Seth:
It was Canadian Bank Note. I've asked my friend when the meeting and photography took place as a gauge as to how long it took to get the graphic elements into place, but haven't heard back. When I do I'll update the post.
Somehow I don't really believe that Bank of Canada has 'bank note designers'. If you pick up a copy of "The art and design of canadian bank notes" from the currency museum, the references to the designers and artists are all CBN, George Gundersen, Gordon Yorke, Yves Baril (of CBN who did a few?) of the portraits on the Journey notes, John Crosby (no, not the politician) the nature artist who did the backs of the Birds series, Henry S. Doubtfire (that's his name - really) who did the portrait of the Queen on the birds series (worked for a company called De LaRue in England), Thomas Hipschen of the Bureau of Printing and Engraving who did the portrait of MacDonald and W. L. Mackenzie King on the birds series. It's interesting that the BA International, who printed the $10s and $50s had to contract out the portrait engraving.
No place in that book is there "… was designed by Joe Doe of the Bank of Canada".
Other interesting facts from the book. The Scenes of Canada (multicoloured) notes were designed by that De LaRue company with, as far as I can tell, input from Gundersen.
The original design for the multicoloured 50 was supposed to be a scene of a frozen lake from Sudbury, Ontario (that's home!), but due to the limited colours, that was canned and Gundersen came up with the RCMP dome formation and the bright red colour scheme.
Also there was supposed to be a $1000 note with the back being a scene of the National Ballet performing Swan Lake. Gundersen even fully engraved the scene, but as we know there was no $1000 for that series.
The back of the Birds $1000 was supposed to be Spruce Grouse, but due to it's nickname of "Fool Hen", which was considered 'to controversial', was changed to the Pine Grosbeak.
All kinds of interesting facts in that book!
John
