TCDL 2026

The Opening Plenary session includes a welcome from TDL’s Governing Board, the TDL Awards Ceremony, and the Keynote Address by Jessie Contour and Kelcey Gray.

Keynote Title: Illuminating Dropcaps: The Magic of the Collaborative Process
Keynote Description: Keynote speakers Jessie Contour and Kelcey Gray are serious about play. Last year, the two associate professors of Arts and Entertainment Technologies (AET) and Design, respectively, published a Medieval-themed word game about spelling and strategy called Dropcaps.
In their keynote address, Illuminating Dropcaps: The Magic of the Collaborative Process, Contour and Gray will address topics like persuasive prototyping, the magic found in archives, when to use (and not use) AI, how to start, maintain, find joy, and execute a multi-year project, and how their cross-departmental collaboration sparked the development of a UT course that bridges two creative communities.