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As a long time stamp collector, I still have difficulty identifying colors
and particularly shades. I can just imagine how beginners feel when they try to
identify a specific shade. The best way, of course, is to have the stamps
expertized, but that can cost a lot of money, especially if you have lots of
stamps with different shades.
I find a "Stanley Gibbons" color gauge very useful but still not
exact. Stanley Gibbons is the major catalog producer for Great Britain and the
Commonwealth - Scott's counterpart. This gauge works somewhat well if
used only in conjunction with their catalog color listing. You see, a particular
shade in their catalog, brick red for example, might be described as dark
brown-red in Scott's. So there is no uniformity among the major catalogs about
to color.
You must also consider that most older stamps fade and some colors actually
change over the years due to the color fastness of the ink used. Violets and
purples turn grayer in time. Some colors just oxidize and look totally different
from what they are supposed to be. Yellows and oranges turn to shades of brown,
for example. Stamps on display in a case or frame, or even left out in direct
sunlight will also change colors given enough time.
Another difficulty is with stamps classified as two hyphenated colors.
Red-orange refers to a stamp mostly orange with some red added to it. The second
color is the primary or dominant color. You may also find the listing as
reddish-orange, meaning the same thing as red-orange. Use these colors only as
guides.
Try comparing the stamp in question with another stamp from the same country.
The reasoning here is that each country often uses the same printers during the
same time period, which use the same inks. So comparing stamps from the same
country is sometimes helpful.
Some shades are nearly impossible to identify, such as light blue, baby blue,
powder blue, and so on.
Here's an interesting project to visually understand what's happening with
colors and shades. Try sorting common definitive duplicates from a variety of
countries by color. Look them up in any catalog you have, as it doesn't matter
which one you use. You'll soon discover that there will be a shade range even
for the exact same specific color listing!
As you can see, determining colors and shades is not for the faint of heart.
Even experts can sometimes disagree. The bottom line is do the best you can and
ask your other philatelic friends or possibly a dealer to give you a hand.
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