US Heraldic Registry or American College of…

 
House of gaels
 
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27 October 2009 10:25
 

Greetings, This is my first post here.

I am an artist trying to starting a business specializing in heraldry particularly in the U.S. My initial idea was that I wanted to create a Coat of Arms for my own family of far higher quality than the clip art stuff that was out there, while researching I didn’t expect to find the amount of fraudulent bucket shops selling crap COA’s. So I decided to try to take up the cause of educating people about this which led me here. My only question is that I wanted to create a package deal of blazoning new arms and then doing the artwork and registering it for people. I was wondering if anyone had any experience with the American College of Heraldry or the US Heraldic Registry?

 

Also, I was hoping to get anyone’s advice in general. I would like to Help The American Heraldry Societies mission to raise the level of awareness to combat these phony companies out there, I am trying to study this subject and finish my website in the coming months. Hopefully there is a market for a real heraldic artist rather than cut and paste clip art companies out there.

 

 

Any thoughts?

 

- Andrew

House of Gaels

 
Joseph McMillan
 
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Joseph McMillan
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27 October 2009 11:23
 

The American College of Heraldry does provide emblazonments of arms as part of their registration documents and may well be in need of a good American heraldic artist.  They and we are on friendly, collegial terms with some overlap in membership, but not affiliated with one another, so you’d need to contact them directly about possible commissions.

The USHR is a one-man (Michael Swanson) operation and I think he does all the emblazoning himself.

 

Members of this society do occasionally commission emblazonments, and of course there are various organizations, schools, churches, etc., who are potential clients for your work.  You might want to get a personal webspace to put examples up for people to look at.

 
Donnchadh
 
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Donnchadh
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27 October 2009 12:10
 

Andrew, first, welcome. it is always nice to see a fellow artist here.

there are several noted American heraldic artists who offer hand painted pieces that are of very high quality as well as those from around the globe and several of them contribute here at AHS. i’ve found each of these people to be really nice and have had my achievement emblazoned by them and vice versa.

 

i would encourage you to post your work here until your website is up and running (loosing/not having a website is something i’m personally very familiar with and it can be very frustrating). you will find the people here to be appreciative of good heraldic artwork and the artists who provide such work; some will become clients, some will become critics (always needed and appreciated), and some of them will be both.

 

so what medium(s) do you work in? how long have you been practicing your craft?

 

as an aside, i would be careful about listing too big a difference between hand painted pieces and e-painted pieces. i know artists who work in either and even in both mediums who are top-notch artists. while i myself am an artist whose mediums involve no computer whatsoever i do appreciate the quality e-artists here because of their work, their collegiality (is that a real word…i mean really?), and their dedication to good/sound heraldic emblazonry practices.

 

again welcome.

 
davidappleton
 
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davidappleton
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27 October 2009 13:34
 

Joseph McMillan;72914 wrote:

The American College of Heraldry does provide emblazonments of arms as part of their registration documents and may well be in need of a good American heraldic artist.


Indeed, the most recent issue of The Armiger’s News (the quarterly magazine of the ACoH) notes that they have no Americans doing emblazons for them at the current time.

 

David

 
davidappleton
 
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27 October 2009 13:36
 

Donnchadh;72916 wrote:

their collegiality (is that a real word…


Why, yes, yes it is.

 

"col·le·gi·al·i·ty (k-lj-l-t)

n.

1. Shared power and authority vested among colleagues.

2. Roman Catholic Church The doctrine that bishops collectively share collegiate power."

 

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009.

 

David

 
Michael F. McCartney
 
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27 October 2009 21:27
 

RE: collegiality—I suspect that Denny’s intended meaning was a good deal less organizational than the dictionary version, though I would have guessed (perhaps wrongly) that a meaning along the lines of "working cooperatively" or some such might also be in an unabidged dictionary.

Ah well—maybe "congenialty" would better fit the bill? (If we could keep a focus on heraldry rather than Sandra Bullock…sigh…)

 

Very strongly second Denny’s suggestion to share (post) some of your artwork here—both for my own selfish reasons (I really, really like to see good heraldic art!) and for practical reasons—until we’ve seen what you can do, we won’t really know how to judge your capabilities as an artist in this fairly specialized field.  It’s nothing personal, since we don’t know anything about you at this point besides your apparent good intentions—but then that’s the point!

 

Anyway, welcome aboard!

 
House of gaels
 
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27 October 2009 21:51
 

Everyone thank you for your prompt responses. I’m very glad to finally be speaking with people who know more about this than I. First, let me tell you a little bit about where I’m at right now with this.

I started this several years ago, with the intention of doing my version of the Scottish clan crests that I saw in books and at highland games. I did about 130 of them. However, I wanted to start doing full blazons, which I have yet to complete, because I have no clientele as of yet. I can show you a few of my versions of clan crests if you’d like.

 

I would like to say that I definitely do not look down on artists that use computers as a medium (or have different styles), for I do use both myself. In fact my biggest fear is that people won’t like the way I do the artwork. I’m a bit more detailed. I believe that I will have to offer a few different styles to satisfy different tastes. Some traditional line drawings some not (which is my preference), but always heraldicly accurate.

 

I’ll get a couple posted if you’d like to critique them. I haven’t shown them to anybody yet, outside my family. I expect some people will not like my style while some may.

 

Maybe I’ll contact ACoH after I get a couple of fully blazoned Coat of arms.

 

- Andrew

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Joseph McMillan
 
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27 October 2009 22:35
 

Michael F. McCartney;72940 wrote:

(If we could keep a focus on heraldry rather than Sandra Bullock…sigh…)


I don’t know why we can’t do both; she has very nice arms.

 
David Pritchard
 
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28 October 2009 03:20
 

davidappleton;72925 wrote:

Indeed, the most recent issue of The Armiger’s News (the quarterly magazine of the ACoH) notes that they have no Americans doing emblazons for them at the current time.


I believe that the late Richard M. Crossett of Louisville, Kentucky was the ACH’s last American heraldic artist.

 
House of gaels
 
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28 October 2009 10:01
 

O.k. here goes. I’m entrusting you guys here on this board. Please keep in mind that you are this first outside of my family to see these. They are copyrighted and hopefully they will be a portion of income for me in the future and I hope that is respected. I trust you guys here, that is why I’ve included these with no watermarks (yikes!).

Also, I don’t believe I have a fully developed Heraldic style yet, that will take many years to come, so I’m not there yet, but this is my start. I have about 140 of these to date.

 

Feel free to add constructive criticism, it’s the only way I can make it closer to what people want.

 

 

let me see if I can get these images up correctly. They are clickable.

 

http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/5522/skeneb.th.jpg

 

http://img691.imageshack.us/img691/84/macleodb.th.jpg

 

http://img203.imageshack.us/img203/8739/crichtonb.th.jpg

 

http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/9537/agnewb.th.jpg

 

 

 

more to come,

 

- Andrew

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28 October 2009 10:04
House of gaels
 
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28 October 2009 10:06
House of gaels
 
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28 October 2009 10:09
 

a few more…

http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/3963/anstrutherb.th.jpg

 

http://img692.imageshack.us/img692/7500/arbuthnottb.th.jpg

 

http://img4.imageshack.us/img4/5628/bannermanb.th.jpg

 

http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/2972/cameronb.th.jpg

 

 

There are many more, However you get the idea. I need to get on to the full Coat of Arms now.

 

Comments/Suggestions?

 

- Andrew

House of Gaels

- Andew

 
Kathy McClurg
 
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28 October 2009 10:12
 

Well, I’m no artist, but I do like them.  My father use to do leatherwork and I like the belts appearing as though the letters are worked into leather.  First I’ve seen that way.  You should do your a coat of arms from your family as the first so you have an achievement to show…  And if you haven’t designed one yet, well join AHS, and the membership here will be happy to help!

 
James Dempster
 
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28 October 2009 10:19
 

I like them too and I think it might well be worth Andrew saying hello over on the Heraldry Society of Scotland forum. I’m sure that there are a number of people there that will be interested.

James

 
Donnchadh
 
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28 October 2009 11:03
 

i like these Andrew. thanks for sharing.

i especially like the detail in the dragon. that is my favorite for sure. i also second Kathy’s comment about the lettering being worked into the leather of the belt. that’s brilliant!

 

i would also advocate you emblazon your family’s achievement first so you have one of your own and can show everyone some of how you’d work an emblazonment of an achievement.

 

as to developing a style, don’t fret over it. there are as many styles as there are stars imo. for example, Alexander, on his way to becoming, if not already, a master of this craft has a most AD sort of style that is, for me anyway, fresh since no one really does that. others have a more simplified, much like a Nordic style and certainly Daniel is, imo only, the best calligrapher of the bunch. all different styles and all much appreciated by those here.

 

i look forward to seeing you continue your work and your continuing to share it with us. smile