I've modeled this simple strap in Blender that I want stuck on top of an already existing curving model. I modeled it flat, but now I need to bend it with as little distortion of the front as possible. There's at least three ways I can do this. I can pull and twist small sections with "Proportional Edit Falloff" enabled. This is easy and fast, but it caused some distortion and isn't nearly as precise as I'd like. I can bend the whole model using a Bezier curve. I can do exact twists with really fancy bending, but the front gets totally messed up by distortion. Lastly, I could add bones and bend the whole model into place with the bones guiding everything. I think this would be my best shot at having the front be distortion free, but the whole process seems like it would take awhile to do right and may in fact give similar results to just using proportional falloff.
What I'm wondering is if anyone has any advice on curving a long model in Blender without stretching out the faces and edges too much. I'm thinking that the Bezier curve is the way to go since If I'm careful I might be able to minimize the distortion. However, I'd love to try other techniques I don't know about. Also, if anybody has any tips on using Bezier curves, I'd love to hear them as well.
Here's a picture to help visualize my problem (and I guess to show off what little I have done). I want to bend the sash that I made over the Scout's already existing sash that's circled in purple.