as positive yellow lines on white paper in the upper area, and as "reversals" (lack of yellow ink) in the solid yellow area.
In the 20c design, the white circles fall half on the blue area and half on the black. If normal procedure had been followed, with the circles reversed in both colours, any variation in registering the black against the blue would have resulted in misplaced semi-circles abutting one on the other inaccurately. The complete circles and the small mast were therefore a positive drawing, printed in opaque white over both blue and black areas; in fact, no attempt was made at a "cut-out" in the "20c" area, and the circles print over the zero of "20c", although being white on white this is not visible to the naked eye. The presence of white ink can be detected,under magnification or when the sheet is held at certain angles, where the white register bar is printed midway between the black and orange bars.
The photographs also show certain other technical methods of avoiding poor prints. In the 5c stamp, the globe appears to have a solid circular border; this is because the sensitive film has picked up the "underdraw" on the yellow, i.e. the artwork has been drawn so that the yellow extends (at stamp size) about half a millimetre under the blue, to obviate any unwanted white outlines if the register fluctuates. Similarly, the 25c photo shows a marked panel behind the words "INTELSAT II", where the blue-green has been drawn in
a wide area overprinted by blue in which the lettering has been reversed; this device, not so apparent in the actual stamp, was also adopted to avoid register faults which would have occurred if the blue-green lettering had been tailored closely to fit the reversal in the blue.
All three stamps were printed on unwatermarked coated paper incorporating Derby Luminescence. For the Intelsat and 5c Weather Watch runs, only the normal four cylinders were used for each.
In the 20c Weather Watch printing, four cylinders were used initially, but the blue cylinder developed a tiny flaw immediately, and a new blue cylinder was made and used throughout the printing. After deletion of spoils, it was found that the total number of good sheets was slightly below the requirement, and a small number of sheets from the first cylinder had to be used to bring up the total; on these sheets, from the beginning of the printing, the flaw was practically non-detectable.
It is not known to which State/s the sheets from No. 1 cylinder were distributed.
|
Australian Stamp Stories 
