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Getting started

Install

T3D is available to patrons on Patreon. It ships as a single component, T3D_<version>.tox. Drop it into a project; it installs the family when its Install parameter is on, which it is by default. With Install On Start on, it installs again whenever the project opens, so a saved project brings T3D with it.

Requirements. TouchDesigner 2023.11290 or later, the first build with custom sequential parameters. In 2025.31550 and later, the operators that exchange data with POPs (geo_to, point_cloud, metaball, sprinkle, advect) gain their POP inputs, outputs and parameters, and Noise T3D uses the Noise TOP's native 3D noise. Everything else works the same in every supported build.

Once installed, T3D is its own operator family in the OP Create dialog, like TOPs or CHOPs, with its operators in five groups: Generator, Filter, Composer, Renderer and Other. It is built on TDFam, the open operator-family framework by dotsimulate and Function Store.

A first network

A lit volume in a scene takes three operators and a Render TOP:

  1. Place Noise T3D. Set Output Resolution to Custom, Resolution to 128 × 128 × 128 and Pixel Format to 16-bit float (RGBA).
  2. Place Sphere T3D and wire the noise into it. Set Operation on its Output page to Multiply: the sphere becomes a soft-edged mask on the noise.
  3. Place Volume T3D beside your scene's Render TOP and wire the sphere into it. Set its Render TOP to that Render TOP: the volume takes the render's camera and lights from it. The Render TOP must also draw the volume, so keep it in its Geometry list; the default * includes a volume placed beside it.

Change the sphere's Softness, the noise's Period and the volume's Density and Albedo to see what each controls. The volume's page explains how density turns into light.

Where to go next