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Front-of-house dashboard ​

Once the show is built, you need to run it — from the booth, from a phone in the crowd, from a touchscreen at the lip of the stage. This arc is the front-of-house (FOH) layer: control surfaces and monitors that sit on top of the network and give an operator cue buttons, faders, a panic switch and a view of what the signal is actually doing.

Reach for these when the build is done and you're thinking about the performance: who taps what, on which screen, with how many seconds of warning.

The web cockpit: create_stage_dashboard ​

create_stage_dashboard (Layer 2) is the primary FOH tool — a unified web-based cockpit served by a Web Server DAT inside TouchDesigner and reachable from any browser or phone on the network. It gives you cue-launch buttons, master faders, a VU meter, a beat indicator and a PANIC safety control (Blackout / Freeze).

It has two layouts, selected with layout:

  • v1 — the original cockpit.
  • v2 (the "dashboard-v2" pass) — adds a stereo VU meter, a BPM display, a cue timeline strip (driven by cue_times and a tempo_channel), an FPS/cook-time overlay, and a sticky confirm-tap PANIC bar so you can't blackout the room by mistake.

"Build a v2 stage dashboard for /project1/mainstage with my four scene cues, a master fader, and the BPM display, on port 9982."

Because it runs entirely inside TD, there's no separate app to install — open the URL it prints and you're driving the show.

Compact surfaces ​

When you don't want a browser:

  • create_control_surface (Layer 2) builds a playable Container COMP of vertical faders and cue buttons, meant to be opened in Perform/Panel mode on a touchscreen or second monitor. Faders drive parameters live; buttons recall or morph to named cues (from manage_cue) with optional crossfade.
  • create_phone_remote (Layer 2) serves a mobile-optimized single-page web remote that auto-discovers a COMP's numeric custom parameters and renders them as range sliders — the quickest way to put a few live knobs in your pocket.
  • create_control_panel (Layer 2) is the generic building block: a custom parameter page (sliders, toggles, menus, RGB swatches, pulse buttons) bound by expression to drive node parameters. Many Layer-1 tools call it internally to expose their own controls.

"Put a touchscreen control surface on my master mix: four scene cue buttons and faders for blur, feedback and master brightness."

Watch the signal: scopes & meters ​

FOH is also about seeing what's going out:

  • create_video_scopes (Layer 1) builds a broadcast-style monitor with up to four panels — waveform (luma), RGB parade, vectorscope and histogram — composited into one TOP. Default source is a synthetic test pattern, so it builds with no camera permission; opt into device for the live camera.
  • create_waveform (Layer 1) is the time-domain audio oscilloscope — the raw signal scrolling left to right — and feeds the dashboard's audio readouts.

"Add a 2×2 video scope monitor on the master output so I can check levels before doors."

Safety lives here too ​

The dashboard's PANIC control and the show's create_safety_blackout_chain are two ends of the same idea: a kill switch the operator can always reach. Wire the blackout into the master output, surface its toggle on the dashboard, and the booth has a guaranteed way to cut to black.

How it fits together ​

Build the show (Show timelines & setlists), then put a surface on it: create_stage_dashboard for the networked web cockpit, create_control_surface for a wired touchscreen, create_phone_remote for a pocket of sliders. Add create_video_scopes / create_waveform to monitor the signal, and keep the panic path one tap away.

See also ​