Perahu Payang Terengganu broken into bits, bytes and kilobytes Posted by Site Master , Wednesday, June 16, 2010 at 5:04 PM, in Labels: 3D animation, east coast, heritage, innovation, modelling, terengganu

Fuel price is going to increase again. Better keep up with the news so when the date is finally out you can be among the first to queue up at petrol station during midnight to fill up with the last bit of cheap petrol before the new price kicks in. You'll save tremendous amount of money for the following month if you stock up with no less than 3000 gallon. While you're waiting for 10 cars in front to finish filling up,
grab some Mister Potato and a can of Livita from the mart. Nothing beats crunching on a hearty snack in the comfort of your air-conditioned idling car with some music to sing along.

What if we can substitute cars with boats like the one we see above. How hard could it be? For one, it uses no fuel at all. And when global warming takes full effect, you still have the measure to go from point A to B. Venice is doing it. Why can't we? In fact we have already done it in the past. The very boat that we have 3D modeled is one that was used. Why on earth did they make more roads for cars while they could have made more water channels instead. We'll forever be worry-less about fuel price, albeit having to put up with occasional fights at the jetty like you see in the P. Ramlee's movie, Bujang Lapok.

Sarcasm aside, the boat that we have finished digitizing is called Perahu Payang. It was very popular as fishing boat in Terengganu. Yes, it was used for fishing activities, not as a transportation from village to village, or from point A to B as mentioned. I was definitely talking nonsense. The Perahu Payang (drag-net boat) is the largest traditional Terengganu fishing boat, named due to the usage of payang (drag-net) netting. The Payang boat is normally used for deep sea fishing activities operated by 15 crews on board. Measuring at 14.2 meter long, 2.27 meter wide and 3.10 meter high, the Payang boat is propelled using wind power blowing on its two sails thrusting it forward into the sea. In the past, these boats were mostly found in Setiu district, especially along the Kuala Setiu Coastline. However, the boats were also used in other districts along the coast from Kuala Setiu until Kuala Kemaman.

 That asymmetrical form is called Bangau, partly hidden behind another smaller piece, Caping

The bangau is a decorative guard placed on the port side of the boat. It is mainly a support where sails and fishing nets are hooked on to whenever the boat is not in use. Traditional Malays also believed the bangau to be the home for the spirit (semangat) of the boat to reside which brings luck during the catch and protects the fishermen from the vagaries of the sea and sea demons. Such an easy to please creature, i must say. For the kind of life preserving insurance it offers, it really should have claimed the whole vessel to itself instead of just the bangau, and call himself Davy Jones. The bangau is always heavily carved with typical Malay meandering awan larat design. The shorter end of the bangau, okok or ongkak that lies across the bow is attached to the keel acting as a prop to secure the anchor and counterbalancing the bangau.

Bangau has its partner called caping. You would find the term caping in various parts of other Malay traditions that are not related to boats. Don't get confused though, caping is not actually a name given to one specific accessory or equipment, rather speculatively, it's the name of the shape that certain thing takes up. That refers to the spade like shape or something that resembles a spade. Let's call a spade a spade, traditional Malays were very superstitious lot that one harbouring place for the spirit is not enough they needed another one. This caping certainly lives up to that expectation, beside being a tool for the seamen to navigate the sea at night. By somehow pointing the pointy edge of the caping towards certain constellation they would know where to go.

 

 Start from a blueprint that produces several other colours

History lesson over. Now we get to the construction of the 3D model. We didn't get the blueprint anywhere from the net. I doubt it is even available on the net. We produced the blueprint by manually measuring the actual boat. The next step is no less complicated that we need to carefully model it according to the right topology. What is topology then? In this context of 3D modeling, it is the basic polygonal structure that determines the quality of the desired model. There are several techniques to control topology but the one we adapted is the quad-edged faces type, which every single polygonal face is bounded by four edges, no more, no less. And there's the undisrupted continuity of flowing edges where you need to come to our classes to know more. This ensures the perfect shape construct that are seemlessly 'meshsmoothable' and fully manipulatable.

 Edges flow and split and flow into eternity

 Try mesh smooth this up to 100 iteration. If you dare

 Spiderman could have been the actual 'spirit'

Vertices carefully placed under a full spectrum of colours

 Smooth, curvy and salivating