When the first sporting event was held at the Sphere in Las Vegas, it was a really big deal. In celebration, at the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) event, Mexico’s rich history and culture took center stage. As such, six short films paying homage to the cultural heritage of combat sports in Mexico were commissioned for the event. The films, representing various chapters of Mexican history, were played on the Sphere’s giant screen. Impossible Objects kicked things off with “Chapter One.”

There are VFX-laden productions created for “the big screen,” aka, movie theaters. Then, there are those created for the big, big screen—the granddaddy of them all, the Sphere in Las Vegas. And with this giant leap in screen size, not to mention the spherical curve of it, the resolution, etc., the work becomes that much more challenging.

The Sphere has hosted concerts and films since its opening in the fall of 2023, and not long ago, the venue’s first sporting event,  Riyadh Season Noche UFC. For this Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) showdown, Impossible Objects, a worldbuilding lab and creative studio, crafted a 90-second short film that paid homage to the cultural heritage of combat sports in Mexico. The CG short was co-directed by Impossible Objects Co-founder Joe Sill and Director Brian Tang.

“This film was an incredible collaborative opportunity to merge the richness of Mexico’s culture, UFC’s history, and Impossible Objects’ love of worldbuilding into one unprecedented experience,” said Sill. “Seeing this work play out inside the epic Sphere canvas is a breathtaking view into what the future of storytelling may hold.”

Impossible Objects’  short film was one of six interstitials, represented in chapters, commissioned by the UFC to play on the Sphere’s giant screen—a venue like no other, with a screen like no other.

The Sphere, at the Venetian Resort, is a music and entertainment arena built at a reported cost of about $2.3 billion. No ordinary venue, the Sphere is immense—measuring 516 feet at its widest point)—holding roughly 18,600 seats.

Visuals captivate audiences on a high-resolution (16K) wraparound LED screen comprising 64,000 panels and covering 160,000 square feet. This is augmented by an impressive audio system and 4D physical effects, immersing audiences in the sights and sounds within. It, like the exterior’s 580,000-square-foot LED display, is powered by 150 Nvidia RTX A6000 GPUs.

Overseeing the event’s six interstitials was Academy Award-nominated director and producer Carlos López Estrada (Raya and the Last Dragon, Blindspotting) and production company Nexus Studios. All six segments were themed around Mexican culture and meant to excite and entertain the crowd while being played before, during, and after the various matches.

Chris O’Reilly, co-founder and ECD of Nexus Studios, described the Sphere as the most exciting screen in the world to be creating stories for right now. “It’s been an incredible journey collaborating with the visionary Carlos López Estrada and a host of exceptionally talented directors, designers, VFX artists, and technical teams to bring this project to life. This venue pushes the boundaries of immersive storytelling,” he stated.

The all-CG interstitial short from Impossible Objects opened and introduced the event. As such, it was titled “In the Beginning—Chapter One,” described as echoes of warriors past resonating through time, honoring Mexico’s enduring legacy. It presents an intergalactic sequence featuring memorable figures and symbols, and merging icons of Mexican independence with celebrated UFC legends. Images take shape, emerging as statues formed from galactic dust populating a surreal galactic landscape. The celestial segment features Aztec soldiers alongside UFC greats in an intricate design that both celebrates and honors the heritage of mixed martial arts.

The team at Impossible Objects brought this project to life in just four months, with a toolkit that included Autodesk’s Maya, SideFX’s Houdini, and The Foundry’s Nuke for production, and Epic Games’ Unreal Engine for previsualization.   

According to Impossible Objects’ VFX Supervisor Morgan McDermott, despite the unique size of the screen, from a tools and pipeline perspective, the project was surprisingly fairly straightforward, albeit with some exceptions.

Using Unreal Engine for high-quality previs, the studio was able to combat the short project schedule. “Unreal allowed us to iterate quickly through initial client notes and land in a place where the overall pacing and composition from our Unreal work let us confidently jump into our traditional 3D DCCs (Maya and Houdini),” McDermott explained.

Still, the project was technically daunting and exciting. “Rarely do you get to produce VFX content for a new medium, and with that came a lot of unknowns we encountered during the process,” said McDermott.

The Sphere provided the group with a 3D model of the venue interior and the screen within the actual Sphere building, which enabled them to place their renders on the screen for internal testing. While this could be done easily in Maya, it was much more helpful using these assets in a VR headset to literally experience what Impossible Objects’ content would look like from different seats in the Sphere.

The final render format was achieved with Maxon Redshift’s 180-degree spherical camera. Although not unusual, for this project, sections of the render would be cut out in comp to account for areas of the screen occluded by seats and the structure of the Sphere itself. Also, extra attention was given to the amount of camera movement as well as the positioning of objects within the renders, McDermott said, to avoid making the audience dizzy and to keep the studio’s hero elements from distorting too much around the edges of the Sphere’s screen.

In addition to Impossible Objects’ “In the Beginning—Chapter One,” the five other shorts included:

“Early Civilizations—Chapter Two,” directed by Saad Moosajee and co-produced by Analog Studios, transports the audience to the beginnings of Mexican civilization, as Mexico’s first settlers forge a legacy of resilience, igniting the nation’s fighting spirit for centuries to come.

“Rituals and Traditions—Chapter Three” is directed by Paul Nicholls, with Factory Fifteen studio. The story focuses on how, through the rituals and traditions of Mexico’s earliest civilizations, the essence of the ancestors lives on, immortalized in customs that endure across generations. To this end, the project blended the fascinating research of Mexican rituals and traditions with the creation of an epic fantasy world for UFC 306 inside the Sphere.

“Battle for Independence—Chapter Four,” directed by Diego Huacuja, with BASA Estudios, tells how at a defining moment in history, Mexico stands against centuries of colonial oppression, as the fight for independence shatters the chains and reshapes the future. Inspired by the greatest muralist artists of Mexico—Diego Rivera, Juan O’Gorman, and David Alfaro Siqueiros—the artists symbolized 11 years of struggle for independence through an epic animated piece serving as an ode to the entire movement for Mexican independence.”

“Fighters and Heroes—Chapter Five” is directed by Shynola, with Nexus Studios. Spanning the origins of Mexico’s history to the present, iconic figures—from ancient leaders to modern sports heroes—embody the relentless spirit that defines the nation’s identity in this short. Shynola says of the project: “Crafting a film for Sphere is truly unlike anything we’ve made before. The screen fills your field of vision, which means it has a filmic language all its own unique to this venue. That’s been both a challenge and a lot of fun: thinking about shots, composition, lighting, and movement in new ways to play with and fully utilize this incredible screen so the audience has the best experience. Sphere has given us a special opportunity to tell the story in a new, astounding way. It’s breathtaking.”

“Mexico Today and Tomorrow—Chapter Six,” directed by Paul Trillo, with Factory Fifteen studio, focuses on a future Mexico, a civilization evolving from its rich lineage, as its people propel their culture forward into eternity.

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