How would you cut out the letters?

[jscott2]

I cut out some words from a piece as shown in the pictures below.  Getting in the interior portions of the capital "A" back in place was easy, but the lower case "b", "o", and "a" were a real problem.  In the case of the "A", I cut the outer perimeter of the letter, then filed away the front 1/2 of the bottom of the pyramid.  It was easy for the "A" but the smaller lower case letters were a real problem.  I ended up cutting slightly over-sized lower case letters and filing the interior piece to fit.

It was very fussy and not very pretty.  One option would be to put a backer on but I wanted to be able to see through where the letters were cut out.

Does anyone have a better idea on how to do this? 

Thanks,
Jim
PS
This was for the flooring company that gave me a bunch of sample.  I wanted to use two of their samples to make this.  When I gave them the piece, they gave me another box of samples - cumaru, jabota, walnut, and tauari.  The best part is that most are unfinished so I don't have to get out the belt sander.
J

[daliclimbs]

I would use either a stencil font or create smaller bridges on the existing pattern so there are no "floaters" with a proper font the details of the letter interiors will be there so there is nothing to have to put back in place. What I mean by creating bridges is Just put small hardly discernible connecters to hold the interior species in place on the pattern.

[jscott2]

daliclimbs, in general, bridges would be the solution.  In this case, I took the words and letter shapes from the flooring company's web site so I didn't want to add bridges.

The company was pleased with my work so I'm thinking of offering to make more but I don't want to go through the hassles of the first one.

Thanks,
Jim