java/swing: converting a text string to a Shape

If I understood you correctly, this is not to address your exact answer, but it's a start...

//Rough pseudo code
import java.awt.Color;
import java.awt.Font;
import java.awt.FontMetrics;
import java.awt.Graphics2D;
import java.awt.TexturePaint;
import java.awt.geom.AffineTransform;
import java.awt.geom.Rectangle2D;
import java.awt.image.BufferedImage;



BufferedImage image = new BufferedImage(width, height, BufferedImage.TYPE_INT_RGB);
Graphics2D graphics = (Graphics2D)image.getGraphics();

//Paint with texturing brush
Rectangle2D rect2D = new Rectangle2D.Double(0, 0, width, height);
graphics.setPaint(new TexturePaint(image, rect2D));
graphics.fill(rect2D);

//Draw text
graphics.drawString("my text goes here", xPos, yPos);

In Summary,

1. Create a BufferedImage object of width and height and ImageType.
2. Get the image's Graphics object.
3. Paint that graphics like you please (i.e. create a rectangle, circle, text, etc.)
4. Write that image to a stream (file, ServletRequest, etc.)