Cathedral ceilings can be a big challenge to
model in 3D. But with a few tools and some
basic steps, creating them in LightWave 3D® is
a breeze. This Tutorial will walk you through
the creation of Cathedral style ceilings
with Pillars.

The first step is to create
a flat disc. Select the Disc tool
from the Create menu tab and
pres the “n” key
to bring up the numerics window. Use the settings
below to create the disc:



Your workspace should look like
this:



Using the Lasso (Right
Mouse Button) select the lower nine points on
the disc like below:



Align the two points that are
at the bottom of the disc with the points above
it so that the polygon looks like this:



With the two lower points still
selected, use the Move tool "t" to
make the polygon look like the image below:



With that out of the way, you
are now ready to create the first walkway of
our object. We need to give our object some depth,
so lets use the Extrude feature. Select Extrude from
the Multiply menu tab or use
the keyboard shortcut “Shift +
E”. Use the following settings:



Your Object should now look
like the image below:



We need to make a few copies
of this object to continue constructing our Cathedral
ceilings. Lasso select the entire object and
copy it by selecting the Copy button
or by using the keyboard shortcut “c”. Paste "v" object
and move it to the left of the object in the
top view port using Move "t".
Your object should look like the image below:



While the new object is still
selected, copy it and move it to the other side
of the original object like in the picture below:



The next step is to select
all three shapes, Copy and Paste them
into a new Layer. Select all three shapes and Copy them.
Select the top portion of Layer 2 and the bottom
portion of Layer 1 like in the image below:



Paste "v" 3
shapes from the clipboard, and with the cursor
over the shapes in the Top view
port, use the rotate 90 degrees shortcut “r”.
Your perspective view port should look like this:



Just a couple more steps. In
the Multiply tab select Boolean,
then from the Boolean pop-up select Union.



Union joins
the background layer with the foreground Layer,
taking the solid objects and combining them into
a single object. Interior faces are removed and
no new polygons or surfaces are created; therefore,
all surfaces will retain their original names.
To work properly, both objects must be closed
3D solids.

Your object should now look
like this:



The Next step is to clean up
your object by selecting all the floor polygons
and removing them. Select all the Polygons like
the image below:



Once all the polygons are selected
delete them “Delete key”.

Turn Smoothing on in the Surface
panel:



Your final object should look
like the image below:



That wraps up this tutorial.

Download the Source
File and a Time-Lapse
Video of this object being created.]