Hong Kong $2 King George VI - Color Shades

Years ago, I had a stamp dealer send me over 100 copies of this stamp on approval, allowing me to pick out different color shades. The Scott Catalogue lists only one entry, Scott #164A violet & red. My Yang Catalogue lists 2 entries, Yang 166 bright violet & scarlet and 166a violet & scarlet. Yang also notes, "Many shades and paper types exist, too numerous to include here." As you can see below, the shades range from almost gray to almost blue, quite a range of colors.

Linus

Linus, Interesting display of tints/shades/tones. Many things could have caused the variations in the color of your stamps, including exposure to sunlight or atmosphere, and variations in ink formula. If oil was used in the ink formula, using too much oil would make the color paler, for example.

For more on color theory in general, see this link:

http://www.tigercolor.com/color-lab...shades_tones

The Commonwealth Catalogue which was published by Murray Payne lists three shades for the Hong Kong $2 (second set of colors). They are listed below with my example of what I think is the stamp they described:


$2 Violet and Red on Substitute Paper - 1946


$2 Purple-Violet and Red on Chalk Paper - 1947


$2 Violet and Red on Chalk Paper - no date mentioned.

I am pretty sure there are more printings.

It is pretty difficult to sort King George VI stamps using used copies because they are not in the same condition as when they were issued. I see a lot of change in your stamps that do not appear on unused issues.

Try at least sorting for the substitute and chalk paper issues. You can use a piece of silver and lightly draw it across the bottom margin to test. Chalk paper will yield a pencil like line. If you don't want to mark the stamps, try lightly rubbing your finger across the surface. Chalk paper is smoother and will feel slick compared to the substitute paper which will tend to drag a little bit.

I have a King George VI Collectors Society Study Paper on the Hong Kong set, but can't seem to locate it at the moment. If I can find it, I will let you know how many printings they show.

I found the reference I mentioned in my previous comment.

"A Study of the Hong Kong Definitive Adhesives of King George VI" by Nick Halewood and David Antscherl. It was published by The Hong Kong Study Circle in 1992, so if you want a copy, you should contact the group.

Anyway, they list all of the printing dates for all of the Hong Kong King George VI Stamps as well as color descriptions, quantities printed, and a nice chart of the many print flaws that can be found on the stamps.

I can not list all of the $2 (second color set) printings for you because there are too many, but their list shows 11 printings on both substitute and chalky papers with a number of combinations of purple and violet ranging from bright to dull for the head plate (King's face). The scarlet used on the key plate (the rest of the stamp design) seems pretty constant.

The stamps you posted were printed during the time period of 1946 until 1953. The colors were changed because the initial color stamps that were in stock when the Japanese invaded Hong Kong were looted and were declared invalid. So new releases with new colors had to be created for use after the British took back control of the Colony.

So even though some of your stamps look a little washed out, they might be the duller violet shade (which is listed). As a suggestion, I place all the stamps of the same value on both black and white paper and compare them under strong lighting. I arrange the ones that are similar together as I try to sort them for color shades. For me, black paper seems to work the best because it tends to bring out the colors.
Have fun sorting them.

I have been putting web pages together for various KEVII, KGV, and KGVI stamp sets. Based on this post, I went ahead and put the Hong Kong page together today. Although the basic set has some color and perforation changes, there are several types of paper - chalk and substitute, and color changes from a number of printings. The link below will show you the various options listed in the Commonwealth, Stanley Gibbons and Scott Catalogs. If you are interested, check the site using the link below:

http://www.kgvistamps.com/articles/...ng-1938.html

Great job on the KGVI site, bookmarked!!!

Thanks, but consider bookmarking my index to all of the sites I have created. There are currently over 180 pages with over 4,000 images of various British Colony sets. I am trying to add a page or two every week. They will all be found here.

http://www.kgvistamps.com/KGVIStamp...leIndex.html