textbox multiple lines

Discussion in 'Customizable Products & Design' started by 925530_deleted, Sep 26, 2015.

  1. I would like the text box to be able to use multiple lines. One line may not be enough for certain products.
     
  2. pinelas
    pinelas Well-Known Member
    Hello,

    I agree with this, multiline and multiple text box.
    I have a cufflinks and I want to add a text in the back of both.
    cufflinks_custommaker_01.JPG

    Regards,
    Ricardo
     
  3. rparkins
    rparkins Member
    I agree with this too. I have often customized models with my own 3D printer to have "Happy Birthday <name>" on them. This makes great gifts, but it needs multiple lines unless the model is very big, which makes it very expensive. If you look at Fencube in my shop you can see multiline text (done with my own software) on the model as well as space for a line of CustomMaker text.
     
  4. MrNibbles
    MrNibbles Well-Known Member
    If they ever do this it will probably be next year after the holiday rush since it will take some code modification and that's not a good idea right now with lots of orders flowing in. There are a lot of ways they could do it, depending on how they are doing it now. I get the feeling they are presently pre-processing something on the model to make the customization process faster, but that is what is limiting how many and where the customizations are placed as determined by the designers.

    The easiest fix is probably to have text fit into a text box with either automatic carriage returns or manual control of carriage returns to get multiple lines with options for side to side text or center text alignment of the lines. But with more lines the text font size might also need to change and then they would also need to limit the reduction of font sizes so text doesn't begin breaking design rules - and that may be different for engraving and embossing depending on the font type. They should be able to come up with a smart font that makes this size calculation easier.

    Right now the customization is also single part centric. It's not set up for a file where multiple parts are sprued or looped together to reduce costs. In order to do that they would need the ability to define more boxes, both text and image, but perhaps those extra boxes could also be applied to single parts.
     
  5. rparkins
    rparkins Member
    "Right now the customization is also single part centric. It's not set up for a file where multiple parts are sprued or looped together to reduce costs."

    Does this mean that ti won't print correctly for the model that I've offered as customizable
    (www.shapeways.com/product/AKYFD3GAK/fencube?li=search-resul ts-1&optionId=57713668)?

    The engraving shows up on the correct surface on the preview, but there is also a sort of shadow on the cage that holds the parts together for shipping. If it isn't going to print correctly I'll want to withdraw the customization option, because I don't want to be inviting people to pay for a customization that doesn't work. Of course I could do a test print, but that's quite expensive.
     
  6. MrNibbles
    MrNibbles Well-Known Member
    I assume what you are doing will work. What I was talking about was having a different situation where you might have 3 keychains or something in a file that are looped or sprued together to reduce costs. Presently you can only apply one instance of text box and one instance of image box into the model having multiple "parts", when for this situation you might want to apply 6 total customization boxes to the keychains in the file.

    Of course a customer could just purchase the single part three times with different customizations but it would make the total order a few dollars more expensive. In an ideal world a person ordering any object or multiple objects in a file could apply as many customization boxes they desire wherever they desire and get a rule check prior to purchase to make sure what they ordered will be fabricated.

     
  7. Bearshake
    Bearshake Member
    Yes, the ability to add multiple text boxes or images is a very important feature to add.
    Who can I talk to, to get this request official?
     
  8. MrNibbles
    MrNibbles Well-Known Member
    Right now the only way to do this is to add multiple lines of text as an image upload. I wouldn't hold my breath for such improvements but these suggestions and others have been floating around since the custom maker tool was introduced last year. I assume there's a very long list at Shapeways containing prioritized suggestions.
     
    104516_deleted likes this.
  9. woody64
    woody64 Well-Known Member
    Fully agree ...
     
  10. 104516_deleted
    104516_deleted Well-Known Member
    @MrNibbles yup there's a very long list of improvements we are working on. I don't know the status of this but perhaps @HenrikRydberg could give an update of what improvements are pipelined. Henrik, would you mind chiming in? :)
     
  11. AlanHudson
    AlanHudson Shapeways Employee Dev Team
    We've implemented a multiline version of the text entry. We've released it for employee testing and once we're happy with it we'll release it publically. I would expect that release in the next week or two. This release will also include special character support such as !,# etc and the ability to customize color sandstone models. Thanks for using Custom Maker and we appreciate the suggestions, even if it does takes us a while to execute.
     
    martoon likes this.
  12. MrNibbles
    MrNibbles Well-Known Member
    [​IMG]
     
    104516_deleted likes this.
  13. StyledForYou
    StyledForYou Active Member
    Yay! Can't wait to try it out!
     
  14. woody64
    woody64 Well-Known Member
    After Mr.Nibble has raised the comment to add an image box instead. I have switched to image boxes for all my customizables. And so far it has done it's work.
    See this test, where an image generated with a monogram generator has been placed on the socket (will provide a picture showing 3 different materials Acrylate, pWSF, pBrass soon)
    [​IMG]

    So based on the gained experiences I will vote for multiple image boxes and get rid of text boxes (sorry :( is against that what you have currently implemented but I think will solve more of our requirements)
    - allows any fonts, characters and
    - any number of lines
    - allows other graphic elements

    Woody64
     
    Last edited: Oct 12, 2016
  15. MrNibbles
    MrNibbles Well-Known Member
    The one thing I worry about with uploaded images or text are possible impacts of breaking design rules. In theory if Shapeways is providing the fonts in the text box they could make sure that wall widths or details don't break any design rules, at least for some pre-approved ranges of font size coupled with engraving or embossing heights. But to this day I can't for the life of me figure out how they deal with these potential design rule violations. As far as I can tell they ignore any design rule issues within customization boxes for CustomMaker parts, possibly because vertical walls end up being canted and that eliminates any worries. Can someone tell us exactly how Shapeways does deal with this??? Do customized regions of customized models get the same active human review as normally uploaded models?
     
  16. woody64
    woody64 Well-Known Member
    Yes this argument for text boxes is correct.
    Indeed I got a denial for an added image I did in blender (with Boolean operator) and not sure how uploaded images are handled (which will end up in a similar operation)?
     
  17. MrNibbles
    MrNibbles Well-Known Member
    This is looking good so far. Apparently no support for color image transfer to color sandstone yet but this is a good start. For color customization does it make sense to have a zero embossing height option? Or does it work out better if a different color sits on a small pedestal? I used the minimum 0.3 mm value. (I've always slightly raised color patterns above the base surface myself.)

    I've been waiting for this for a long time. So much better to allow a customer to add a facial expression of their choice as opposed to going with one that the designer might upload..

    color_customization.jpg



    butler color test 2.jpg
     
  18. StyledForYou
    StyledForYou Active Member
    Any updates?
     
  19. StyledForYou
    StyledForYou Active Member
    Yippee! Special characters are working!
    Thank you!

    thank you.jpg
     
    Last edited: Nov 6, 2016
  20. woody64
    woody64 Well-Known Member
    Yes it does ...
    CaptureDr.PNG