This Scott 332B Brittain Certificate Is The Gold Standard For Transparency

No positive control present in analysis, it just shows it differs from carmine. Maybe needs more work, but it is an admirable step forward to tackle the difficult field of colour.

Problem is that this approach will drive higher prices as stamps become an investment opportunity, and just like paintings these stamps will be left in vaults as simply another currency. Once this happens then I am afraid it will be very easy for a forger to imitate ink composition so it will require very detailed analysis indeed…and do you know what…it will come back to the personal opinion of a small group of experts based on the visual look of the stamp and other indicators.

How does proper identification of color lead to investment opportunity?

Why not simply use a colour chart and how the stamp presents itself currently (regardless of the effect of UV etc.) is what that colour is.

Nick - Which chart would you recommend? How many people look at a color and see it the same?

Pretty sure that I've posted these images before-- my Scott 66TC3, once known as Scott 66, the Lake shade. Jack Daley, one of the prolific 3c 1861 shade experts out there showed me how he uses Photoshop Elements after scanning to bring out the pixels in the area under the "3", where there is the best concentration of color on the stamp.

The scans show dark spots (dark purple, almost black), making the normal carmine color, lake, very similarly to the Brittain cert:

The stamp, my favorite in my entire collection:

After scan:


After scan showing and bringing out the pixels:


The 2nd image looks very similar to the Brittain image. I do not make any claims of being an expert here, nor am I trying to make light of Dr. Brittain's certs-- in fact, I would hope that this post would help clarify that the lake shade does indeed have darker areas compared to the normal reds and carmines. The Brittain certs, IMO, although I've not used them, have a LOT of potential-- particularly I would think in helping to clear up some loosely defined or misunderstood shades (I'm thinking pigeon blood pink here).

Hope this is helpful,
Ray

In the past I have used a Munsell color system book which contains an incredible array of colours and hues which is each allocated a specific internationally recognized reference number. This is what I would like to see in catalogues. Stanley Gibbons produced a colour chart when it first produced its larger catalogue as a standard reference for the colour descriptions it used. This booklet actually contained printed stamps which they used for their description of colour in their catalogues. They now produce a simplified card colour system which is not so good for those earlier stamp varieties where the hues are so subtle. I have heard, but not seen, that the other catalogues (e.g. Scott) also produce their own colour charts as a control definition for their stamp descriptions, so you probably have to use specific charts for species catalogue series. This is the problem I think. These descriptions are not actually based on a detailed reference but on a close fit.

So to answer your question charts like the Pantone GP1601A colour chart which is used for paint mixers and dyers are probably to intense in terms of colour to really get a good match. We are really interested in tones and hues, so we need to go to a Munsell chart for that I tink. I used to have one at work but had to leave it behind when I left, and they are expensive. But if we want to expand stamp valuations into this area then we need to define the colour against an international accepted standard such as Munsell. The charts are pretty good and eliminate that problem of how we percieve colour as individuals by direct comparison based on hues and tonal variation. Here is a link https://munsell.com/


I wonder if they would be interested in producing a specific chart. However, if anyone has a copy of that original Stanley Gibbon Colour Chart, perhaps they could scan it.

Like stamps, color charts age.
Scans will vary from one scanner to the next, and any given scan will look different on different monitors.

The well known color guides/systems have never gained traction as being the end all, be all in philatelic expertizing because you still need more than one human to agree on a color/shade/hue/tone. Having thousands to choose from does nothing to help. People do not see colors the same. Period. Stamp attributes change with time. Electronic images change everything. Lighting of the subject has a gigantic impact on what it looks like to any given person. There have been legions of published color resources throughout the years including R. H. White's handsomely produced and highly sought after US specific color work for the stamps of 1847 to 1919.

It has all been discussed ad nauseum. Colors are extremely challenging and chips, charts and books are never the answer if two human eyes have to agree whether it be on an in-hand stamp or an image.

That is exactly why technical analysis of the patient is the way to come to agreement. Especially when much money can be riding on a color that was mixed up by hand and applied 100 years ago on a piece of paper.

True, all pigments fade in light, especially stamps. tHowever, there is an available copy of the original SG colour guide on eBay at the moment. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/203796163366

Used color guides have little value; you have no idea how it was stored or the environmental conditions it has been exposed to. Additionally, ambient light is a key factor in identifying colors and I have never seen a stamp color guide that defines the ambient lighting needed to match a stamp to the guide.
Lastly, this hobby has no consistent color nomenclature, the color names that one chart publisher uses has no relationship with what another publisher might use.
Don

Absolutely Don, and this is the problem. We have to refer to colour and colour variations if we are going to classify stamps. So, we need to have a standardized approach to colour coding stamps which has been successfully done in science and engineering using very expensive colour comparison charts like those produced by Munsell. They have been tested and the results harmonized for repeatability (within labs) and reproducibility (between labs) and found pretty accurate. So much so they are an integral part in species description as well as high-end reproduction printing and photography, and much more. So why can't this be applied to stamp collecting so that we can be more certain about those colour hues and get the catalogues harmonized. If you want chemical analysis fine, but I want to be able to know what these variations actually look like, as for example when separating between the early Danish issues which are all variations of brown.

Colors are one of the most frustrating parts of our hobby. Not only are colors ephemeral over time, but as you point out the lack of standards is maddening. The only color experts that I have seen in the hobby are those who have dedicate very large amounts of time and effort in building their own color reference collections of similar stamps AND have developed a good 'color eye'.
But one of the troubles with colors is that a lot of people are confident that they can ID colors accurately. Add to this the inane practice of catalog editors assigning varieties to stamps with different hues, shades and tints and we virtually guarantee a confusing mess.
Don

The human eye needs to be removed from the equation. That is where spectrography(not sure I have that term correct) comes into play. Using a consistent light source to identify colors is needed and compared to a known example. Too many variables at play when you have people looking and trying to compare. One of the reasons that I feel that many of the shades should just be removed from catalogs, as I feel there is no real evidence of what they really are, but money talks.