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I am looking at printing a fair amount of text, ideally using some custom fonts. I quite like Stay Classy but will likely have to consider change if it causes issues.

I am a little stuck on where to start with using these in some tools. I have tried creating an SVG using the font and importing to Tinkercad however that always fails. I only want to print the text, nothing else.

How do I properly convert my font into .svg and import that so I can make my bodies? While I have tried Tinkercad I am open to alternative tools if this can be achieved more easily.

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    $\begingroup$ We don't deal in recommending software at all, but "how do you do this" is totally OK. $\endgroup$
    – Trish
    Jan 25 at 9:39
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    $\begingroup$ @Trish thank you for the pointer and also the friendly edit to correct this :) $\endgroup$
    – Bijington
    Jan 25 at 9:40
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    $\begingroup$ This very easily done in F360 or OpenSCAD, which now doesn't fit the question. Tinkercad is a horrible choice for this question, so asking for the proper tool would be very viable. $\endgroup$
    – towe
    Jan 25 at 11:04
  • $\begingroup$ @towe thanks. I have updated the question to hopefully make it easier to answer unrelated to Tinkercad $\endgroup$
    – Bijington
    Jan 25 at 11:17
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I think @Trish answered your question more specifically, but an alternate route (that I think its simpler assuming you don't mind the learning curve) is using Blender.

Rather than creating an svg in a different software and having to go from something like photoshop to inkscape to tinkercad to your printer software... Blender could do most of that in one step, and its free.

In Blender, add text: enter image description here

Hit tab to go into "Edit" mode and in edit mode you can simply backspace and type whatever you want. enter image description here

In the "Font" menu, you can choose from any font on your computer. enter image description here enter image description here

And you can make it "3D" by extruding it: enter image description here

When it looks good and you're ready to print it, make sure to convert it to a mesh, then export as .stl for your printing software. (Cura/Slic3r/etc.) enter image description here enter image description here

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    $\begingroup$ Your answer might not directly answer how my question is now phrased but I really like the simplicity in using fewer tools. Thank you for the step by step guide too! It was very easy to follow $\endgroup$
    – Bijington
    Jan 26 at 7:29
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Fonts are not saved in a format that is .svg compatible. However, text that is written in a font and saved as a black-and-white picture can be turned into a .svg by software. This .svg can be imported by Tinkercad then.

Step 1: Text Picture

Use any software to create a .png or .jpg or something similar. Among the multitude of programs that can do this are GIMP and Adobe Photoshop. Even Paint can do this, or any word processor and then screen capture. If you know your Inkscape, you can skip this.

Step 2: making the .svg

Either you use software like Inkscape to import your picture and trace the outlines, or you use a web service. For example Convertino or the Fontquirrel Webfont generator. You only need the outlines, no filling!

In Inkscape the rundown to tracing is:

  • File/Import
  • Path/Trace Bitmap
  • Update
    • OK

Step 3: Import

You got your outline .svg, so import that into any software and you can start making your embossed letters. Personally, I would use Fusion360, but most CAD software support importing an SVG and treat that the same as if you had sketched in that software.

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  • $\begingroup$ Why rasterize then re-trace the fonts? $\endgroup$
    – R.. GitHub STOP HELPING ICE
    Jan 25 at 13:19
  • $\begingroup$ @R..GitHubSTOPHELPINGICE I said or, because you need an svg. - and fonts are not importable and then extrudeable in most CAD packages $\endgroup$
    – Trish
    Jan 25 at 13:50
  • $\begingroup$ But you can start with step 2, just making the text in svg and keeping it as vector all along. Inkscape can break down text objects to paths if needed. $\endgroup$
    – R.. GitHub STOP HELPING ICE
    Jan 25 at 14:00
  • $\begingroup$ @R..GitHubSTOPHELPINGICE true, but then you already know how to use Inkscape :P $\endgroup$
    – Trish
    Jan 25 at 14:23
  • $\begingroup$ OK.. but getting Inkscape to trace a raster image well is harder/more-to-learn than just commanding it to convert a text object to paths. $\endgroup$
    – R.. GitHub STOP HELPING ICE
    Jan 25 at 14:28
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Tinkercad and Inkscape is likely the easiest method, requiring very little to learn anew. The key in Inkscape is to use Path, Object to Path, which converts the text format to "ordinary" vectors supported by Tinkercad.

If you're comfortable with both programs, there's no reason to divert to a new package.

Tossing a conversion from vector to bitmap and back to vector is going to "damage" the image, while the suggestion I've made will retain all detail.

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