Box Castle IV: the Eight Flags of Helmrood

The devil, so they tell me, resides in the details, and one detail I knew I wanted for my castle project was flags. BIG flags.

Like most things I do, I have a slightly idiosyncratic and um interdisciplinary approach to making flags and banners. I like to use experimental illustration techniques on them, since banners are small and low-stakes.

Because I was trying to finish this project intime for the CSW Kings of War campaign finale, I thought it would be fun to have a flag representing each participating faction. Hence my take on the wolf of house Stark, Karl's Night Heron of the Black Crown, Jon's Underworld Devourer, and Michael's Mark of Slaanesh.

I started with rough ink concept sketches in my sketch book:

I then used my light table to transfer the sketches onto bristol board in pencil:

At this point, it was time to raid my ink collection. I keep a drawer full of fountain pen ink samples for this kind of work because they are vibrant and sometimes have interesting and unexpected effects. (Though any ink or even watercolor will work to create these washes.) I deliberately keep it messy, uneven, and flowing to maximize the amount of visual interest.

While these are still wet, I then go in with my secret weapon, Noodler's Eel Black fountain pen ink (the same one I used for the shadows on the box castle). The extreme granulation it exhibits is unparalleled for texture.

With just a little bit of manipulation of the ink and water, you can create shadow gradients really easily.

Once all of that is dry, now we get to go back in with the pen for the final drawing:

We also can go back to some special-effect inks, specifically I LOVE using metallic inks. They typically have an underlying color and a slight sparkle when applied thin, but when left concentrated will dry almost completely metallic.

For the heron feathers, I used a silver/red and gold/orange ink, placed in small drops, and then used a straw to blow them into streaks:

After a few layers, and then a spritz of water from a spray bottle, this is what I had:

Final drawing step is with a white gel pen:

The eyeball pennants were looking a little too plain, so I decided to go back in and add some text. (I wrote the words down next to them so I wouldn't forget how to spell XD)

I didn't need/feel like making these banners two-sided, so the backs just got a dark brown/grey wash.

Then it was time to cut them out!

It's helpful to have other small projects around when you're working on something like this, so you have something to do during the drying time. In this case, it was more doors.

And also flag stanchions. I needed a way to fly these flags in multiple positions, but also pack them away inside the castle. I opted for cocktail sticks glued into three-layer sandwiches of chipboard. The middle piece is shorter than the outer pieces, allowing the outer pieces to form a clip that fits snugly around the chipboard walls of the castle. I illustrated them to look like stones.

I also needed to make sure that the flags could rotate on their poles, so that no matter where I placed them, they could all be oriented to the same wind direction. I did this by cutting the tabs a bit long and gluing the ends to the flag itself, using a cocktail stick as a form, rather than gluing the banner directly to its pole.

Finally, to give the illusion of rippling wind, I carefully dampened the flags very lightly (I didn't want to reactivate anything) and used a pencil to bend gentle curves into the bristol board. I left them to dry on their stanchions:

 If you like these banners enough to want to use them yourself, I've scanned and mirrored them (to make them two-sided) and put them up on Drivethrurpg for pay what you want. Feel more than free to download a set for $0. Hope you like 'em!