Project For A Database Of World Watermarks

Bingo...

AnthonyUK, that looks wonderful. It would certain make sense to add another dimension to an existing philatelic site rather than start one from scratch.

It looks like all I would need to do is start a new category ('Watermarks') and then a sub-listing for each country.

Please feel free to make a start with maybe one or two examples.
I'll drop you an email as the site admin is away and he may have some background on how to proceed but I think what you suggested will be fine.
An open catalogue scheme for identifying will be useful.
I'll help with scans and images where I can.

It is possible to scan the back side of stamps and sharpen them with Corel's Paint Shop Pro, or Adobe Photo Shop.

In the following link Picked I KGV stamps and scanned the front(first page) then scanned the back (second page) then adjusted the sharpness with PSP (third Page). You with the sharp eyes the third row is not upside down the wmk are inverted.

http://www.mancos.org/KGV.html

Kihn Conn wrote, 'then adjusted the sharpness with PSP'

They're very impressive results, there!!

Unfortunately, I don't have PSP myself but for those who do can you pls describe the steps you took to get those fine results?

jimjamtwo - Sorry I did not explain more about the process .There are two programs used by photographers to process and print photographs. One is Corel's Paint Shop Pro (PSP) the other and most popular is Adobe Photo Shop.
The process involves scanning the stamps as photos or pictures then using one of the many adjustments ( sharpen) to bring out the watermarks
Hope this helps.
Conn

I find the best method in PSP to show watermarks is to split your scan into CMYK as used in commercial printing.
One of the layers usually shows the WM much clearer.
The option is in the menu as Image - Split Channel - CMYK.

There was indeed, it was a vast collection,
and extremely well done.
It was, I think, a part of Stanley Gibbons.

The site now has been hacked by Iranian hackers

Here is a sample of what it was like

G'Day Rodney

Thanks for the backup.

I have a link for Stamp2 but I notice that the Watermark link is not listed anymore. Did you copy the entire list?

Jerry B

Hi Jerry,
No I did not, I didn't have a spider at the time,
and the list was vast, I just took a snapshot
of the India wmk re paper I had.

It was, a marvelous resource, lost to progress
copyright etc.

While researching for this project, I discovered the following (Italian) website:

http://www.definitives.org

It has a list of watermarks used on Italian stamps:

http://www.definitives.org/cat/wm.php?id=13

The website is in an early stage of development, but it looks like they plan to do most every country and that watermarks will be included for all the countries they list.

It seems to me that what I had in mind is already being undertaken by somebody (plus a whole lot more).

Definitely a website to watch (if you can get by in Italian).

There's also an English introduction page:

http://www.definitives.org/cat/index.php

It's wonderful that there's a website focusing on definitives - and for a very good reason.

Snip: 'this kind of stamps, seemingly the commonest, often hide some unexpected surprises.'

And they're planning to do 'the whole world'!

Hi

If desperate one can always use Google Language Tool. It does a fairly decent job.

http://www.google.com/language_tools?hl=en

Jerry B

I've time and energy and as long as we don't have to function under the forum constraints of <100 to upload, I've probably got a fair share of early us postal stationary watermarks... but they are also documented in Scott.
Let me know. I'll help if I can.

I could easily setup the pages for watermarks on the site - http://www.stampsoftheworld.co.uk

There are already listings under quite a few countries, all that would be needed is an additional page just for the watermarks of that country.

Would you think a single page would suffice for all the watermarks of a country or would multiple pages be required.

Drew