Learn how to work with 3D text in Dimension.
In Dimension, you can add 3D Text to your scene using the fonts on your system. You can change the appearance of the 3D Text using properties which support depth and beveling. 3D Text is procedurally generated by Dimension, so textures and materials will always look correct.
Add and edit 3D text
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In the Starter Assets panel, click on the Text object to add it. A new text object will be added to the center of the scene with default properties.
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Use the Properties Panel to change the text and bevel properties.
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Apply materials to the text to customize the look. Text has automatic material regions for the front, sides, bevels, and back.
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Text behaves as any other 3D object. You can position it and add other 3D objects to create a final composition.
Properties
Text properties
Text Input:
The string that will be used to create the 3D Text object. Press Enter on the keyboard to insert a line break and create multi-line text inputs.
Font Family:
The font family that will be used to create the 3D Text object. Dimension reads fonts installed on your operating system. To update the list of fonts available, restart Dimension.
Font Style:
Selects a font style from the current font family, such as italic, bold, narrow, or other variations. Not all font families support multiple font styles.
Character Spacing:
Uniformly changes the overall width between all characters in the 3D Text object.
Line Spacing:
Uniformly changes the overall height between lines for 3D Text objects that have multi-line text inputs.
Alignment:
Controls the distribution of lines and characters relative to the pivot.
Size:
The size of the 3D Text object, measured in scene units.
Depth:
Controls the depth of the 3D Text object. This does not affect additional depth caused by bevel effects.
Bevel properties
3D Text Objects have unique bevel controls, which allow you to add characteristic edge styles.
Bevel types:
Bevel properties:
Width: The thickness of the bevel, measured from the outline of the text to the center line of each glyph as 0-100%.
Angle: The angle of the bevel, measured from the base of the glyph to the edge of the bevel as 0-100%.
Repeat: Controls the number of times the bevel is applied across the width distance, from a range of 1-10.
Space: Controls the amount of space between each repeated bevel, as a range from 0-100%.
The depth of the bevel, the distance it extrudes away from the base of the text, is automatically controlled based on the other properties. For example, increasing the angle of the bevel or the number of repeated bevels will adjust the depth automatically to retain the width and angle settings.
Materials for 3D text
3D Text objects have four material regions so you can easily apply materials to the face, back, sides, and bevel areas of the text. Simply changing materials between regions can give drastically different visual effects.
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Activate the Select tool: Double click the 3D text object to select its materials. The scene panel view will update to show a list of the materials applied to the current object.
You can also select regions of the 3D text with the Magic Wand tool.
Select the material you want to edit or replace.
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Use the properties panel to adjust the appearence of the selected material.
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Click a new material in the Starter Assets panel or CC Libraries panel to replace the selected material. You can continue to edit the material to customize it for your scene.
Also, materials react differently based on whether you use the 3D text object properties to change their size or use the transform tool.
- When changing the shape of a 3D text object with its properties like depth and bevel settings, Dimension generates a new surface area for the material to adjust position without stretching.
- Changing the shape of a 3D text object with the transform tool will apply as a modifier on the entire object, stretching materials and features like bevel edges.
Converting parametric models to standard models
3D text objects are parametric in nature which means their underlying shape is generated by Dimension and is controlled by their properties. Due to the changing nature, some features don’t work with a model while it is parametric:
- The general transform size and scale properties will act as a multiplier on top of the base size settings of the parametric model.
You can apply materials to parametric models but cannot apply graphic layers which rely on the geometry to be positioned.
The magic wand will select predefined areas on parametric models.
You cannot use the Align and Distribute tool on a parametric model with multiple parts such as the glyphs of 3D text as the spacing is controlled by the tracking and line spacing properties.
You cannot delete or remove parts of the model.
You can choose to convert a parametric model into a standard model, which will freeze the parameters and unlock standard behavior for the object. To convert a model:
Select the parametric object.
In the Actions panel, choose the Convert to Standard Model action.
Font selection
Dimension displays all fonts installed on your OS.
Fonts in the same family are displayed in a group. Use the Star icon to set a font as a favorite and then use Filter to quickly filter out non-favorited fonts.
Supported languages and scripts for text
Dimension supports rendering glyphs for most languages. Script glyphs can only be displayed when the font in use supports that language. If you input a character that is not supported by your current font, Dimension displays it as a null character. See the complete list of supported languages and scripts below:
Latin |
Indic |
South East Asian |
East Asian |
Middle East and North Africa |
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French |
Hindi |
Thai |
Chinese Simplified |
Arabic * |
German |
Marathi |
Khmer |
Chinese Traditional |
Hebrew * |
Spanish |
Gujarati |
Sinhalese |
Korean |
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Dutch |
Gurmukhi |
Lao |
Japanese (basic) * |
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Italian |
Malayalam |
Burmese |
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Portuguese |
Kannada |
Indonesian |
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Norwegian |
Telugu |
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Swedish |
Tamil |
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Russian |
Oriya |
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Bulgarian |
Bengali |
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Serbian |
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Ukrainian |
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Greek |
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Vietnamese |
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Polish |
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Turkish |
*Languages are supported for rendering but layout is left to right only.
