Greetings. So, all my friends have told me i need to add my name or logo to my designs so i can get credit for them. Well, i was wondering if people had some suggestions on the best workflow to do this in order to get a nice looking model when done? More than likely this will be on curved surfaces but there will eventually be flat surfaces too. I'm using Blender 2.49. my first attempt I wrote out my name and converted the Text into mesh, Then i bent the mesh and aligned it as best i could to the location on the model i wanted it. Then i made faces or in some cases i extruded the verts then merged all of them to the center of the group of verts. Afterwords it kinda looked messy. Second attempt. I learned how to use the Retopo tool which got the alignment and shape better, but the joining of the two meshes is still awkward looking... Thanks! Ray
Hi Ray, Have you had a look at the Shrink wrap Modifier?. http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Doc:Manual/Modifiers/Defor m/Shrinkwrap It may be useful to have a play around with it. Cheers Stu.
Oh, yes! The shrink wrap modifier is GREAT! Just be careful to apply any "extrusion" after the shrink wrapping - otherwise, your 3-D words will become 2-D words...
Ray, I realize this is a mild form of thread necromancy, but... Did you ever reach an amenable solution for the text/logo problem? In case you did not: I discovered in my last project how to use the curve modifier to bend text (no more manual stuff!) - have you realized this also? Just create a curve for the text to follow (remember, bezier curves can be actual curves or line segments) and add the curve modifier to the text object. It's possible and beneficial to do this before converting the text to mesh.
I did figure it out... in a few different ways. I created a fun logo that i think will work for my jewelry designs, and will be easy to implement in multiple ways. I also figured out how to use shrink-wrap... as far as curves go.. ohhh i LOVE ME SOME CURVES!!! I just wish you could fork them instead of just having a single line... it would make some things sooo much easier!!! Eventually, i will post pics.. i've just been so busy with real life... Ray
Hey Ray, No help on this problem but you should know there is a new version of Blender available, v.2.59. Seems to have improved free form sculpting tools. Check it out. -G
Thanks GlenG, already upgraded AND i got a Wacom Bamboo for my birthday!!! Been too busy to play around with it.. but hopefully soon i will be getting more stuff up and printed out... We shall see. Ray
Hi, Another way is to use a hires bitmap of the text you want, position it using UV tex mapping and then apply a displacement modifier. If you also apply a subdiv modifier to the mesh you can get supprisingly good results. I've used this method to engrave whole slogans in script text around bangles before!
Wow - that's really clever. I'll have to try that sometime. I wonder if that might work better than the boolean modifier system I've been using, which gives good results, if you don't mind waiting a long time for it to process and don't mind horrible topology.
I'm a 2.49 blender-er, myself, and "Crazy topology" is the one reason I don't play with blender-oolian functions. I get all the use I need from the shift+w warp in editmode! Grooving on that UVmap + Displacement mod trick! That'd seem to be the way to go, imho.
LeftySpinhand & TurtlesAreCool thanks! Glad you like the technique. I like to avoid messy boolean meshes and the displacement mapping process means that you can also move the text easily if you need to reposition. I could write a short but sweet tutorial if you want to know more? Mark.
Would using a 16bit texture rather than 8 bit for the displacement, make much of a difference? That way stairstepping would be reduced. Just wondering if Blender can use all 16 bits of information.
What i've finally figured out to do is Make my design, Shrink wrap it to the surface that i want it to be on, then extrude it back into the design, Works well enough.. if with some.. Intersting topology due to the design it's self. How would you use an 8 or 16 bit texture for displacement? Ray
In my experience, the limiting factor that causes stairstepping of the displacement is not the texture but the number of vertices which is receiving the projection. Your texture probably should not have sharp edges in most cases - you'll want to do a slight Gaussian blur before you use it. At least, that's been my experience with doing bump mapping.