Instructors:
- Matthew Ragan
- Zoe Sandoval
- Workshop TouchDesigner version - 2025.31760
- TouchOSC
The world of live entertainment is an ever-evolving landscape full of new technology and new techniques. For technicians and content creators alike, TouchDesigner is a tool that can help solve technical and creative problems alike. Whether you need a surefire way to create pixel maps, visualize data, or build your own production tools, TouchDesigner might well be the missing piece of your live production tool kit. This workshop will largely be focused on the intersection of art, design and the development of new tools for live performance.
This half day course is designed to introduce participants to the fundamental principles of TouchDesigner, a node-based programming environment, including an in-depth study of each operator family. Along with the basics, students will learn the fundamentals of creating their own tools, working with camera feeds, realtime rendering, and integrating with other systems using OSC.
SudoMagic is a boutique software and design studio that partners with organizations to bring their creative and technical ideas to life. The team at SudoMagic has produced everything from branded activations to immersive experiences, from permanent installations to bespoke pipeline tools and resources. Their clients include Meta, T-Mobile, UCLA, and Derivative among others.
In addition to commercial work, SudoMagic is an education and research focused studio. Most recently they collaborated with Derivative, makers of the TouchDesigner software, to help develop the official TouchDesigner Curriculum.
Before we begin, there are a few important things to keep in mind that will make the workshop run smoothly, and ensure you can focus on getting the most out of our time together. Below you’ll find a list of required first steps / tools to have with you, and some recommended steps to help you prepare.
Bring you Laptop – Mac or PC. Make sure you review the System Requirements from Derivative so you know you have a machine that’s TouchDesigner ready. Don’t forget your power adapter – TouchDesigner is largely a GPU based environment. This makes for fast operations, but often means that your battery will get consumed quickly. You’ll definitely want your adapter, even if it’s a pain to lug around.
Download TouchDesigner – it’s very important to make sure your machine can run TouchDesigner before you get to the workshop. There are some specific graphics card requirements and making sure everything works before the first day will make sure we can get the group started right away. We'll be using the latest stable version of TouchDesigner for the workshop - if you have an older version installed, just know that some examples in the workshop may look a little different.
Get your TouchDesigner License – you can register for a Derivative account here - Derivative Registration, and that will make sure you can create a non-commercial license key. The non-commercial license is free, and we won’t need anything more than this for our workshop.
A 3 Button mouse – You certainly can use a track pad while you’re working, but you’ll be much happier to have an actual mouse for working in Touch. Download and Install a text Editor – Visual Studio Code is a great place to start if you don't have one.
Bring some Assets – You certainly don’t have to bring any extra assets, but it’s often nice to have more than just the stock images / videos handy.
Be ready to share your contact info – the best resources you’ll find at any workshop will be the other people in the room with you. If you’ve got some extra business cards make sure you bring a stack to share with the folks in our group.
Take a look at some of the projects featured on the Derivative Blog to see what people are making and doing with TouchDesigner.
Over the course of the workshop, participants will walk away with:
- an understanding of working with the environment
- creating realtime video effects
- rendering 3D scenes
- working with datasets like point clouds and lat-long coordinates
This workshop will largely focus on techniques for live performance, data processing, and interactive applications.
| Time | Topic |
|---|---|
| 2:00 PM | Intro to TouchDesigner, Navigating the Environment & OP Families |
| 3:00 PM | POP & TOPs Deepdive |
| 4:00 PM | Realtime Rendering & Post Processing |
| 5:00 PM | I/O with TouchDesigner (OSC) |
| 6:00 PM | Wrap |