Armoria Tutorial - Azgaar/Armoria GitHub Wiki
Armoria is a free tool that procedurally generates customizable heraldry images. See a short video tutorial if you prefer video format.
The tutorial covers Armoria GUI version, for Armoria API please check its documentation.
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Gallery mode
Once opened, Armoria shows up in Gallery mode. Hover the mouse over an individual image to get control buttons to re-generate 🎲, edit ✏️ and download 📥 the coat of arms.
Top navigation pane allows to set preferences [Options], re-generate the whole gallery [Reroll], restore the previous one [Rollback], download gallery in different formats [Save], load custom charges to Armoria [Upload] and see legal information [License].
One thing to note here is that saving in png and jpeg produces a single image for all Gallery, while saving in svg will download all images as separate files. Download file size can be set in options.
Options
Shield: coat of arms or banner shape.
Random shape is getting selected on each new roll. But the value is getting saved and locked once shape is manually changed via options. To unlock shield or any other option just click on a bookmark icon 🔖 next to the option.
Please note that Middle Earth shapes are coming from the LotR props and hence I don't recommend to use them for commercial purposes.
Tinctures: coat of arms colors.
The core specific of heraldry is its simplicity, including a very limited number of available colors (tinctures). While you can add any number of custom colors, the default set is a time-proven historical artifact.
Heraldic colors can be split into 4 categories: metals, colours, furs and stains. Metals and colours are basic set of used colors, furs are common patterns and stains are rarely used additional colors. The rule of tinctures (RoT) states that metal should not be placed upon metal, nor colour upon colour. The rule may be ignored to show the coat of arms owner status, but generally it should be always followed for the sake of contract. Stains may not follow the rule, but for the same reason I advise to consider them as colours and not place upon other colours.
| Tincture | Type | Represents | Chance | Color |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| argent | metal | silver | ~25% | |
| or | metal | gold | ~16% | |
| gules | colour | red | ~17% | |
| sable | colour | black | ~14% | |
| azure | colour | blue | ~14% | |
| vert | colour | green | ~7% | |
| purpure | colour | purple | ~13% | |
| murrey | stain | mulberry | ~1% | |
| sanguine | stain | blood red | ~1% | |
| tenné | stain | tawny | ~1% |
The tinctures option allows to add or remove metals, colours and stains, but not furs. In Armoria furs are unified with other patterns into a single category. Patterns are hard-coded and cannot be changed via options.
You can also change the shades of colors. Heraldry has no strict hue rules, i.e. azure usually means both sky-blue and dark-blue. It is up to you what shade to set.
Left pane allows to set probability of tincture selection on generation. As an example if probability is metals 7, colours 10, stains 1, patterns 2, it means that generation chance is 7/20 (35%) for metals and 1/20 (5%) for stains.
Gradient: coat of arms gradient overlay. Damasking: decorative pattern upon shield. Gallery: gallery size, bigger means more smaller coats of arms will be displayed. Border: color and width of coat of arms border. Background: color of the working window. Scale: relative image size on download, e.g. 2 means image will be twice bigger than the displayed coat of arms.
Edit mode
TBU.
Charge upload
Armoria allows to upload custom raster and vector images as new charges. Custom charges can be used as default once, but won't be preserved on application refresh.
Raster images
Raster images are better to be in png format as it supports transparency. Charge will work the same as vector ones, but only available in their initial color. So if you need to upload a raster charge in specific color, use image editor to re-color it before uploading to Armoria.
To load the image just drop the image to the upload screen or browse it from the disk. Once loaded, use Size, Offset X and Offset Y inputs to fit the image in the displayed rectangle. It will ensure charge is correctly positioned on random generation.
You also have to provide a unique name, license information and select a category to add charge to. Then click Add and use the charge as any other in Edit mode.
Vector images
Vector images are a bit harder to work with, but if handled properly, they are smaller in size, scalable and can be colored inside Armoria. To make sure your svg image is in expected format, download the template file and open it in any text editor. It has comments showing how default charges are organized. Generally file should have root g element that Armoria will use to color and position the charge. Inner element should not have color specified. Only this root g element is getting loaded to Armoria.
Once file is loaded, you can see svg markup and change Tincture select to make sure color is getting applied. If not, the change will be available only in its proper color. Use Translate and Scale inputs to fix the image into rectangle for a better result.
Hotkeys
TBU.
License
TBU.