Lyons' films — which he not only directs, shoots, and edits himself, but also supplies complex animation and visual effects work — have been screened at the Cannes, Onedotzero, and Raindance film festivals, and received nominations from Lux and the London Short Film Festival. In 2010, he was commissioned by UK festival Latitude to remix Ridley Scott's Blade Runner; his live re-imaginings of Scott's classic, presented at venues like Berghain, find him splicing his own footage into scenes from the film and replacing the soundtrack with his own score. He also performed "Crossing Borders" live for the 2012 Berlin edition of the TED conference.

A longtime collaborator with Alec Empire, Zan Lyons played in Empire's band The Hellish Vortex and has created videos for Empire's German digital hardcore group Atari Teenage Riot, in addition to more recent work with Empire on Low on Ice.

Lyons is currently at work on a long-form audio-visual album, for which each new, original track will be paired with a specially designed short film.