How to make custom badges and banners (all expansions)

This will teach you how to make your own badges and banners for the Army Painter in Dawn of War.

Renovations + 10 Year Anniversary

Hey everybody! At the time of writing, I've completed a major renovation to this guide. I've revised some of the text to be much more clear, and I've also taken a bunch more screenshots, so the guide should be much more consistent, clear, and clean-looking. Just in time (read: 3 months late for) the 10th anniversary of me posting this guide!

With that in mind, I'd like to thank everyone who's read this guide over the years. This is one of my favorite games of all time. It's taken me from my cringy teenage years to my cringy alright adulthood, along with this very guide. It warms my heart to know that there's still people out there who love it enough to tinker with it.

Speaking of tinkering: I'd also like to thank the people at Rakrent (now reconfigured, with the RTS parts placed on the sidelines) and Skins@HWT for discovering and first explaining the process I describe here. I'm pretty familiar with it, but they figured it out first and know it best, so they deserve recognition for that.

As always: If you have any questions, or you need help troubleshooting, just ask down in the comments. Also: If you find any errors or mistakes that I missed during the renovation process, just say so. My time is a bit limited these days, but I can still make time to keep this guide accurate and clear.

Introduction

If you've played Dawn of War and tried to make a custom army, you've probably noticed a problem. Coming up with a color scheme and a name for your army is easy, but when you get to picking your army's badge and banner, you just can't find the right logo for your troops. Since all the existing ones belong to the vanilla armies, there aren't any that fit custom ones.




As a result, you only have 3 options: Play with the stock armies, go into battle without any badges or banners at all, or explain to the other player why your Imperial Guard have the Blood Ravens logo on their tanks. However, there's also a fourth option: Make your own insignia. This guide will teach you how to how to use the fourth option, letting you have custom armies with insignia of your own.

What You'll Need

• A program that can convert images into TARGA (.tga) files. Since it's free and easy to use, I'll be using GIMP[www.gimp.org] in this guide.
  
• An image editing program. This is also covered by GIMP, but you can use any image editor, like Photoshop, or Pixlr [pixlr.com].
  
• An image. This can be something made by yourself, or pulled off the internet, but it must work with your image editing program.
  
• Optional: A folder to keep your finished badges and banners in. This isn't needed for actually putting them in the game, but having a place to keep them is a good idea, in case you do a fresh install and need to put them in your game again. This also makes moving them between the different expansions a little easier.

TL;DR, Steps 1-4

If you want to put your image into Dawn of War 1 or one of its expansions, this is the format it has to be in. If it satisfies all of these, it should be able to be read by the game, and put onto your forces:

-TarGA file (.tga)
-64x64 pixels for badges, 64x96 for banners
-Name of file does not conflict with any other
-No RLE compression
-Has an alpha channel
-In your game's Badges folder or Banners folder (for badges and banners, respectively)

Step 1: Making new image, image proportions, importing your image

Open up GIMP, then go to File, and click New. This will open the Create New Image window, which will ask you what you want the dimensions of the image to be. For the easiest process and the best results, I recommend 1000x1000 if you're making a badge, or 1000x1500 if you're making a banner.




While the size of the image technically doesn't matter at this stage, the game wants 64x64 or 64x96 images (more on this in Step 2), and working on a canvas that small will probably be very awkward, requiring lots of zooming in, and desperately trying to shrink the image the image you're importing so that it fits. In addition, the finished images will have to be a square or 1:1.5 rectangle, so if your image doesn't follow this geometry, you'll have to stretch or squash your image to make it fit, which will make it look worse. This is why I recommend 1000x1000 for badges, and 1000x1500 for banners.



Once you're done typing in the image size in the Create New Image window, click OK. This will take you to GIMP's main window, which will have a white background layer waiting for you. Go to the top of the screen and click the File dropdown at the top. Then, click Open as Layers. This will bring up the Open Image as Layers window, which will let you navigate through your computer. Find the image you want to use, click it, then click Open. This should bring your image onto the canvas as a layer.


[url=https://blackwingpainting.wordpress.com/2019/04/13/step-by-step-blood-rav
Note: Space Marine shoulder pauldron image by Blackwing Painting[blackwingpainting.wordpress.com]

Step 2: Editing, Scaling, Adding Alpha Channel To Layers

Once you've opened your image as a layer, perform any editing that it needs to look clean. Erase any backgrounds or extraneous details, center it, crop it or resize it to fit the canvas, etc. (I'll make a section with more detailed advice on this later) Also, delete the Background layer that GIMP gives you by default. You want a nice transparent background for your image, so that your unit's color scheme can show through your badge or banner.


Speaking of which: Once you're done editing, go to the Layers tab on the Channels/Paths/Layers window on the right. Then, right click each layer you have, and click Add Alpha Channel. This will add transparency to each of your layers, which the game requires in order for your image to be read successfully. It also means that there won't be any ugly white backgrounds beneath your image.



Once you're done adding an alpha channel to each of your layers, it's time to scale the image to the dimensions the game wants. Click the Image dropdown at the top of the center window, then click Scale Image.


The Scale Image window will have two text boxes for Width and Height, under Image Size. If you're making a Badge, put 64 for Width and Height. If you're making a Banner, put 64 for Width, and 96 for Height. If the window is changing one value when you're typing the other, click the chain connecting the two boxes so that it's unlinked (it makes your dimensions auto-adjust to a certain aspect ratio, and unlinking the chain turns it off). Click the Scale button when you're done entering in your dimensions.

Step 3: Exporting your image, TarGA file and RLE Compression

Now that you've made the necessary edits to your image, resized it, and added alpha channels, you're ready to export it. Click the File dropdown, then click Export As. Then, navigate to where you want to export your image on your computer.




Then, select "TarGA image (*.tga)" from the dropdown list at the bottom. Pick a name for your image, make sure the extension is ".tga" (no quotes), and hit Export. Your image must be in TarGA format, or it won't be picked up by the game.





Once you hit the button, a window will pop up with an RLE Compression checkbox, and a dropdown with two options for your image's origin. Uncheck RLE compression, or your image won't be detected by the game. Leave the origin dropdown alone, I'm pretty sure it doesn't have any effect on your image being read. (I'm not really certain about this, though. If anyone can talk to the machine spirits and get an answer on this, that would be much appreciated.) Once you've unchecked RLE Compression, hit the Export button.

Step 4: Placing your images in the Badges and Banners folders

You've resized your image, included alpha channels, made it into a TARGA file, and unchecked the RLE compression box, putting it in the exact same format as the game's original badges and banners. Now, it's time to actually put your image in the game.

To do this, go to the directory of the DoW1 game your army's in. There are two ways to do this: The first is to go your Steam Library, right click on the Dawn of War 1 expansion (Dawn of War, Winter Assault, Dark Crusade, or Soulstorm) of your choice, then click Properties. Then, go to Installed Files, then click Browse.




If you know where your Steam folder is already, open it up, then go to SteamApps, then Common, then click on the Dawn of War 1 expansion of your choice.

Once you're in the directory of your Dawn of War 1 expansion/game, you should see two folders marked "Badges" and "Banners". Put your badges (64x64, square images that go on your dudes' shoulder pads) in the "Badges" folder, and your banners (64x96, images that go on your strategic point flags) in the "Banners" folder.


NOTE: Army Painter information does not carry over between expansions. For instance: If you put a badge in Dark Crusade's badge folder, then play Soulstorm, the badge won't be accessible in Soulstorm. If you want to see your badges or banners in all expansions, you'll have to copy them to each one manually.

Step 5: Enjoy!

Now that your TGA file is in the right folder, you should be able to apply your badges and banners to your custom armies. Custom images should be at the top in the Badges and Banners folders, with the newest ones being closest to the top. Change your badge and banner to your images, save the scheme, and take your army into battle!

For the Emprah
Blood for the Blood God
MEHTUL BAWKSES
WAAAAAGH
Alien species make me pee my pants, and I drive a tank the size of a house in order to hide that
Blow ♥♥♥♥ up in style!

Thanks for Reading

Thanks for reading! This guide has been up for 10 years at the time of this edit (October 2024), so here's to 10 more years of Dawn of War 1, awesome Warhammer 40,000 video games, and putting custom content in video games!

As always, if you have any questions, leave a comment below! Also, feel free to upvote, share, or favorite!

Addendum: Do custom badges and banners work in multiplayer?

Yes! If you use custom badges or banners, they will work in multiplayer. There is a bug in versions 1.3 and 1.4 that cause them to stop showing up on consecutive matches, but this can be stopped by selecting another army, then switching back to your custom one again. This answer (and additional troubleshooting) found here: https://skins.hiveworldterra.co.uk/FAQ/BannersAndBadges.html#qBadgesBannersNotShowingInOnlineSkirmish

Citations

Most of my information was taken from the page that was at this address: ishttp://www.rakrent.com/rtsc/html/dow02.htm

The website seems to have changed, so you can't view it anymore, unfortunately. Either way, let it be known that I got the info for this guide from other people. You can credit me for compiling it into a Steam guide, but not for coming up with it in the first place.

Answer for addendum from here: https://skins.hiveworldterra.co.uk/FAQ/BannersAndBadges.html#qBadgesBannersNotShowingInOnlineSkirmish

NOTE: skins.hiveworldterra has a more detailed text guide on badges and banners here[skins.hiveworldterra.co.uk], along with a lot of other resources on Dawn of War 1 custom content. I already linked them above for the multiplayer addendum, but I figured I should shout them out by name. If you have questions about this process and you can't reach me, go to skins.hiveworldterra and take a look around.

[Remy]

having trouble, i scaled down the images n made em tgas like it says and added them to the respective badges/banner folders and neither is working, am i missing a step?

[Texas Red]

lol strombolis legendary

[Stromboli Jones]

I'll rewrite it to be clearer. I probably should have reworked step 2 a long time ago, tbh. I'll message you if I need your help!

[cat]

Awesome guide. Would you be opposed to updating it to be a bit clearer? I can help.

Each time I go through this process (and editing campaign colours), I have to relearn everything.

[Stromboli Jones]

sure! send me a message whenever you're free

[GUH??????]

I have literally done everything by the book and yet my banner and badge won't appear in the base game, can you help me with that?

[Stromboli Jones]

I can confirm: It does work on the base game! I know that you double checked everything already, but make sure that RLE compression is turned off when you're exporting, that all layers in your image have an alpha layer (I think that's how it works, and I don't think I put that in the guide, unfortunately), and that the dimensions for the images are correct, down to the pixel. Those are what trip people up most frequently, when it comes to this process.

If you're still having problems after triple checking (sorry for making you triple check), add me on Steam. I can troubleshoot with you on Steam chat, or do it via Discord screensharing, if you want. I should be free this whole weekend, so contact me anytime!

[Chris P Chicken]

I followed this guide but my badge still isn't showing up. I tried changing the name and double checking I did everything but it still won't load. does this not work on the base game?

[Stromboli Jones]

Try putting that same image in the Badges folder. From what I can tell, the game specifically wants 64x64 for badges and 64x96 for banners, since badges are square-shaped and banners are vertical rectangles. Hopefully, your image will show up when it's in the right folder!

[Kim John Dude]

I made a banner 64x64 pixels, with alpha channel, and exported as tga and put it in the banner folder in Dark Crusade. But it is still not showing up in the army painter. ???