THERE'S A GHOST IN EVERYTHING
Immersive Theatre Production
Developed by: Third Rail Projects (NY), UIUC
Scenic Designer: Ciera Keller
Technical Director: Ryan Schultz
Lighting Designer: Griffin Ferguson
Sound Designer: Grace Aumiller
Costume Designer: Susan Becker
Properties Head: Binky Donley
CURRENTLY IN DEVELOPMENT
Talking an audience member (Zach Morris TRP) through the next steps
Sharing Ghost Stories with Audience Members
Talking an audience member (Zach Morris TRP) through the next steps
Development
There's a Ghost in Everything (TAGIE) started being developed back in Fall of 2025 at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). Third Rail Projects, an immersive theatre company, traveled to Champaign to work with the University on this piece. Students and Faculty participated in a couple weeks long workshop to help develop the story and ideas around TAGIE. Third Rail came back in the Spring of 2026 to continue this development and start fleshing out the design ideas. Before Spring 2026, I got assigned as the Scenic Designer of the final production that would be put on at UIUC in Spring of 2027.
Research​​
A lot of my research focused on different ways the audience can interact with the story as well as the set itself. I looked into group traditions like Maypole Dances and immersive experiences like personalized signs and moveable scenery.
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For the overall look of the production, we resonated a lot with the wooden crate look as well as a dim autumn vibe. I collected many images together that showed warm lighting, overgrown nature, wooden structures, and sparce but powerful use of vibrant color.
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These images show small collages of the images I found for each "environment" that the audience gets to put together in the production.
Diorama Research​​
Another area of research that I did focused on dioramas and how they can create mini stories that have multiple layers to them. I researched how boxes and structures can open up creatively as well as how to create a small environment that has a lot of depth.
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These images show my mock-ups of the different diorama environments as well as some inspiration for how the exterior box can open up to reveal them.
Mock-Ups
\Along with digital mock-ups, I did a lot of physical ones during workshops and rehearsals over three semesters. These were used to help visualize many ideas during the development of the production and they were also used as placeholders for ideas we wanted to try out before adding them into the final experience.
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Some of these were created in a few minutes in the moment to aid the development process like the Braid Model and the Branches Model, while others took more time and detail to realistically show how it will interact with the ideas we had.
Draftings
For this production I worked closely with the Technical Director, Ryan Schultz, to successful create these moving design elements and units.
Paint Elevations
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Final Playable Model
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Final Production Photos​