Miles Skarin

Director & Visual Effects Artist

I'm a music video and film director & producer at Crystal Spotlight, where I combine my passion for music and visual effects to create entire digital worlds and tell stories within them.

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Contact Miles at Crystal Spotlight

Crystal Spotlight

Video Producer, VFX Artist

At Crystal Spotlight, I provide cutting-edge video production for artists & record labels. I’ve been fortunate enough to be able to work with some of the most respected artists, labels and management companies within the music industry - with music videos I’ve produced reaching millions of viewers online.

Learn more about Crystal Spotlight

Steven Wilson - The Overview

My latest project is a collaboration with 6x GRAMMY® Award-nominated musician/songwriter/producer Steven Wilson on an experimental, animated film to accompany the release of his latest album The Overview - a 42 minute audio visual experience into the endless darkness of outer space!

The film premiered to a sold-out event at the largest cinema screen in the UK, the prestigious BFI IMAX in London. The film is currently being shown alongside the live band performance on Steven Wilson's The Overview Tour.

Here you can find a collection of some of my favourite Crystal Spotlight projects

Steven Wilson – Objects: Meanwhile

The "Objects: Meanwhile" section of my film for Steven Wilson's The Overview aimed to contrast small-town life with vast cosmic events, highlighting the insignificance of human worries against the universe's grand scale.

Cinema 4D

Octane Render

Houdini

Video Production

Canary Yellow

In early 2020, we worked with Haken on videos for their album 'Virus'. For 'Canary Yellow,' we were inspired by 1950s nuclear tests, so for the video we combined this with themes of toxic family dynamics and dramatic destruction. The project pushed our creative limits and garnered an amazing fan response - it's probably my personal favourite of all the videos I've made over the years!

Cinema 4D

Octane Render

Houdini

Music Videos

Hex

For 'Hex' by Dance With The Dead, we were inspired by Evil Dead and the brilliant cinematography used for the entity - the camera flies through a forest before diving into the depths of the cabin, where a spooky ritual is performed...! It's also achieved an incredible 10 million+ views on YouTube, making it my most viewed video ever.

Cinema 4D

Octane Render

Music Videos

Doom Woods

The video for Whitechapel’s Doom Woods takes a lot of conceptual inspiration from the band’s seventh studio album ‘The Valley’. I wanted to present a mostly first person journey through a nightmarish forest, where the viewer feels immersed into another world. I am very proud of the overall sense of dread and atmosphere that I managed to capture with this video – it’s really a thrill ride into hell and back!

Cinema 4D

Octane Render

Music Videos

Blackest Eyes

For the live visuals of Porcupine Tree's "Blackest Eyes," I drew inspiration from Lasse Hoile's iconic artwork for In Absentia. My goal was to bring that character to life in CGI, a challenging yet rewarding task. This approach added a dramatic and unsettling depth to the final video!

Cinema 4D

Octane Render

Unreal Engine

Visualisers

Luminescent Bridge

When the Stargate Research Society asked me to visualise an extrasolar communication from Blood Incantation's expedition, I was able to "decode" the footage and depict their journey across the stars.

Cinema 4D

Octane Render

Music Videos

Video Production

Impossible Tightrope

Steven Wilson’s Impossible Tightrope is an 11-minute epic blending prog rock, jazz, and electronica. I aimed to create equally immersive visuals, inspired by Steven's music and his artist collaborators and also Storm Thorgerson's iconic artworks!

Cinema 4D

Octane Render

Houdini

Music Videos

Video Production

The Harmony Codex

The video for the title track of Steven Wilson’s new album ‘The Harmony Codex’ was a project we worked on over a period of 6 months. The video features twisting, dreamlike sequences with gravity-defying visuals.

Cinema 4D

Unreal Engine

Music Videos

Video Production

Herd Culling

For the music video for Herd Culling, we created a full 3D environment of an mid-west ranch that was being haunted by a supernatural wolf - based on the stories from Skinwalker Ranch. The video also featured in Porcupine Tree's live visuals, creating a dramatic effect as the wolf looks over the audience!

Cinema 4D

Unreal Engine

Music Videos

Video Production

My favourite apps for work are DaVinci Resolve (video editing), Octane Render (3D rendering), Cinema 4D (3D modelling and animation), Unreal Engine (video rendering/environment creation), Houdini (simulations).

You can find out more about the work I do by visiting the Crystal Spotlight website.