I'm looking for some better strategies on building features on curved surfaces. I'm very new to this.

A close example of what I'm doing is this snowboard binding: I have an initial curved surface which is extruded into a solid. Then, I need to go in an build features on top of that, similar to the ribs and features you see on this binding. I feel like it shouldn't be that hard but it's turning out to be a pain and my models end up getting pretty complex.

I think one thing that is giving me a lot of trouble is I have to build a nice blended bead around the edge of the surface and I just can't get it to come out how I want it to.

This is the desired edge I'm trying to get (can't share the whole image unfortunately). I only have a top view to work from.

The method I'm using right now is basically drawing 3D splines and connecting them as boundary surfaces.

For example, if I was building the binding below, my procedure would be the following:

1: extrude a surface for the large constant thickness binding back

2: project a split line to make up the curves on the raised section, and raise this as an offset surface

3: build 3D splines and connect with boundary surfaces to add the center raised sections of the ribs

4: cutout the cutout sections using a simple cut extrude

5: knit as I go along

6: add fillets