The Ganek Immersive Studio · USC Athletics · 2026

USC Football. Fight On.

The Immersive Room

Two films for USC Athletics, both made at The Ganek Immersive Studio: a live-action cinematic short, and a 54-second CG opener for the Immersive Room's curved LED wall, cut to the beat of an original score.

01Cinematic Short

Live action

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Director: Akaash Tumuluri
Cinematographer: Harnish Ambaliya
Producer: Nathan Fairchild
Studio: The Ganek Immersive Studio

02The Opener

0:54 · 3.26:1 wall master, letterboxed

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Director: Jordan Halsey
Music: Jasper Patterson
Studio: The Ganek Immersive Studio

54.47srunning time

1634frames @ 30

8000×2454wall master

4Mgrass blades

A sword strikes the field, grass erupts from the impact, Tommy Trojan burns into existence, and the camera finds the player — every cut placed on Jasper Patterson's score. Built for the Immersive Room's curved, ultrawide LED wall, a canvas more than three times wider than it is tall. The frame is composed for the room, not for a screen.

SceneHoudini + SolarisUSD layout, cameras, FX, lookdev

RenderKarmaMaterialX shading throughout

TimingTouchDesignerBeat grids and section cues from the track

FinishNukeComposite and delivery

Stills

Frames from the 8000 × 2454 wall master. Select any still to open it at full resolution.

Helmet side detail: facemask clip and cardinal shell

Helmet front: facemask with light streaks behind

Tommy Trojan's torso and shield, gold with sparks and lens flare

Tommy Trojan's head and crested helmet against a golden sky

03Cut to the Music

The track is rhythmically ambiguous. Its strongest accents imply 101.33 BPM with a triplet feel; beat-detection software reads 152 straight. Both are correct — and the film uses both.

The score — “Trojans,” by Jasper Patterson · 0:54

Beat timing chart showing two tempo grids, the frames where they coincide, and the five cut points — **Both grids, drawn together.** They share a subdivision and agree only every **35.53 frames**. Those agreements are the strongest moments in the piece, and every major event — sword strike, ignition, the camera's arrival — sits on one.

The player ignites one beat after the camera arrives: the same interval as the statue igniting one beat after the sword lands. The second event rhymes with the first.

Every camera key was then snapped to the nearest quarter-beat and a whole frame — 95 keys, none moved more than a frame. No single move is visible. Together they are why the camera feels locked to the track instead of merely near it.

04One Scene, One Hierarchy

Houdini Solaris scene graph showing the USD hierarchy for the opener — **The whole show as one USD hierarchy.** Cameras, environment, FX, lights, materials and props under /World, with shots as siblings. The coloured bands on the timeline are the song's sections — the structure of the music is visible while you work.

Disciplined naming is what made a fast, collaborative build possible: a scene everyone can read is a scene anyone can change safely.

05Shading the Burn

MaterialX network for the statue burn shader — **The statue burn as a MaterialX network.** Height compared to a keyed threshold, fractal noise breaking the edge, emission running gold to cardinal before cooling to bronze.

The helmet is two-layer metal-flake paint — sparkle in the base, a smooth clear coat on top, so it glitters without looking sandy.
The sparks read the shader's own parameters. One timing source drives both the burn and the particles, so they can never drift apart.

06Sparks & Grass

Particle system setup in Houdini — **Edge sparks**, gated by the same burn parameters.

Particle simulation in the viewport — **Simulation in context**, against the field and lighting.

Rendered frame 842: the statue burning with sparks over the grass field — **Frame 842.** Between ignition at f800 and the full reveal at f936, with the grass field and logo behind. Rendered at 8000 × 2454 for the wall.