Properly fit a 3D-text into a box/mesh

Question

does anyone have a good idea how to properly fit a 3D-Text into a box which is deformed in all axis? This target box results out of another mesh, basically I want to fit a text properly into a ring which has such deepenings. Looking forward to your ideas! :)

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Sorry for the inaccurate description.

I tried simple deforms (mainly bends) using various coordinate systems as references to get the text into that 3D shape. But it's quite hard to really exactly fit the text to that box (the box is the negative of the extrude in the ring). As a simple deform requires one pivot point, I felt there is no chance to adjust the form of the bend when the target is not exactly round.

My thought was, if there is a modifier or a technique to simply take a few points of that text-mesh and fit them to the box. The remaining vertices of the text-mesh should be interpolated and therefore also exactly hit the boundaries of the box. Basically attach the texts vertices to the boxes vertices. I also thought of using boolean operators to simply cut away the overhang of the extruded text, but still I wasnt able to do the perfect bend to meet the exact shape.

Basically, it should look like this in the end. As you see the text has bends in all axis and squeezes etc... I really struggle to do that

Answer 1

Here are two ideas:

1. Place Individual Letters: Separate the letters, so you can place and scale them manually to fit in the 3D shape.

   • pros:
     • no retopology of the letters is required
     • the individual letters keep their shape and don't get deformed, are only scaled in height and width
   • cons:
     • not a perfect fit, hard to animate
     • manual work: it may happen that you have excess space or letters and have to start from the beginning
     • changing the text and changes to the layout require more manual work

2. Use the Mesh Deform Modifier:

Use "the box" as a cage (1), create a shape key for it, enable the shapekey (value = 1) and straighten all verticex to create a straight box (2), e.g. SZ0 in Edit mode to align all selected vertices to the same height.

Place "deform-friendly" font letters in the box (3), join them into a single object and add a Mesh Deform modifier. Bind it, disable the shape key (value = 0).

• pros:
  • a perfect fit in all directions
  • the text and the layout can be changed easily, (just Unbind the modifier, activate the shape key, move the object or scale the cage and the object, Bind the modifier again, deactivate the shape key)
  • the cage can be deformed by other modifiers (e.g. Simple Deform, Cast) and the text will follow its deformation
  • easy to animate
• cons:
  • retopology of the letters is required, they must deform well
  • individual letters can change their shape slightly, can be deformed or can have a shear effect (e.g. C, S, A, M in the example)