Contrast Studio
Interactive Multimedia

Experiments

Posts in touchdesigner
Particles Physic Experiment

Fun fact: Do you know that the word umbrella in Chinese literally looks like an umbrella ?

Anyway in this particles physic experiment, we’re using Google Keep to draw on the phone, then stream the content via WiFi using Screen Stream. With TouchDesigner, we take the drawing and convert it to 3D mesh, and interact with the particle system.

The source file can be found on our bitbucket page :

https://bitbucket.org/contraststudio/draw-your-umbrella/src/master/

All Our TD Files Are Belong To You
All Our TD Files Are Belong To You

When Contrast Studio was established, we strive to push the boundaries in projects involving media, lighting and interactive elements. And that means, for most of the time, to thread the uncharted water, using various softwares and scripts to "hack" together different components to make it work in harmony. When we met and talked to other studios, they were mostly very guarded, especially on the tools that they used. 

Then someone introduced us to a wonderful software called TouchDesigner. And he insisted that I should join the help group and forum. One thing leads to another, and it has been an exciting journey developing interactive installations on TD. The community has been really helpful, and this is where the spirit of sharing has been really impacting and infecting our workflow here at Contrast Studio. 

In the spirit of open source movement, Contrast Studio has decided to share our TD showfiles and components library. We believe that the community, and ourselves as well will benefit by sharing of knowledge and workflows. Here you go: 

https://bitbucket.org/contraststudio/ 

Face Tracking Experiment
Screenshot from TouchDesigner showing the patching

Screenshot from TouchDesigner showing the patching

Using the awesome open source tool from ofxFaceTracker, we use Syphon to stream the live image and Open Sound Protocol (OSC) to stream all the face tracking parameters to TouchDesigner software. 

The CS logo was programmed to track and follow the user's face movement, and when the user opens their mouth, it will trigger and change the image to banana. 

Generative Media Experiment
Screenshot from TouchDesigner software

Screenshot from TouchDesigner software

We did a little experiment in the studio with TouchDesigner and Kinect Sensor. The idea was to use Kinect sensor to capture the scene in 3D, generate the 3D mesh, while at the same time, generating particles effect, all rendered in real time. 

By using the "scientific" latency test: running in front of the sensor and furious arm-waving, we found that the latency of the sensor was not perceptible, but the bottleneck was on rendering the 3D mesh in real time. To increase the refresh rate, we had to lower the 3D mesh resolution/details.