Washington-Franklin Watermarks

Family,

I am having a terrible time finding watermarks on my W-F stamps. Even when I know that that a stamp has a watermark, I can not find it 90% of the time. For example, all three of the five cent perf 12 Washington stamps have a watermark. I can't find them. Even though the stamp is blue!

I believe part of the problem (besides my poor eyesight) is that I don't know what I'm looking for. I downloaded and printed out the double lined watermark PDF file on the StampSmarter 1847USA site. And I cut out the cardboard template. But the watermarks on the PDF are huge! Way bigger than I envisioned. They are 25mm tall. Is this correct? That's bigger than the stam, itself!

It would be extremely helpful to me (and hopefully to many others) if someone would post a nice, clear, and centered single lined and then a double lined watermark. Something for the rest of us to go by. Oh, and tell us what the letter is (U, S, or P).

Thank you so much for your help,
Jack Kelley

Correction on that 25mm watermark. It was SINGLE lined. (Sorry)

Jack Kelley

Jack, I can sympathize with you! I have problems also; hair falling out, teeth missing, nails breaking and the worst of them all for a stamp collector, eyes going! I have no remedy for the W-F watermarks, but maybe another geezer has a suggestion that works.
I have had some success with training younger family members but as soon as they discover girls that is out the window too!

Peter

Peter4522,

I know that watermark detection can be enhanced by wet scanning and tinting. But the fact remains that we have to know what we're looking for. Disi123 is on it. He'll help us out!

Jack kelley

Does this help? (That is, is this the correct time period?)



http://www.stamp-collecting-world.c...ps_1910.html

The block on the left is soaked in Clarity and one can see just how difficult it is to discern the watermark, especially on orange (apparently.) The watermark in the top selvage, however, is pretty easy to spot.

Single-line watermarks are difficult for me unless there is a substantial portion of it to see. single-Lines are also smaller than double-line watermarks. I can usually see double-lines unless there is an extremely small portion--then its harder to distinguish and sometimes looks like it is a single-line. Sometimes the watermark pops out quickly, usually double-lines do, but sometimes I have to leave them in solution for a while before the watermark come out--usually the single-lines. Following are scans of: Double-line "S" on a pair of #345 and Single-line "S" on a paste-up pair of #390. Note the top stamp in the single-line example has the "S" fairly well center in the stamp and the bottom stamp has the "S" high on the stamp.

Thanks Al E. Gator, that helps a lot!

Peter

Yes KGB, That's the ticket. This is very helpful. It appears that the actual height of SL watermarks is about half the height of the stamp. The watermark would be about 10-11mm tall. Do you have anything like this for the DL watermarks?

Jack Kelley

Family,

I wish we had a spot on this site where we could repose these images. I'm sure the same question comes up over and over. They are really helpful. Thanks to all who contributed.

Jack Kelley

Double line watermarks will often show on mint stamps just by looking at the gum obliquely, single lines much less so. A flat glass tray allows more light in than the traditional tray with sides and makes it easier to see the watermarks. The bottom of an old black glass ashtray turned upside down is ideal, I know of experts who use nothing else.

Another image of the DL watermark.

Jack, I'm still trying to find something like what I found for the SL.

As an aside, here is a sample of a template one might make for oneself.

Jack, nothing yet. The best I can do at this point is say that the 1895 issue was described as having the DL watermark you S P S spaced with a single letter to each stamp.

KGB,
Your Single Line (SL) watermark (WM) illustration does a great job of depicting the worst case scenario. Note how many of those stamps have a WM only at a small area in the perforations.

Detecting WM's on the perforations can be very difficult. Practice with larger WM's that are closer to the center first. When you feel confident with them, then start studying the one's with WM's only on the perforations.

Are your actual stamp images photographs or wet scans? I don't see much of the design visible, so I wonder if your camera is using a flash. Turning the flash off would help you significantly. Wet scanning would probably make them easier for you to see than using a camera.

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Dave,
Both of your images show that you need to be using more fluid and need to flatten them better. After you lay the soaked black paper above the stamp, take something like an old credit card and lightly squeegee the air and excess fluid out from underneath. You might find that a bit of weight on top of the closed scanner lid could improve the scan quality as well. Something like a heavy book works well.


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Jack,
To get a feel for the size of a DL vs. a SL WM, look at Al E. Gator/Dave's two images. They are both on W/F designs. The DL WM is larger than the SL and is nearly as tall as the design.


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Anyone,
A wet scan of a block of 5x4 (20 total) SL watermarked stamps would help out greatly. I will take that and turn it into a transparent overlay. It then can be used in a photo program above your actual stamp instead of a using a physical template and a paper printout.

Here is a look at how the double lined watermark (watermark 191) will distribute.



But then you get into the eight possible orientations...

http://www.stampsmarter.com/1847usa...ntations.htm



-IBFS