"It will work much better if you make the base surface more of a replica of the target surface..."

Not exactly sure what is meant here. As far as I can tell, the base surface is a rectangle; the same as the target surface. Only one is bent and the other is not.
Perhaps what you're saying to to try and create the the base surface from the target surface, then edit it? If so, I suspect there still may be a slight continuity issue.