I recently designed some flags for the Developmental Simulation Football League's Southern Football Conference. You can find them in the graphics section of the forum. I wanted to explain my design choices.
First it is important to explain that there are five fundamental rules of flag design according to the North American vexillological association.
These fundamentals are as followed:
One. Keep it Simple The flag should be so simple that a child can draw it from memory.
Two. Use Meaningful Symbolism The flag’s images, colours, or patterns should relate to what it symbolises.
Three. Use Two or Three Basic Colours Limit the number of colours on the flag to three which contrast well and come from the standard colour set.
Four. No Lettering or Seals Never use writing of any kind or an organisation’s seal.
Five. Be Distinctive or Be Related Avoid duplicating other flags, but use similarities to show connections.
Now, when I set out to make these flags, I wanted to keep the flags similar to the actual cities flags; or least be based in the same relevance. What I did not know going into this, that I wish I had,
American flags are freakin' awful.
To give you some idea, here are the flags for the SFC teams, why they suck, and how I took inspiration from them to develop the team flags.
Norfolk, Virginia
The flag for Norfolk, Virginia is arguably one of the least offensive flags, as far as American football teams go. However, it does break rules two and four. As explained by Roman Mars, seals are supposed to be used on documents that will be seen by the reader in their immediate vision.
Therefore, for the Seawolves version, it was very easy to just add in the team colours and remove any unnecessary iconography.
Norfolk Seawolves
Dallas, Texas
The flag of Dallas is actually pretty great, all things considered. It's distinctive, shares colours with the flag of Texas. Now if only didn't include that god forsaken seal. So this was pretty easy, all I had to do was add the Birddog's colours. I was tempted to add the 'D' in, but I felt like that would end up taking too much space, and negatively affect the presence of the star.
Dallas Birddogs
Tijuana, Baja California
As you can see, Tijuana doesn't have a flag. It has a coat of arms. But there are still workable elements in here. First and foremost, I was glad to see that it had a red boundary. In order to avoid it looking like San Francisco's awful city flag, I decided to use the Luchador red for two parallel bars with the team's green in as the center bar. Next the contents of the Coat of Arms look quite 'microsoft paint'y' so I thought it would be better for the team to keep its Lucha Libre roots at the forefront of the piece.
Tijuana Luchadores
Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
Look at this ugly turd of a design pretending to be a flag. The overflow of imagery, the use of text, using different shades of blue. I almost had a heart attack trying to come up for a way for the buccaneers to use. The only salvageable element of the design was the sun. I was tempted to turn it into a ferris wheel as that's all Myrtle Beach has (as a former Buccs player has told me), however, I want the design to be something a child could replicate, so I opted to keep the sun. After that I just darkened down the colours so they wouldn't be as in your face as the neon green and purple are. Finally, I had the decision to make about whether including the silhouette of the pirate or not. After conferring with some Myrtle Beach peeps, it was decided that less is more, and that it would be better to just leave it as a tribute the the Bangladeshi flag.
Myrtle Beach Buccaneers
First it is important to explain that there are five fundamental rules of flag design according to the North American vexillological association.
These fundamentals are as followed:
One. Keep it Simple The flag should be so simple that a child can draw it from memory.
Two. Use Meaningful Symbolism The flag’s images, colours, or patterns should relate to what it symbolises.
Three. Use Two or Three Basic Colours Limit the number of colours on the flag to three which contrast well and come from the standard colour set.
Four. No Lettering or Seals Never use writing of any kind or an organisation’s seal.
Five. Be Distinctive or Be Related Avoid duplicating other flags, but use similarities to show connections.
Now, when I set out to make these flags, I wanted to keep the flags similar to the actual cities flags; or least be based in the same relevance. What I did not know going into this, that I wish I had,
American flags are freakin' awful.
To give you some idea, here are the flags for the SFC teams, why they suck, and how I took inspiration from them to develop the team flags.
Norfolk, Virginia
The flag for Norfolk, Virginia is arguably one of the least offensive flags, as far as American football teams go. However, it does break rules two and four. As explained by Roman Mars, seals are supposed to be used on documents that will be seen by the reader in their immediate vision.
Therefore, for the Seawolves version, it was very easy to just add in the team colours and remove any unnecessary iconography.
Norfolk Seawolves
Dallas, Texas
The flag of Dallas is actually pretty great, all things considered. It's distinctive, shares colours with the flag of Texas. Now if only didn't include that god forsaken seal. So this was pretty easy, all I had to do was add the Birddog's colours. I was tempted to add the 'D' in, but I felt like that would end up taking too much space, and negatively affect the presence of the star.
Dallas Birddogs
Tijuana, Baja California
As you can see, Tijuana doesn't have a flag. It has a coat of arms. But there are still workable elements in here. First and foremost, I was glad to see that it had a red boundary. In order to avoid it looking like San Francisco's awful city flag, I decided to use the Luchador red for two parallel bars with the team's green in as the center bar. Next the contents of the Coat of Arms look quite 'microsoft paint'y' so I thought it would be better for the team to keep its Lucha Libre roots at the forefront of the piece.
Tijuana Luchadores
Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
Look at this ugly turd of a design pretending to be a flag. The overflow of imagery, the use of text, using different shades of blue. I almost had a heart attack trying to come up for a way for the buccaneers to use. The only salvageable element of the design was the sun. I was tempted to turn it into a ferris wheel as that's all Myrtle Beach has (as a former Buccs player has told me), however, I want the design to be something a child could replicate, so I opted to keep the sun. After that I just darkened down the colours so they wouldn't be as in your face as the neon green and purple are. Finally, I had the decision to make about whether including the silhouette of the pirate or not. After conferring with some Myrtle Beach peeps, it was decided that less is more, and that it would be better to just leave it as a tribute the the Bangladeshi flag.
Myrtle Beach Buccaneers