Penny Black printing plates Penny Black printing plates The printing plates for the Penny Black, two pence blue and the VR official were all constructed by Perkins Bacon, the printers of the first postage stamps issued in Great Britain. The construction of these plates was long and complicated, which was intentional so as to make the forgery of the finished article almost impossible. The first stage involved the engraving of a background for the design. This was produced with a rose engine which laid down a circular pattern of symmetrical design onto a piece of soft steel. This was then partly cleared to leave
Penny Dreadful (TV series) creator John Logan announced that "Penny Dreadful" had ended as the main story had reached its conclusion. The title refers to the penny dreadfuls, a type of 19th-century British fiction publication with lurid and sensational subject matter. The series draws upon many public domain characters from 19th-century British and Irish Gothic fiction, including Dorian Gray from Oscar Wilde's "The Picture of Dorian Gray"; Mina Harker, Abraham Van Helsing, Dr. Seward, Renfield, and Count Dracula from Bram Stoker's "Dracula"; Victor Frankenstein and his monster from Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein"; and Dr. Henry Jekyll from Robert Louis Stevenson's "Strange Case of Dr Jekyll