Hello.
really struggling with this one. I have a geotext (but could also use a text SOP) which I would like to bend around the curve of a circle sop to act as a label on a circular graph (like a speedometer sort of thing).
Have tried using the bend mode of the twist SOP on a text SOP but it’s just tapering no matter what offsets etc I put on it. It needs to fit along the circle path as close as possible - any idea what I’m doing wrong?
Hey @Poke_Developers1,
you can try using this technique here to draw text along a path such like a circle:
cheers
Markus
On a recent project we were working with this same challenge - our variation being that we wanted to use an arbitrary path.
We ended up using a cork-screw type patten, but this could be any input shape:
The big idea is that you start by converting your shape into a SOP:
The next step that really unlocks the magic here is to use a script SOP to calculate a normal that perpendicular to your current and previous point - a little bit of trig here lets you build a triangle, and then find a perpendicular vector. This is the magic that gives you a vector which follows your curve:
Next you build the position and rotation data for each letter:
It’s a little python heavy, but you really can use aribrary paths:
Take a look at this example to keep moving:
text-on-arbitrary-path.toe (8.6 KB)
big thanks for that, and especially for the technique theory breakdown. will have a go today.
If you haven’t seen them yet, there are also some examples on bending text in the Geo Text Op Snippets. The ‘per-string relative transforms’ case shows rotating the text in a variety of ways that could be useful.
I built my solution based on those opSnippets - thanks @robmc 
It’s the exact same concepts, just one letter at a time. Please feel free to steal it for snippets - would have saved me a brush up on trig 2 months ago 
