Welcome back, TouchDesigner developers! Today, we’re taking a look at the work of Daniel Molnar, also known as Function Store. Dan is an artist dedicated to creating interactive and immersive art, as well as designing unique tools for TouchDesigner users. In this post, we’ll provide a brief overview of his background, recent projects, and some of the standout tools he’s developed. Whether you’re new to his work or a long-time fan, join us for this quick dive into Daniel’s contributions!
Artist Profile
Self-describing as a developer, artist, musician, and educator, Dan has a background in electrical, software, and audio engineering. Currently based in Berlin, he has always pursued artistic expression through playing in bands and producing music. Like for many of us, discovering TouchDesigner was a turning point, blending his interests in visuals, music, and coding. This led him to start creating YouTube tutorials, hold workshops, and work with commercial clients.
Recent Projects
Monopol Berlin x LED Pulse
Function Store collaborated on an installation at Monopol Berlin involving the Dragon Volumetric LED Display. This project was a collective effort with various artists, musicians, and institutions, transforming the display into a living laboratory of creativity and innovation. The installation featured a fractal array of 36 modules that interact with the environment, creating a mesmerizing light display paired with an immersive audio system.
Tools
As I mentioned before, Dan’s contributions to the TouchDesigner community include a set of tools that he’s been shaping over the years in order to make artist’s workflow on TouchDesigner more fluid and efficient. Let’s take a look at some of these tools!
Custom Shortcut Expander
Do you happen to find yourself typing absTime.seconds a lot in your projects? Dan does too, along with many other repetitive expressions! To save time, he wrote a few lines of Python code in the form of a TouchDesigner component to create custom shortcuts for frequently used expressions. Here is a quick demo of this FREE tool!
Download this tool here:
https://olib.amb-service.net/component/expr-hot-strings
RealRamp Component
TouchDesigner’s Ramp TOP can have an interesting behavior at half sub-pixel phase values where the gradient doesn’t transition smoothly from maximum to minimum in one pixel, causing issues in instancing data and other scenarios. Dan’s free RealRamp component addresses this by producing a gradient jump from maximum back to minimum in one pixel/sample using GLSL. While it isn’t a full replacement for Ramp TOP, it includes the most common features and is glitch-free.
Download this tool here:
https://functionstore.gumroad.com/l/urlee
Reset Pulse Component
This free component simplifies the process of resetting feedbacks and LFOs. Instead of referencing a single Keyboard In CHOP to all your feedback networks or LFOs, which can be tedious, this component pulses every reset you want. It’s a straightforward yet effective tool that makes managing complex feedback networks or LFOs much easier!
Download this tool here:
https://functionstore.gumroad.com/l/bjkcb
Get Our 7 Core TouchDesigner Templates, FREE
We’re making our 7 core project file templates available – for free.
These templates shed light into the most useful and sometimes obtuse features of TouchDesigner.
They’re designed to be immediately applicable for the complete TouchDesigner beginner, while also providing inspiration for the advanced user.
FunctionStore Tools Collection
This collection is a set of TouchDesigner workflow enhancements and UX improvements designed to streamline your work and customize the default behavior of TouchDesigner! These tools allow you to place operators with preferred default parameters, create operator chains, or even set up full render networks with just one click. Here are two videos where Dan guides us through his creations.
Part One
Part Two
And here is the Github repo for further information and tool download:
https://github.com/function-store/FunctionStore_tools
Wrap Up
That’s it, folks! I hope you enjoyed this brief overlook at Function Store’s work and the tools he has developed for TouchDesigner! Be sure to explore the tools and find the ones that you think will serve you a great purpose. When it comes to artistic creations and interactive technologies it’s a luxury to have access to this wide range of tools that can simply make our process easier, as well as providing opportunities for new techniques and artistic progress!
Until next time!
