Smestad Portfolio

Dear BBC AI Creative Lab.
I'm Stian Smestad,

a film director and creative technologist exploring how new tools change the way stories are made.

My work has expanded from traditional directing into virtual production, generative AI, gaming engines, software development and custom LLM systems.

I'm interested in how technology, especially AI can deepen creativity rather than simply make it faster or cheaper.

Selected work.

Virtual & Hybrid Production
Directing
Historical images to moving image
Systems, AI tools & lectures.
AI World building
Photography

A film director exploring how new tools change the way stories are made.

My work has expanded from traditional directing into virtual production, generative AI, gaming engines, software development and custom LLM systems.

I'm interested in how technology, especially AI can deepen creativity rather than simply make it faster and cheaper.

Selected work.

Directing
Hybrid Filmmaking
Generative Worlds
Photography
Creative Tool Building

VIRTUAL PRODUCTION → FAILURE
→ AI REINVENTION
'Odori' Short dance film.

Odori is a three-minute artistic dance film inspired by Shinto trance rituals, where the performer becomes a temporary vessel for a God.

This project died on me, leaving only a useless offline edit on green screen.

It was shot using virtual production, capturing dance in a green-screen studio. Filmed with a motion-control rig and real-time Unreal Engine environments. Allowing us to see the performer live inside a mock-up 3D world when shooting.

To save the project, I developed custom AI video workflows in ComfyUI, redesigned environments and characters and composed the full film score using generative tools.

The result is a 4K animated film.

My first experience of hybrid filmmaking, where traditional production and generative systems meet.

Funded by the Norwegian Film Fund Viken and developed with Storyline Studios, Oslo.

The virtual production film that died and was reimagined as an AI animation

BTS of the Virtual Production shoot

DIRECTING.
'Hayley' Short film
Vimeo Staff Pick 1.2M+ Views

‘Hayley. 90 Seconds About Fear’ is a personal short film that grew out of a global adidas campaign I directed and served as co-creative director.

Before walking a 52 meter highline at 2800 meters, I asked athlete Hayley Ashburn about fear. She answered with a quote from Frank Herbert’s Dune.

I created and released the film independently on Vimeo, later it was picked up by Fubiz, outdoor magazines, TV stations, and film festivals.

‘Hayley. 90 Seconds About Fear’ is a personal short film that grew out of a global adidas campaign I directed and served as co-creative director.

Before walking a 52 meter highline at 2800 meters, I asked athlete Hayley Ashburn about fear. She answered with a quote from Frank Herbert’s Dune.

I created and released the film independently on Vimeo, later it was picked up by Fubiz, outdoor magazines, TV stations, and film festivals.

"Fear is a mind killer" - Frank Herbert from the book Dune.

"Fear is a mind killer"
- Frank Herbert from the book Dune.

"Fear is a mind killer" - Frank Herbert from the book Dune.

For full directing showreel visit www.liff.tv

'Trollmann'
from historical archive image → moving image

I’m developing a short film about Sinto-Romani boxer Johann Trollmann and his final German championship fight in 1933. In protest against rising fascism, Trollmann dyed his hair white and powdered his skin to appear “Aryan.”

Only a handful of black and white photographs remain.

Using generative tools I am reconstructing him. Building colour character studies, locations, art direction, costume and makeup tests.

It is an extraordinary story I want to tell, but also an experiment in how historical archival material can be transformed into immersive storytelling. This is currently non-public. Moving forward, I plan to develop it in dialogue with the Trollmann Foundation

CTRL RIOT is evolving into my ‘micro’ studio.

I’m developing a short film about Sinto-Romani boxer Johann Trollmann and his final German championship fight in 1933.

In protest against rising fascism, Trollmann dyed his hair white and powdered his skin to appear “Aryan.”

Only a handful of black and white photographs remain.

Using generative tools I am reconstructing him. Building colour character studies, locations, art direction, costume and makeup tests.

Only a handful of black and white photographs remain.

Using generative tools I am reconstructing him. Building colour character studies, locations, art direction, costume and makeup tests.

Reconstructing a boxer from three archival images.

First glimpses of Trollmann

SYSTEMS, TOOLS & LECTURES

Beyond directing, I work with AI coding and custom LLM systems to build small applications, GPTs and creative tools.

Ranging from, an interactive voice-based theatre rehearsal app for a youth theatre group to AI agents designed to develop business ideas and test product concepts.

I’m currently developing my first full MVP in collaboration with designer. An AI-assisted writing tool designed to help long form writers regain momentum without compromising authorship.

Over the past year I’ve been invited to run a full-day AI workshop at the National Film School in Stockholm (SKH) and speak at Filmpool Nord’s Futureday conference about generative AI from a director’s perspective.

SYSTEMS, TOOLS & LECTURES

Beyond directing, I work with AI coding and custom LLM systems to build small applications, GPTs and creative tools.

Ranging from, an interactive voice-based theatre rehearsal app for a youth theatre group to AI agents designed to develop business ideas and test product concepts.

I’m currently developing my first full MVP in collaboration with designer. An AI-assisted writing tool designed to help long form writers regain momentum without compromising authorship.

AI WORLD BUILDING
CTRL RIOT → An Experimental Alias

CTRL RIOT plays with synthetic sound, image and identity to ask:

What will be left of culture in the end?

Under this alias I create fully AI generated music, personas, artwork, marketing and music videos. Launching across streaming platforms and social media as fully realised “artists", but being explicit that these are synthetic experiments. This is experimental work infused with humour and absurdity.

The projects led to commissioned work, including a hybrid music video for the Swedish punk band Svart Katt. The video mixes live action footage of the singer with AI generated VFX, creating a surreal world where nature gradually absorbs him.

Building Artists and Worlds That Don’t Exist

PHOTOGRAPHY

I was recently commissioned by Sweden’s leading newspaper, Dagens Nyheter (DN), to photograph a man living in London and navigating life between soup kitchens.

The journalist’s article and photographs explore dignity and poverty, through the story of the Swedish man with direct family ties to Alfred Nobel, now living in hardship in East London.