Posts: 98 Location: United States
Wed 29 Jul, 2015 11:29 pm
Well, if you're looking for historically accurate inspiration, you can do a lot better than those guys. It's not terrible, granted, but you should start with the artifacts as your template rather than the ren-faire derivative if you care to do the research.
The close helmet appears around 1510, and as far as I can figure it evolved out of the visored sallets of the end of the 15th century which increasingly incorporated the lower face and throat defense into the helmet itself instead of having a seperate bevor like the mid-15th century sallets. It does owe something to the armet, which in the mid 15th century usually came with a wrapper like this one.
http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-colle...arch/24691
It's not a very big jump from this
http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-colle...arch/26445
To this
http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-colle...arch/23213
To this
http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-colle...arch/26446
To this
http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-colle...arch/25397 (ignore "armet" title, this is a close helmet)
To this
http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-colle...arch/26431
Armets continue to be used, and once the gorget is invented the wrapper is not really necessary. Most thereafter have no collar lames and are designed to fit closely to the gorget.
http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-colle...amp;pos=17
The kind you linked to is about 1550, and this is a typical example although it's missing its collar lames. As you can see, the eye slot is somewhat higher than the lower visor, and it also has a lifting peg so that you can raise the upper visor without needing to raise the lower one.
http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-colle...arch/26508
They might also have a part that can be used to prop open the visor, like this one.
http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-colle...arch/26518
I would not take the eye slots on that photo helmet as a good example. They look too large from top to bottom and are a tad too high on the upper visor. You generally want the eye slot close to where it meets the lower visor if not necessarily right against them. If I had to guess, it would be to reduce the chance that an opponent's weapon would easily find the eye slots. The lower visor would probably deflect most thrusts from below. You don't want them too wide open vertically because they might be an appealing target, and you don't need them that wide anyway. Human vision is horizontally oriented, so you get more visual information by widening the slots horizontally than you do by widening them vertically. Small eye slots do not obstruct your vision much if the helmet is well designed, since they sit close to your eyes, and if you make them too open to an enemy's weapons your visor won't be much good as protection.