BIOGRAPHY
An Italian-American from a small town in New Jersey, Steve Dabal spent over a decade in Hollywood's post-production industry before becoming a director in New York City.
While attending the prestigious Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles, Dabal was awarded the Matthew Rolston endowed scholarship with a 3-year mentorship underneath the famous photographer turned creative director. Foundational inspiration also came from independent studies with Academy Award-nominated editor Billy Weber (Top Gun, The Thin Red Line), Professor of design sciences M A Greenstein Ph D. (using Virtual Reality for spatially-based storytelling), VFX flame artist Dan Bartolucci (Captain America, Avengers: Endgame), and Emmy-winning documentarian Richard Pearce (Woodstock, Food Inc.). Unbeknownst to him, these mentorships would shape a multi-hyphenated career of exploring various forms of storytelling.
In need of a quality bagel, Dabal moved back East to found the Family, a film production house specializing in immersive storytelling to create physical and digital artworks. His wide range of clients has taken him from doing visuals at the main stage of Coachella to directing global campaigns for Broadway shows and everything in between. What started as a few broke students creating a small art collective became a creative house for Fortune 500 companies and legendary artists. It is still proudly artist owned and operated.
As an advisory member of SMPTE Rapid Industry Solutions and NVIDIA's Inception Program, Steve Dabal's technical expertise allowed him to open New York City's first independent virtual production LED studio. It became a home base to incubate projects like Mini Studio, a start-up creating artificial intelligence tools for kids, and the critically acclaimed film, Molli and Max in the Future.
He is currently in development for a docu-series about the design history and cultural impact of sneakers, as well as a limited-series about Virginia's 757 area code (with Michael Vick and Allen Iverson). Dabal's feature film debut Italian Wannabe will release in 2026.
You can find him drinking espresso in Brooklyn, NY.
PRESS
“[Ricerca VR] completely stands on its own and is one of the best examples of how innovative artists can harness the potential VR to tell stories in physical space.” -Indiewire
“[The Old House VR] is not only an experience in itself, but it is also used as a tool of encouragement for other artists to take on storytelling in this new medium.” -VR Focus
"Virtual production in Hollywood have been connected to big-budget event cinema, and television shows from the likes of Disney and Netflix. The Family, however, found virtual production offered an approach to independent filmmaking that opened up new possibilities" -Disguise
“[Tree] starts off looking like Luke Skywalker before disrobing a la Channing Tatum in Magic Mike” - Noisey
