Tonight I made a 64-bit compile of the TUIO-Client Plugin for Quartz Composer. I messed around with the Kinect-Plugin for Quartz Composer and discovered the TUIO-multitouch and gesture protocol, which looks really promising. The protocol support really a lot of common creative coding software.

The binary of the TUIO-Client Plugin for Quartz Composer I downloaded from the TUIO-site did not launch in my Quartz Composer on OS-X Lion. The problem actually seems, that it was compiled for an older version of Mac OSX and Quartz had problems in actually loading and/or finding the path.

Now I freshly compiled the source for 64-bit Mac OS-X machines and put it into the “right” plugin directory for Quartz Composer on Lion. This is the path where you will put the “TuioClient.plugin“-file.

/Library/Graphics/Quartz Composer Plug-Ins.

And here is the binary:

Download TuioClient-Lion-64bit

Current work is on “Particles” – a “framework for FabLabs” that should enable quick scripting of FabLab-equipment, like laser cutters, CNC-machines or plotters. The framework is written in Lua, because Lua is extremely flexible and easy to install on almost any machine – even on an Arduino for example. The current state is “early alpha”. Feel free to linger around on the Particles-site but consider, that things are far from being completed right at the moment.

Two screenshots, that point into the direction

I am currently in the mockup-phase of a new tool. This will be a tool for VJing and live-image and movie manipulation. The working title is “Photovoltaik“. The tool is all about playing with visuals and I think it will jump into the wonderful world of projection-mapping as well. Photovoltaik will be a tool for Mac OS-X. In the initial phase, the releases can be downloaded for free. After a solid feedback and testing phase, there should be a price tag. I think about 79 Euros, but this could still change. Early adopers will get a special price of course (if any), so jumping on the boat early will pay out later.

Due to the lack of great resources on Quartz Composer, I just opened an resource at Nodepond to provide a good starting point of learning. It is meant as reference and a how-to section – somehow the missing Quartz Composer manual. It’s located at quartzcomposer.nodepond.com with Tumblr running under the hood. This means, that every Tumblr-user can contribute own patches and how-to’s, that only need to be moderated. Feel free to add you own things, that took you ages to figure out in Quartz Composer!

The site should remain clean and minimal, that only looking at it will result in a learning experience. It’s a little bit inspired by the great UI-tumble-blog littlebigdetails.com.

I just uploaded a short video-introdiction of how to work with the HiScore Pixeleditor. This should give primers a good starting point about the unique quality of HiScore. Feel free to embed the video on your webseite! Video on YouTube and Vimeo. HiScore is available in the AppStore.

Smoove is now the “HiScore Pixeleditor“. At was a little bit of work, to find a new name, but at least it was worth the work. There is also new sub-page, that is dedicated the the editor: hiscore.nodepond.com

Current status:

The feature-set for the first release of Smoove V1.0 is almost complete. Lot of time went into usability-details, like the cursor-navigation or convenient ways of drawing. The UI as well as the navigation-structure of the app was completely re-worked. The current version has the lightness and easy-of-use that was intended, when starting this piece of software. App-Store submission will be end of this week. I am not sure, how long it will take at the Apple review process, but we really hope to get this thing out in March. Yay – get exited!

The work on this then won’t be over. There is a growing list of cool new feature, that will went in future updates. Also making the binary universal, to work also on the iPad is coming!

Attention: If you don’t want to miss anything about this release, subscribe to the newsletter, or follow @nodepond in Twitter.

A little more progress on the Smoove Pixeleditor for iPod Touch and iPhone. Massively tweaked the usability-aspects (that you for sure can’t see on a screenshot) and cleaned up the UI. There is still something to do – adding some tools like fill, better color handling, tweaking the look and feel – that sort of things. But this version finally feels like nearing a first release.

Months passed with new features and constant improvement. At the end of this week, I want to submit a first version to the public. I proposed this to Friday, but do not know, how much time the review-process of the App-Store will take into account. The feature set is basic, but with the “Send .png per e-mail”-function, it is possible to integrate works made with Smoove to any workflow, just by having a valid e-mail adress.

The release will be V0.4 and the initial price is 2.99 Dollar / 2,39 Euro. Future updates are free, and there will be a lot. In an incremental fashion.

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