[SOVLED] Easy Way to Add Text to a Model?
Posted by Lazerlord
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[SOVLED] Easy Way to Add Text to a Model? April 24, 2016 03:29PM |
So I want to print a dragon statue out for a friend, and he wants me to put his name on it. It seems simple enough, but I cannot seem to find any good and reliable way to get the name text to join with the original dragon model. I created the text in Sketchup, and it seems fine on its own, and the dragon was downloaded from HERE and it prints fine. All I want to do is combine the two models so I can get a result that looks like this:
When I use the boolean union, no matter what setting I use, I get flat text that looks like this:
If I use the combine tool, I get something close, but it seems to get messed up within Repetier and/or the CuraEngine slicer
Exported STL open in Meshmixer, and it looks like what I want:
Open in Repetier, and the green faces seem to indicate a lot of errors, but it still thinks it's a manifold:
The exported Gcode, note the missing chunks of text in the N's:
I've tried running the "make solid" tool in meshmixer, but whenever I set it up to be high enough resolution to look good, the file gets way too big (almost 1G
and it still fails in the same section after the Gcode is exported.
I've run into this problem before when modifying STL files with meshmixer, so any help here would be useful for more than just this one instance.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/24/2016 09:49PM by Lazerlord.
When I use the boolean union, no matter what setting I use, I get flat text that looks like this:
If I use the combine tool, I get something close, but it seems to get messed up within Repetier and/or the CuraEngine slicer
Exported STL open in Meshmixer, and it looks like what I want:
Open in Repetier, and the green faces seem to indicate a lot of errors, but it still thinks it's a manifold:
The exported Gcode, note the missing chunks of text in the N's:
I've tried running the "make solid" tool in meshmixer, but whenever I set it up to be high enough resolution to look good, the file gets way too big (almost 1G
and it still fails in the same section after the Gcode is exported.I've run into this problem before when modifying STL files with meshmixer, so any help here would be useful for more than just this one instance.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/24/2016 09:49PM by Lazerlord.
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Re: Easy Way to Add Text to a Model? April 24, 2016 08:23PM |
It looks like you have three different models to combine, the figurine, the name plate and then the name.
This can be done with ease in Sketchup if:
A) All three models are really solids.
All three models are true solids in Sketchup as well.
C) The models are of similar complexity.
Problem with combining models is that in most cases not all models have been created by yourself or in the same program.
So you only get STL files to work with.
Meshmixer and so on love to "fix" your models but in return you get a STL file of biblical file size.
Blender works too but with similar problems, in most cases the resulting model is unusable to 3D printing.
However if you are at least a semi-pro with the programs it works (almost) fine.
IMHO all this can be done within Sketchup instead of using a multitude of programs.
The trick is to make Sketchup accept the files for processing.
Highly complex models like your statue should be simplyfied if possible to reduce the number of triangles, some tweaking here can reduce the filesize drastically.
Now, to combine two more or less complex models in Sketchup with success requires some tricks.
In a lot of cases even models created in Sketchup produce very unwanted and hard to explain results when you combine the solids.
This is not really a bug but based on the fact that not everything is modeled equally.
Take a circle for example.
You downloaded a model with a round something on it where you want to join something else.
How many line sections are there to create the circle? Can you align the old and new part for a perfect match of the circle? ....
It is even worse when combining a flat surface with a curved one.
Here large flat areas made from big triangles need to be broken down to form a good combination of the two.
You can imagine that matching something highly complex to something extreme simple will cause some problems when going from round to flat.
Sketchup can be fooled to think a model is far less complex and that the triangles used are much bigger too.
With all model parts imported resize the entire workspace by a factor of 1000, so your 1mm model would become a 1m model.
Combine two of your models, best the two that are most simple in compexitivity.
If the solid check returns too many errors or it looks bad right away go back a step and repeat with a enlargement factor of 10000 (or more if the models are too complex).
Combine only two models at a time and if succesful check and where required repair the solids - manual labour here is often much better than automated repairs.
Once all models are combined into one and seem to look good upload the STL to the Netfabb online repair tool to get the final repairs done and the model reduced to a model with a resolution good enough for printing instead of a total overkill in filesize.
If one or more of your models result in exported STL files bigger than 5-8mb you should use the Netfab service first on the single models - unless you created them yourself in Sketchup.
The hard part is the repair after combining but doing it right here by hand (stry lines can be removed automatically) means the filesize stays small but more impotarntly the models stays like it was in Sketchup without unwanted deformations.
This can be done with ease in Sketchup if:
A) All three models are really solids.
All three models are true solids in Sketchup as well.C) The models are of similar complexity.
Problem with combining models is that in most cases not all models have been created by yourself or in the same program.
So you only get STL files to work with.
Meshmixer and so on love to "fix" your models but in return you get a STL file of biblical file size.
Blender works too but with similar problems, in most cases the resulting model is unusable to 3D printing.
However if you are at least a semi-pro with the programs it works (almost) fine.
IMHO all this can be done within Sketchup instead of using a multitude of programs.
The trick is to make Sketchup accept the files for processing.
Highly complex models like your statue should be simplyfied if possible to reduce the number of triangles, some tweaking here can reduce the filesize drastically.
Now, to combine two more or less complex models in Sketchup with success requires some tricks.
In a lot of cases even models created in Sketchup produce very unwanted and hard to explain results when you combine the solids.
This is not really a bug but based on the fact that not everything is modeled equally.
Take a circle for example.
You downloaded a model with a round something on it where you want to join something else.
How many line sections are there to create the circle? Can you align the old and new part for a perfect match of the circle? ....
It is even worse when combining a flat surface with a curved one.
Here large flat areas made from big triangles need to be broken down to form a good combination of the two.
You can imagine that matching something highly complex to something extreme simple will cause some problems when going from round to flat.
Sketchup can be fooled to think a model is far less complex and that the triangles used are much bigger too.
With all model parts imported resize the entire workspace by a factor of 1000, so your 1mm model would become a 1m model.
Combine two of your models, best the two that are most simple in compexitivity.
If the solid check returns too many errors or it looks bad right away go back a step and repeat with a enlargement factor of 10000 (or more if the models are too complex).
Combine only two models at a time and if succesful check and where required repair the solids - manual labour here is often much better than automated repairs.
Once all models are combined into one and seem to look good upload the STL to the Netfabb online repair tool to get the final repairs done and the model reduced to a model with a resolution good enough for printing instead of a total overkill in filesize.
If one or more of your models result in exported STL files bigger than 5-8mb you should use the Netfab service first on the single models - unless you created them yourself in Sketchup.
The hard part is the repair after combining but doing it right here by hand (stry lines can be removed automatically) means the filesize stays small but more impotarntly the models stays like it was in Sketchup without unwanted deformations.
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Re: Easy Way to Add Text to a Model? April 24, 2016 09:48PM |
Thank you all for your support and software advice! Those programs mentioned will definitely make things easier for me in the future. What I did (because I was impatient 
) was use MeshLab to to the combining, and it worked great after I got everything scaled and positioned (which is a bit tricky in MeshLab). It took about 30 minutes just to figure out the software. Oh, and just a little sidenote, this model doesn't require support material at all, which is pretty impressive.
) was use MeshLab to to the combining, and it worked great after I got everything scaled and positioned (which is a bit tricky in MeshLab). It took about 30 minutes just to figure out the software. Oh, and just a little sidenote, this model doesn't require support material at all, which is pretty impressive.
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