Almost

It's getting down to the wire. I've been working with Pengfei on creating the right map/grid so that he can more easily code the locations of various activities in the ritual. I've been using the 3D Warehouse to find small objects to use as markers on the map; I even found this great little jagged wall model which I 'exploded' and onto which I added a new texture taken from one of Dr. Erickson's Inca wall images. Sometime early this week, I think the whole group is going to get together to figure out how to finish this thing off once and for all; I'm really looking forward to the moment when it all comes together. In the meantime, I'm recording the voice over in English and looking around for good music to have in the background.

SketchUp Skills

I spent about five hours the other night trying to figure out how to model terrain in SketchUp. I started by doing a very haphazard, ugly triangle method which made the mountain/field look jagged and unrealistic, then I went for the curved terrace look (which was equally unrealistic but more aesthetically pleasing), and then, after watching a few YouTube tutorials, I figured out how to use the sandbox features to create a smoothed mountainous terrain for the field. I will withhold screenshots here so that I have more new material to show for myself in the presentation on Wednesday. After making this discovery (and, in the fervor of epiphany, continued to play around with the model for a looong time), I sent the model to Pengfei, the graduate student that Dr. Badler got involved with the project. I went in to see him the next day to try to transfer the image from Sketchup to Maya and then Maya to Ogre. At the SIG lab, I learned several things:

1. The field surface on which the "agents" will tread must be perfectly flat in the model
2. Newer versions of OGRE are pretty different from older versions
3. How to increase the order of magnitude of the view of the objects in Maya
4. That the model must be made up of triangles to be able to tag coordinates for CAROSA (and that the smooth feature in SketchUp simply conceals the triangles)

I've been in touch with Diana about modeling props and other items for the model. She showed me a screenshot of a kero cup model and a plow, both of which looked amazing. Things are really shaping up.

Mo-Cap

This morning I suited up to do the motion capture for the model of the ploughing ritual. I had written a list of all the discrete movements that might take place during the ritual, from drinking chicha from a kero cup to slicing the throat of a llama, from drunken staggering to rhythmic dancing. It was a process not unlike filming a movie; there are takes, someone yells "action," and sometimes one must do away with inhibitions. A friend who is a DMD major was working in the room where we were doing the motion capture and there were a few embarrassing moments (like when I mimed a man drunkenly urinating).

We are well on our way, I think, to having a really cool model. Brigitte is working on putting together the "schedules" of all the agents participating in the ritual (we will have to cap the total number at 20, which is fine but not quite the crowd I had envisioned); I've been researching and writing the script for the animation as well as writing voicover text for the final product. I'm looking forward to hearing Bauer's responses to my questions. Perhaps he will be able to clear up some of the remaining confusions about the ritual, particularly regarding the two different fields and the observation of the sun on the day of the ritual.

Re-Change of Plans

We're back to focusing on the ploughing ritual (though still weaving in the origin myth). I spent the last three and a half hours searching through primary source documents (thank you eHRAF) trying to find an answer to the question of whether the ritual took place at Sausero, Collcampata, or both. From what I can tell, Sausero tends to be associated with Mama Huaco, and the maize from this field is said to be made into chicha for the cult of Mama Huaco. Collcampata, on the other hand, seems to be associated more with Manco Capac and the Sun. There is a version of the origin myth in which Manco Capac is said to adorn himself with silver and gold so that the people on distant mountains can see him glimmering and believe that he is the son of the Sun. I think we can say, then, that Sausero and Collcampata are separate but part of the same ritual; both are included in various account that mention that it is the first plouhing, and I found one account this morning (it referenced the harvest ritual but suggests continuity with the planting) that says that the ceremony started at Sausero and moved to fields of other deities, including Collcampata/the sun. We're getting closer!

Change of Plans

Brigitte and I just met to discuss our project and decided to change our focus slightly. Rather than trying to piece together "factual" information about how the sowing ritual and the anti-zenith relate and coming up with one quasi-definitive rendering of events, we will focus on the origin myth of Mama Huaco and Manco Capac, which will, we think, offer us more interpretive wiggle-room. If we focus on modeling our interpretation of the myth (which is, after all, a myth) based on various accounts and oral histories, we can still insert elements of the corn planting ritual as they relate to the first sowing by Mama Huaco and Manco Capac and discuss Mama Huaco's journey along the ceque/sight line of Quispicancha in relation to the anti-zenith sunset observation on August 18th as described by Zuidema.

Update: Ritual Confusion

As I have mentioned in class, I've been trying to come up with an account of the first corn planting ritual of the season, which seems to occur on August 18, the day of the anti-zenith. Bauer's account has the Inca king with four noblemen and their wives sewing seeds in the field of Sausero, which is near the (long-gone) Arco Punto and the fields in which Mama Huaco and Manco Capac were alleged to have sewn the first seed after defeating the jungle people. He says that they sing haylli (war songs) to celebrate their triumph over the earth, and a white llama with gold adornments is prepared in the center of the field for sacrifice. Guinea pigs are also sacrificed, according to Bauer's piecing together of stories, and the commoners all assemble and watch while everything is happening. Onlookers drink and pour chicha throughout the ritual. Bauer does not discuss the cosmological significance of this date in August; he does not mention the anti-zenith, as Zuidema was quick to point out, and he does not discuss the viewing of the sunset at Quispicancha from the Ushnu in the plaza or the ritual procession along the ceque that leads to Quispicancha (which Mama Huaco apparently traversed long ago). Zuidema also mentioned the Priests of the Sun (children of thunder), as well as the fact that the ritual took place on a field that was not intended for true agriculture.

I am attempting to reconcile these two very different conceptions of the ritual, from Zuidema's intensly astronomical/cosmological, ceque-oriented account to Bauer's ceremony-oriented, war-over-nature account. Brigitte and I are teaming up to get to the bottom of this (with Prof. Erickson's help), and I fear that we will either have to pick one account and stick to it (and accept that we are missing parts of the story), try to mesh multiple stories (at the expense of losing some factuality), or find a new ritual to study that has a better written record from which to draw information.

Corn(y)

I just read Bauer's account of the corn plowing ritual and the origin myth of Manco Capac and Mama Huaco, after which I read Zuidema's account of the Capac Raymi Camay Quilla feast. I was under the impression that both scholars would be describing the same ritual(s), but it seems like Bauer and Zuidema are talking about completely separate things. Perhaps Bauer just isn't getting into the astronomical specifics, but in Zuidema's telling there's little about corn, which is the essence of Bauer's piece. Either my expectations were false or my understanding is dim. Either way, I think that the plowing ritual sounds like something that would be really cool to model. We could capture the movement of plowing with motion capture/Maya, research/reproduce the sounds of the hailis being sung, model the 600 nobles lined up and the llamas and guinea pigs sacrificed, recreate/model the Arco Punto and the fields of Huanaypata and Sausero, reconstruct the ceremonial tunics depicted in the illustrations in Bauer, and more. We could even include a tutorial on chicha and perhaps link to/embed the video I found of the chew-and-spit process (on BoingBoing) or reconstruct the making of chicha ourselves.

With a little clarification on the compatibility/incompatibility of the Bauer/Zuidema discussions of the ritual, I think I'll be on the way to getting started producing the actual content for our final project!