Three Fall 2026 courses exploring creative coding across sound, image, and real time systems: ChucK for audio programming, p5.js and openFrameworks for visual and interactive art, and TouchDesigner for real time, node based visuals. Each runs on its own weekly schedule, and every final project connects to at least one of the other two.
A pre-recorded video series paired with a weekly class. Students learn ChucK by building sound step by step, then perform a final piece as a group.
Starts in p5.js, moves into openFrameworks and C++ halfway through. The same ideas, taught twice, in two different languages.
A weekly hands-on class in TouchDesigner, building from a simple color palette up to real-time, audio-reactive visuals.
Nearly the same across all three courses. See each course’s own Resources page for the full list and class-specific links.
No textbook purchase is required for any of the three courses.
The same scale and the same weighting in every course.
The weekly assignments share splits evenly across however many weekly assignments actually run that semester, not a fixed per-assignment percentage. Weekly submission details vary by course, see each course’s own Policies page.
The same structure across all three courses.
A required group performance, no solo projects, performed in person on December 2, within a shared 1–6 PM window across all three Fall 2026 Creative Computing courses. Groups are 2–3 students, formed the week before the midterm, and each should include at least one Masters student when enrollment allows.
Every final project has to connect outward to at least one of the other two courses’ own tools, ChucK, p5.js or openFrameworks, or TouchDesigner, and bring in some kind of live, external interactivity. MFA students additionally complete a written application package, using the final project as the work they’re applying with.
Performed live in Week 13 (Dec 2). A separate digital submission, the GitHub portfolio, and the Digital Expo are all due by the end of Week 14: Friday, December 11, 11:59 PM.
Student presentations will be added here after Week 13.
Each course teaches its own weekly material. At the midterm, during the Week 10 holiday, and again from Week 12 through the end of the semester, all three classes share the same calendar day.
Wednesday, November 11 (Week 10) is a campus holiday for all three courses: no live class anywhere that day, each course’s own material is pre-recorded instead. Week 11 isn’t a shared lesson though: Coding Art Fundamentals runs its last required weekly assignment, Intro to TouchDesigner holds an optional workshop, and Coding Music Fundamentals holds a required in-person final project workshop, since ChucK’s own sequence shifted a week to make up for the holiday.
Week 7 is the shared midterm. Week 9 is the deadline for final groups. Week 10 (Nov 11) is a shared holiday, pre-recorded for all three. Weeks 12 through 14 are the shared closing run: a remote day with a Stanford CCRMA workshop (required for Coding Music Fundamentals, optional for the other two), the in-person final performance on December 2, and the digital submission and Digital Expo deadline, Friday, December 11.