AIF 2026
infoWelcome to Runway’s fourth annual AI Festival. Originally established in 2022 with a focus on AI films, AIF has evolved into an interdisciplinary celebration of creatives experimenting at the forefront of art and technology. In Film, Design, New Media, Fashion, Advertising and Gaming.
Works showcased offer a glimpse at a new creative era. One made possible when today’s brightest creative minds are empowered with the tools of tomorrow.
Works showcased offer a glimpse at a new creative era. One made possible when today’s brightest creative minds are empowered with the tools of tomorrow.
Finalists of the various AIF tracks will be selected and showcased both virtually as well at gala screenings in NYC and LA. Winning submissions will be chosen by an esteemed panel of jurors and shown at partner festivals around the world.
The Awards
2026CATEGORY
Grand Prix / $20,000
Cash prize & 1,000,000 Runway credits
Gold / $10,000
Cash prize & 500,000 Runway credits
Silver / $5,000
Cash prize & 500,000 Runway credits
Honoree (x2) / $1,000
Cash prize & 100,000 Runway credits
Merit (x5) / $500
Cash prize & 100,000 Runway credits
Submission Criteria
2026(1)
3-15 minutes in length.
(2)
Includes the use of generative video within the film.
(3)
Film must be a fully contained, linear narrative.
Photo Gallery
NEW YORK 2025
AIF Winners
Past Editions
Total Pixel Space
by Jacob Adler
9:28
Grand Prix
Total Pixel Space contains every possible digital image, including films of your entire life, every life you never lived, and the lives of every creature or object that ever and never existed on or off the earth, from every possible angle.
JAILBIRD
by Andrew Salter
2:49
Gold
JAILBIRD invites the viewer to experience the world through the eyes of a chicken as it goes through a transformative experience -- being sent to a human prison. The film highlights how projects like this can benefit not only animals, but the lives of those who care for them.
ONE
by Ricardo Villavicencio & Edward Saatchi
6:18
Silver
After Earth collapses, a crew of transhumans follows the path of Voyager I to a distant planet, only to find it inhabited by lost souls desperate to reclaim human bodies again.
Distance Between Two Points Of Me
by Illya Dutsyk, Bogdan Nesvit, Anatolii Kasianov
2:27
Honoree
The film contemplates what it means to lose a home, as many Ukrainians have. It gently walks through the emotional distance between presence and absence, grief and gratitude, showing how memory and hope help us stay connected to who we are.
More Tears Than Harm
by Herinarivo Rakotomanana
3:14
Honoree
A sensory collage of childhood memories from Madagascar with present-day impressions. Fleeting moments quietly echo within.
Fragments Of Nowhere
by Vallée Duhamel
8:04
Merit
A short film about the spaces between what's real and what's perceived. If reality is just another layer of perception, what happens when those layers collide? Time bends, places shift, and nothing holds still for long.
RŌHKI - A Million Trillion Pathways
by Hachi and IO
5:38
Merit
A broken swordsman, a grieving immortal and a cosmic being entwine across timelines to stop an empire built on blood and memory. To save the only family he has left, Hachi must survive his past — and master the demon within.
6000 Lies
by Simon Rieth
5:06
Merit
It is the story of a detail that is missing, or that never existed. The image of a child we are looking for and trying to recreate. Thousands of lies to find the truth.
Editorial
by Riccardo Fusetti
3:28
Merit
A bold and unexpected piece about femininity — contrasting the fun and playful with the surreal and horrific, the authentic with the fictitious — blending these elements into a wild, fever-dream rollercoaster.
Emergence
by Maddie Hong
3:35
Merit
After seventeen years underground, we emerge. Emergence invites us into the final moments of one small creature's life. Through its eyes, we experience the anticipation, the fear and the joy of becoming — and what it means to live for one moment of light.
