Making My Own Album

First some Hungary pages, I modify Steiner's for them as I don't want to redo all the pages of Hungary, so I redo only few

Many information on these 2 pages are different or not included in Scott catalogue








Nest those 2 one was made with AlbumGen , both are engraved Cinderella. Those stamps was not included in EzStamps, but when I did the US after 1965 , I use AlbumGen and I just import the stamps boxes and images from Ezstamps, much more easy. ( Before 1965 the US are in a Lighthouse album )

What is your concern about that? Do you think it will affect the stamps if not in mounts? I use mounts so never consider it a concern.

I do not like Mystic paper just because it is too thin. I can scan them and then reprint on better stock. I have 28 lb paper for Steiner pages (white) but considering changing to Domtar Colors - Earthchoice CREAM Opaque Text - 8.5 x 11 Paper - 28/70 Text - 500 PK. It has a vellum finish.

Andy's hack made me rethink what is possible. I downloaded Scibus and opened his files and there is potential. All you need is a starter kit (frames and text boxes for common stamp size) and you are ready to go.

I am now in analysis phase since I did this before when I was using AlbumPro (no longer runs on win 7 even in virtual mode).

Al

I use mounts as well. My concern about the facing page text is its location after you add pages. Depending on where you insert new pages (I suggested two options) I want the subsequent page text to face the stamps they are describing. That's the reason for the hack in my second option.

I agree that Mystic's pages are flimsy. I use blank Mystic pages only to maintain consistency. I use much heavier stock for my Steiner pages.

Dan

I did this some time ago using Album Pro. I did not get very far along. I am going to do a more tight layout (uniform but closer spacing between stamps) with white area on the outside.

Boring..I did another experiment with the title/sub title on bottom with characteristics on top.

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I've had the same idea and even picked up a few domain names in hopes of starting the effort. Unfortunately copyright laws are most likely to kill the effort at some point. For example, I created Australia pages based on the Stanley Gibbons catalogue. I pulled a few small images from the catalog, images of stamps, and a few odd images from the web. I know that US copyright laws allow me to create this album for my own use, but I'm also dealing with UK and Australian copyright laws along with the grey area of sharing content.

I think agreeing on a common format. Some want a lot of detail and others want minimal.

Al

A 'WikiStampia' online specialized WW stamp album. A wet dream indeed....

I'm in the process of moving my Netherlands collection out of Davo albums (which I never liked) onto Steiner pages. The process is going well but since I mount all of my stamps, it is going to cost me $200.00 just in mounts. $300.00 plus if I include the Netherlands colonies.

Hello fellows, I always had the idea of making a classic Zeppelin only album containing the issues listed in Scott. I do have Libreoffice and found that it is easy to remove the border that Steinler puts on his pages, but how can you move around individual boxes? In "Draw" I am only able to grab blocks of boxes to move them. In addition I'd like your take of grabbing images of stamps off ebay and pasting them on the album page. It might not be ethical (or not) but is it illegal? Is any image posted on ebay automatically copyrighted?

Stampwolf, the box a probably group together, when selected right click with the mouse and select ungroup from the menu.

OK. So what are the ethics/legality of capturing an image off an ebay listing and using it to paste on your home-made album page? I personally don't have a problem with it. I mean, it is of an already defined issue and the like, just listing specific. I don't want to start an ethics discussion, but I'd like to know the groups take on it. Thanks! Wolf-==-

Stampwolf - I am not worried about images from ebay - it's the images I have pulled from the Scott, Stanley Gibbons and other catalogs that are my concern. I used scans to display watermarks, flaws, overprints, and other items from catalogs. Since I purchased the catalog, fair use would assume I can use them to create derived works for my own use. Once I upload them for public distribution the usage becomes questionable.

Paul

I don't see what is questionable . You can't publish something copyrighted without a written authorization from the owner of the copyright .

"I know that US copyright laws allow me to create this album for my own use "

Have you check wth a copyright lawyer ? When they say you can't copy, you can't copy even for your own usage.


Why people's need images in their album pages, it's not real stamp we are supposed to place on those small rectangles ? You only need to put denomination or Color or some description

Don't even thing to make albums with only images from ebay, you need a lot of reference material and research, or else you will just copy a catalogue like Steiner do ( with all the mistake included in Scott catalogue) I see no need to redo his work. I have a lot of respect for the huge work Steiner do, but it's beginner and intermediary stuff, but good thing is ; he did a huge part of the work, his pages are a good reference for the size of the boxes, but many are the wrong size, so you have to check with real stamps.

I just pass 25 hours this week working on my album pages of revenue stamps of Hungary and Austria and I have only few made, you can't imagine the sum of work needed, first the reference book are a problem, The Forbin date of 1915 with very little image and description, The Erler is half German half English a real pain to read, good thing the stamps are illustrated in their real size, it's help to make the box. And then the Hungary catalogue is in Hungarian, so Google translate all the time.

And those are pages for my need, they will not fit others peoples need. Just look at the work of Robin Harris just for the Machins, he made so many versions of albums and I have to modify one to fit my need.

This is why I am using Vario stocksheets and binders for my albums. I am not graphically inclined, and have limited amounts of free time to work on my collection. So laying out my albums on the Vario stocksheets is faster, just have to refer to the catalog of choice and then create my key for each page.

Currently I am laying out pages for New Zealand, based on the Gibbons Catalog.



Each box of 5-6 lines is a vario page, the numbers inside are the Gibbons Cat # of the stamp showing where to place it in the row. I use 7 cells across for each line, though small vertical defins you can fit usually 8 to a row.

Each row is 195mm long on a page, so you just need to do a little math to figure out how many stamps in a set will fit per row etc. Horizontal commemortative run 39-44 mm long so 4 per line is usually about right, whereas verticals tend to run 25-30mm so can get 6-7 in a row. Bigger stamps mean less per row (an issue for most countries after 1960). Height wise each row varies depending on number of rows on page, 6-rows are 39mm tall pockets, 5-rows are 51mm, 4 rows are 63mm tall, etc. Generally I find 6-rows work best for most countries up to about 1945, then there is usually a switch to 5-rows as stamp sizes get bigger, and by the 1980s or so usually use 4-row to be able to fit setenant blocks of 4 (laying vertical blocks on their side, which doesn't bother me. Personally I don't mind a mm or two of stamp showing above the pocket, but that option is of course there by choosing a page with taller strips.

Very flexible system, doesn't require artistic talent to create, and is a great way to learn about the items listed in whatever catalog you use. Wnen done I can print one copy of the key to keep with the album, and save the mother file to my storage HDs and in cloud.

And best part - no mounts to buy, no tons of paper pages to get, very little ink used to print out the key. Vario pages in the USA can usually be sourced from Amazon or ebay for apporx US$20 per pack of 25, and Vario binders are not that much more.

For me, its the combination of flexiblity of the page system (miss something just means editing the excel file to fit missing items in) and cost that makes this work so well for me.