Online shield designer

[John]

I've found a website that will create shield designs based on an emblazon, eg. Tierced in pairle reversed, or, gules and ermine, over all a tau cross azure. Or create them by selecting components. You can also download it for free (it's open source).

http://www.karlwilcox.com/?page=shield is the portal page.

[Sir Edward]

Cool, I didn't know about that one. I've added it to the links page.

One of the ones I've taken a real liking to is this one:  http://www.inkwellideas.com/coat_of_arms/free_coads.shtml ... The downside to it is that it can't do anything other than straight line divisions, so nothing can be "wavy" or "embattled" for instance. It has a nice selection of charges, and allows you to import images to use.

Blazon95 can do those sorts of edges, but it doesn't have very many (or very pretty) charges to work with.

[ECOX]

Thank you John, I'll have to give it a try.
Sir Ed I have used inkwell also. I have done plain white shields with charges on them to be a able to easily change in a editing program. IE: I needed a cocks leg. So I downloaded the full creature and then erased the part I did not need.

[Sir Wolf]

cool

[John]

If you chose the Save As File option and accept the default file format SVG, you'll have your shield in a vector based format. This means it can be enlarged infinitely and still look crisp. It also means you can use a graphics package such as Inkscape to manipulate the components as distinct linedrawn objects. Inkscape is free for download from http://inkscape.org/download/?lang=en and runs on Windows, MacOS, and Linux. That way you can have your shield printed on a poster, or printed on vinyl and then applied to your shield, or you could have a laser cut out stencils that you can use to paint your shield, or have laser cut the components out of metal...

[Sir James A]

Oh wow - I have never seen one that will take heraldry blazon and turn it into a shield. That's really cool. I like the SVG option too.

[Thorsteinn]

I put in my arms and got bubkis.

Mine are "Azure, a point pointed and in chief an axe between in fess two arrows argent."

-Ivan

[John]

I put in my arms and got bubkis.
Mine are "Azure, a point pointed and in chief an axe between in fess two arrows argent."

Contact the Karl Wilcox at http://www.karlwilcox.com/index.php?page=contact give him your blazon, he wrote the software and may tell you why it didn't work, or he may fix the software so that it does.