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Curving text

What is the easiest way to curve text on any surface/shape?

Best Answer

Answers

  • Matt_ShieldsMatt_Shields Member, Onshape Employees Posts: 861 PRO
  • jnewthjnewth Member, OS Professional Posts: 88 PRO
    Answer ✓

    Hi @Grav_electric I recommend people use my new feature "Text". You can get it here:

    https://cad.onshape.com/documents/4e187c2b2f7f4974f4e2b612/v/a94c2b1949ec131c8d9eb61f/e/3458f1d46464375effca78a5

    You can draw a path or a curve on any surface and then distribute text along it as needed. It has a number of manipulators to make text orientation and position easy to adjust: you can read about it here:

    The newest release 3 adds kerning control and a few other useful controls:

    orientation.gif kerning.gif

    And it all works on surfaces as well:

    000099.png
  • Grav_electricGrav_electric Member Posts: 20

    thanks

  • colin_haycockcolin_haycock Member Posts: 2

    Great tool, thanks.

    Is there a way to control the spacing between the letters so that the space between the lettrs is consistent?

    Here's an example of what I mean; the spacing between the letter I and the others appears different because the letter itself is narrower but the bounding box for the letter doesn't take account of that.

    Screenshot 2025-12-21 at 11.58.48.png
  • jnewthjnewth Member, OS Professional Posts: 88 PRO


    @colin_haycock Yes, you can totally do that. What you are asking for is "kerning" which for various reasons is hard to make work the way you'd want (which is: automatically). The feature provides that control via "Adjust offsets":

    Greenshot 2025-12-22 10.17.50.png

    When you enable "Adjust offsets" a point manipulator appears on each letter (the white dots). You can click on the letter you want to move and drag it left or right to position it:

    Greenshot 2025-12-22 10.18.16.png


    And tweak letters in this fashion until you are happy with the result.

    Greenshot 2025-12-22 10.18.37.png

    Hope that helps!

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