tonga2 wrote:3D lenticular
On 1 August 2018 Australia Post issued a 3D lenticular S/S for Reef Safari.
This sheet was overprinted for the 2018 Macau Stamp Exhibition with special limited edition postmark for each of the four days of the exhibition.
I didn't see your post Glen, and only happened to find it now!Global Administrator wrote:Why do they do that?stampchris wrote:I wonder how many other collectors noticed that the size of the stamps in the block of four is different to the regular sheet stamps. The regular sheet stamps are 37.5 mm x 26 mm, whereas the lenticular stamps are 41 mm x 30 mm.
Perforating lenticular stamps as they did with this issue would much more time consuming and would wear down any perforating comb faster (hence it is likely that a special, more expensive, comb was used). The only other country that has released perforated lenticular stamps is the UK when they did this with their Thunderbirds issue, which was produced by Cartor in France, and had 41 mm x 30 mm stamps.
I suspect that the Australian lenticular sheet was printed by Cartor in France (I spoke to the Cartor representatives in Melbourne in 2017, and they indicated that they were in discussions with Australia Post to produce more specialist issues), and since they already had a perforation comb suitable for perforating lenticular stamps, Australia Post probably decide to use it as it would save costs. The stamps were computer generated, so repositioning the design elements would've been fairly easy. This would also explain why the $2 Shark stamp is imperforate. Yes, it adds interest to the sheet, but the reality is, it would've been more expensive to produce a new comb just to perforate this stamp.
The only other printer of lenticular stamps is OuterAspect in New Zealand, but their expertise is in self-adhesive lenticular stamps.
