Laos: The Way Its Attractive Stamps Used To Be Printed

On his blog IMPRESSIONS TIMBRÉES, Papy24 has published a fascinating article on the "camaieu" method of printing stamps in the National Stamp Printing Works, Paris, where those attractive stamps of Laos used to be printed.

He begins with the 1959 Floralies Parisiennes stamp (Scott France 904), whose original design can be seen on page 6 of Giorgio Leccese' Gallery of Original Drawings - Maquettes ( http://www.dieproofs.it/archivio/ga...2_itemId=104 ).

Here is an attempt at a translation of his most instructive treatment of the subject:

Pour répondre a un correspondant qui souhaite avoir des informations au sujet de ce timbre :
In reply to a correspondent desiring some more information on the following stamp:

(Illustration: FLORALIES PARISIENNES 1959 STAMP)

Ce timbre français a été imprimé en « camaieu » en 1959 par l'Imprimerie des Timbres-Poste a Paris.
This stamp was printed by the "camaieu" method in the National Stamp Printing Works, Paris in 1959.
Ce terme « Camaieu » est impropre puisqu'il est utilisé en réalité pour une seule couleur en plusieurs
The term "camaieu" is a misnomer as it is actually used for one colour in several
tons, du clair au foncé, et non pour un ensemble de différentes couleurs obtenues par mélange.
shades, from light to dark, and not for a set of different colours obtained by mixing.

En 1959, l'Imprimerie française utilise la rotative taille-douce « Chambon » qui ne dispose que de 3
In 1959, the French printer used the rotary intaglio press "Chambon" (which can be seen below) that had 3
éléments d'encrage pour un cylindre gravé avec une impression en un seul passage, avec des plages de couleurs
inking rollers only for a single printing cylinder for printing, in one pass, distinct and juxtaposed colour patches.
de couleurs distinctes et juxtaposées, comme on peut le voir ci-dessous.

Pour ce timbre, il a été utilisé la superposition de 3 couleurs : jaune, rouge et bleu. Bleu pour la
To print this stamp, three inks, yellow, red and blue, were used, sometimes one blended with another. The blue ink only for the
valeur et le ciel, rouge pour la fleur en bas a droite. Les autres couleurs résultent de la superpositions
value and the sky, the red one only for the lower right-hand flower. The other colours resulted from a mixture
de 2 couleurs différentes : jaune et rouge pour l'orangé de la fleur de gauche, jaune et bleu pour le
of two different inks: yellow and red making orange for the lower left-hand flower, yellow with blue for the
vert des feuilles, rouge et bleu pour le violet de l'Arc, et peut-etre meme la superposition des 3
green leaves, red with blue for the purple Arc, and perhaps even a mixture of the three
couleurs pour le brun des lignes du haut et du bas.
inks for the top and bottom inscriptions in brown.

Habituellement pour les autres timbres produits en 3 couleurs, chaque rouleau toucheur est découpé
To produce stamps in 3 colours, each inking roller is cut with extreme precision
pour déposer son encre sur les endroits prévus sans en dépasser les limites pour éviter qu'une
so as to apply its ink selectively to the required area without exceeding its limits as well as to
couleur ne vienne polluer sa voisine, et meme avec une extreme précision pour éviter le traînage a
prevent it from polluting its neighbour and even to avoid spreading it on
l'essuyage d'une couleur sur l'autre.
another area as the printing cylinder is being wiped.

Pour ce timbre des Floralies parisiennes, les rouleaux toucheurs ont été découpés en laissant la
For the above stamp, the surfaces of the inking rollers had been precisely cut, allowing them
matiere pour obtenir soit la couleur pure, soit son mélange par la superposition avec une autre
either to apply, to parts of the printing cylinder, just one pure ink or a mixture
couleur. Ce qui donne cet effet de polychromie avec un seul passage pour un seul cliché taille-douce
of them. This produces the polychrome effect in one pass of a single line-engraved plate through
en creux. Le maître taille-doucier a du etre tres adroit et tres concentré sur le découpage des
the press. The master printer had to be very skilful and very careful while cutting the
rouleaux pour ne rien oublier des superpositions.
inking rollers not to forget any of the overlapping parts.

Il devait etre tres expérimenté pour obtenir un tel résultat pour l'impression. C'est tres difficile. Il a
He must have been very experienced to achieve such final result. It was most difficult. It
fallu une extreme précision pour le réglage des rouleaux toucheurs, leur pression sur le cylindre
required extreme precision in setting the inking rollers, their pressure on the plate
cliché, et le réglage des encriers. Plus ou moins d'une couleur sur une autre change totalement le
cylinder and in the setting of inkwells. More or less of one ink in relation to another completely alters the
résultat, ainsi que le réglage du cylindre essuyeur qui peut lui-aussi changer ce résultat en enlevant
result, and the same goes for the adjustment of the wiping cylinder, which in turn may also change the result as it may remove
plus ou moins d'encre dans les tailles. Sans compter que le deuxieme rouleau récupere l'encre du
more or less ink from the recesses. Besides, the second inking roller acquires some ink from
précédent et finit par polluer l'encre de son encrier pour en modifier la teinte. Il faut de temps en
the previous one, polluting the ink in its inkwell and, in the end, changing its hue. It is necessary to
temps vider l'encrier pour en remplacer l'encre. Il y a eu beaucoup de variations dans les couleurs
occasionally empty the inkwell and replace the ink. There are many variations in colour
résultant de superpositions.
resulting from the mixtures of inks.

Pour un tirage normal, il y a un certain nombre de feuilles mal imprimées a chaque démarrage de la
In standard print runs there is always a certain number of faulty sheets due to each start of the
presse, a chaque changement de bobine papier ou changement de bobine de papier anti-maculage,
press, with each change of the roll of printing paper or that of the wiping paper to prevent smudges,
pour certains réglages habituels, mais pour notre tirage des Floralies, les difficultés ont été
or owing to regular settings of various units. But in printing this particular stamp, the difficulties
additionnées et meme multipliées, ce qui fait que pour ce tirage de plus de 127000 feuilles livrées, le
increased and even multiplied, which was why in the print run of over 127,000 good sheets, the
pourcentage de feuilles éliminées a du etre tres important. C'est probablement la raison qui explique
percentage of faulty ones to be discarded had to be very important. This was probably the reason why
que l'expérience n'a pas été renouvelée, sauf pour des tirages de faible quantité comme pour
the experiment has never been repeated except for low quantity print runs like those produced for
Monaco ou certains pays d'Asie.
Monaco or some Asian countries.

(Illustration: STAMPS OF LAOS PRINTED BY THE CAMAIEU METHOD)

Pour ce timbre de Monaco imprimé dans les memes conditions :
Here is a Monegasque stamp printed under the same conditions:

(Illustration: MONACO 1962 MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS SOCIETY STAMP)

On peut voir les 3 couleurs utilisées sur cet essai de couleurs : jaune en haut, rouge au milieu et bleu
You can see the 3 colours used on this colour test: yellow in the row above, red in the middle, and blue
en bas, pour l'ordre des rouleaux sur la rotative
below, in the same order as they appear on the rotary press,

(Illustration: COLOUR TEST OF MONACO 1962 MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS SOCIETY STAMP)

et sur la rangée du bas, les variétés de couleurs qui seraient possibles selon les découpages des
while the bottom row shows the colour variants that are possible according to the cuts in the
rouleaux toucheurs.
inking rollers.

Ces timbres ne sont pas les seuls réalisés selon ce procédé dit de « camaieu ». Pour les Etats-Unis,
Those are are not the only stamps produced by the so-called "camaieu" process. In the U.S.A.,
une autre machine est utilisée :
a different press was used:

(Illustration: PRINTING PRESS)

Apres un premier essai en 1961 :
After the first experiment in 1961:

(Illustration: U.S. 1961 FREDERIC REMINGTON STAMP)

et en 1962 et 1964 :
and some more in 1962 and 1964:

(Illustrations: U.S. 1962 WINSLOW HOMER AND 1964 NEVADA STATEHOOD STAMPS)

Il ne semble pas qu'il y en ait eu d'autres ainsi apres, sinon des timbres polychromes avec une
no more in that style seem to have appeared later on, except for multicoloured stamps produced by
impression mixte, hélio - taille-douce ou offset - taille-douce.
mixed printing, photogravure combined with line-engraving or offset combined with line engraving.

Il est possible que ce procédé ait pu etre utilisé dans d'autres pays, a vous de le signaler dans un
The method might have been used in some other countries as well. It is up to you to report on them in a
commentaire …
post of yours ...

Interesting, but a shame that the link is not working!

Peter

Petert4522 - Pity, just try the same link in my post of 01/18/2016 on the Stamp Engravers thread. Sometimes this works wonders.

Florian, thank you for translating and posting this
most interesting aspect of multicolour stamp
engraving.

Here is the link to Papy24's blog IMPRESSIONS TIMBRÉES
which shows the illustrations of the stamps mentioned.

http://blog-impressions-timbrees.blogspot.ca/

lithograving - Thanks.

Just count the colours resulting from mixing the three basic inks, yellow, red, and blue, used for the stamp of Monaco:
yellow + red = orange, yellow + blue = green, red + blue = dark purple, and perhaps even yellow + red + blue = light purple.

Printing such small-scale miracles did certainly call for remarkable skill, devotion and unwavering attention.

No wonder that line-engraved stamps of Laos printed by this method find lots of fans among the lovers of the beautiful in stamps.

Many thanks to Papy 24 for dealing with this topic in detail as well as his search for very fine illustrative material.

In his earlier article on "Camaieux", entitled "4 Couleurs pour 3" (= Four Colours for Three), that of December 28, 2011 published on his blog IMPRESSIONS TIMBRÉES, Papy24 notes that in the process of printing colours in this way it is extremely difficult to maintain these in their tints. This accounts for a number of variations in colour in such printings.

I have acquired 2 different colourings of the soil and the lower part of the bouquet in the Scott Monaco #506 stamp and have seen a third one in an image on my monitor (where the soil in the bottom left corner of the stamp is orange). Unfortunately, I lack the proper equipment to show you my specimens.

On the other hand, I have never seen any of the U.S. stamps exemplified by Papy24 presenting a slightest difference in this respect while those U.S.stamps printed by mixed techniques do offer examples of misregistration. For example, I have got #1370 Grandma Moses with substantial misregistration of the red colour.

Can any of the posters show specimens of the three U.S. stamps shown by Papy24 (#1187 F. Remington, #1207 W. Homer, #1248 Nevada Statehood) with evidence to the contrary?

Here's a recent acquisition...colour proof of a Decaris engraved stamp issued by Monaco in 1962 Scott#506



Image of reverse of proof..there are three faint rubber stamps on the reverse side...i think the top part reads "Monaco-Timbres-Poste".....the bottom part reads "Palais de Monaco




Here's the original issue with the proof above.




Here's an article (in French) that includes a sheet of six colour proofs..the strip I acquired is third from the left

http://blog-impressions-timbrees.bl...com/2016/01/

graphis, your excellent scans show perfectly how just 3 primary colours
can be combined to produce a wonderful multicolour stamp.

Here is Florian's post from 01/22/2016 : 09:30 am which
explains it all.

Just count the colours resulting from mixing the three basic inks, yellow, red, and blue, used for the stamp of Monaco:
yellow + red = orange, yellow + blue = green, red + blue = dark purple, and perhaps even yellow + red + blue = light purple.


Thanks for showing the proof.

graphis and lithograving - Wonderful, indeed! Many thanks!

Let me compare the camaieu Proof with the Stamp:

yellow: P / S : most of the sun
red: P : fore part of the bouquet , S : much of the bouquet
blue: P / S : the skies + MONACO + o,20 + the inscription below the value tablet
blend of yellow + blue = green : P / S : topmost / rightmost / bottomost part of the bouquet + the scroll
blend of yellow + red = orange : P : top of the bouquet + leftmost rose, S : leftmost rose
blend of red + blue = purple : P / S : the chest
blend of yellow + red + blue = brown : P / S : lower part of the bouquet + the soil at bottom left

Here's another version of the stamp tied to the FDC
There are subtle colour differences. I am certain that Florian
will elaborate.

This is pure theory. In practice these ink rollers aren't that accurately mounted as the two stamps shown here above can tell you :)

Rein

Here's an explanation of the differences in colouring kindly provided by Papy24, whose well-informed blog on French stamp printing http://blog-impressions-timbrees.blogspot.com/ is much appreciated:


Sur une rotative taille-douce 3 couleurs, il ne peut y avoir que 3 encriers et donc 3 couleurs déposées sur le cylindre clichés.
On a 3-colour rotary intaglio press, there can only be 3 inkwells and therefore 3 colours deposited on the plate cylinder.
Pour ce timbre de Monaco, comme le montre l'essai de couleurs, il y a dans l'ordre le jaune, le rouge et le bleu. Le jaune est déposé en premier,
For this stamp of Monaco, as shown by the colour test, there are yellow, red and blue, arranged in that order. The yellow is deposited first,
une autre couleur déposée par dessus modifie le résultat, mais il ne faut pas oublier que le jaune est au fond de la taille
another colour deposited on top modifies the result but we must not forget that the yellow is at the bottom of the recesses
et que selon l'encrage de la couleur en plus et de l'essuyage, on peut avoir des nuances dans le résultat final.
and depending on the additional inking with a different colour and the wiping, one may have nuances in the final result.
Et c'est tres difficile d'avoir toujours la meme couleur résultant du mélange. De plus, il peut y avoir des erreurs,
And it's very difficult to always have the same colour resulting from the blend. In addition, there may be errors,
des différences dans le découpage des rouleaux encreurs et quelques fois des taches d'encre inattendues, la ou il ne faudrait pas.
differences in the cutting of inking rolls and sometimes unexpected ink stains where they should not be.

With many thanks to Papy24 for his comment,

Florián

Florian, thank you for the translation.