Jessica Palmer – Python and TouchDesigner for Interactive Experiments

PyData Berlin 2016

I will dismantle the guts of an interactive multiplayer brain data driven installation we made last year. It uses Python modules to handle data from the users to create a new experiences every time. I will discuss the benefits of using Python with visual programming to create very complex experiences quickly, which can be useful for interactive art and science experiments alike.

Abstract

TouchDesigner is a visual programming software made by a company called Deriviative. I use this software with Python to make complex interactive installations which are hybrid of art and science. I use the same technique to make science experiments so the lab can test the validity of neurofeedback paradigms. I want to share some of the techniques I used in our brain driven installation, My Virual Dream, because I think there is huge potential to make very practical and very fantastical things. Quickly. This mixture of touch designer and Python could give scientists access to powerful audio visual tools usually associated with complex game engines or complex coding from scratch, in order to create limitless experiments. Even better, one can create usable modules to string into new experiments or share with each other.