Text on a Cylinder

Hi forum,
Is it somehow possible to add text to a cylinder??? I’m designing a beer mug for printing and would like to add text to the side of it.

Can it be done with several construction planes and then projectiong the text from there?? Or is there an external tool that can do this??

Please share your tips :slight_smile:

Hi Jesper,
For 3D printing I use PrusaSlicer (free external tool) to wrap text on a cylinder (or irregular shape). There are limitations, but it is worth checking out.

Another method expertly shown by @welshsteve is here:

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Yeah, that’s right. I did notice it, when 2.6 was announced, but never got around to trying it. And kinda forgot. Thanks for reminding me!

It actually works better than I expected. I print these cups with 1.0 nozzle and just one 1.2 mm wall, so I would prefer to have the text put on, before I do the shell, so the printer can keep trucking along with it’s 1.2. But putting a 0.6 mm text on that surface actually works.

How about embossing a logo? can we do it in Shaper so that when I slice it is already there?

Hi, Slamm. Yes you can, but it may take some work to get it the way you want it.

It will depend on how precise you want to be, and the sizes and geometries involved.

You can try projecting onto the curved body then off set the projected face. There will be some distortion the farther your projection is from parallel to the curved body. So if you have a small logo and project straight on, you may not notice the distortion. Here is an example with text:

This has the same “logo” imprinted on a large cylinder and on a small cylinder. The one on the small cylinder has more distortion.

Shapr3d does not have a tool to eliminate distortion. For text, some go to great lengths and get great results. Here is an example from @Mike3

Best thing to do is give it a try!

At the risk of repeating with another video. https://youtu.be/chh4IcUnS3A?si=UiFlxT4fA9AhHFZj