[ANSTHRLD] question about counterchanging

[kobrien at texas.net]

> The shield at sinister chief (Per saltire vert and Or, a trefoil knot
> inverted counterchanged) does not suffer from that.  However, due to
> the small size and thinness of the knot as you drew it, it's hard to
> tell what's going on.  Fill the space available -- with nothing else
> on the shield, the corners of the knot should be approaching the
> corners of the shield.  And make the lines of the knot thicker (even
> more than the knot at sinister base), especially considering that
> you're trying to express counterchanging.  If you did that, my own
> opinion would probably be that it's busy but I can tell what's going
> on -- but it would still be a judgment call.


My armory skills are way rusty.  So I'll ask this of the folks up to date on 
armory here:

- shouldn't the trefoil basically have it's center in the center of the 
shield?  (With the knot drawn big enough that its points get near the corners 
of the shield, as noted by Daniel.)

- shouldn't the middle of the per saltire division be higher?  It looks a 
little low in the top left image and definitely too low in a couple of the 
others.  What's the correct location for the center of per saltire?  The center 
of the shield (basically, the halfway point from the top of the shield to the 
bottom point)?

The rule of thumb I've used fairly well for drawing armory has been to draw the 
item on a shield the same size as used on the forms, tack it to a wall (or 
stick it on the fridge with magnets) and walk across the room.  If I can easily 
tell what the things are from about 15 feet away, I figure I've drawn it clear 
enough to be recognizable.

I think I like the yellow on black and green best (but I may be prejudiced as 
they are the three colors I originally chose for my arms way back when).  I 
can't tell with the current size of the trefoil, but I think that the 
counterchanged yellow & green one could also be quite striking.  

One thing I tell folks when they're thinking about their armory: think about 
how you will put it on stuff.  One of my personal requirements was that I had 
to be able to sew my arms (and badge) without all that much trouble.  My 
solution on how to sew a cross formy was to do it "pillow" style: take two 
layers of fabric, sew an outline of the design (leaving a small opening on one 
edge) and turn the thing right side out - then sew it to whatever I'm making.  
The crosses came out nice and sharp.  If you're going to be painting this 
design, you may want to create stencils.  And I would think that you could 
create a trefoil stencil fairly easily.

One more question for the armory folks here: is the center of the trefoil 
supposed to be open?  Or does it matter?

Mari