Problem solver
I start with questions. What’s actually getting in the way? What can be simpler? I work through the details, test ideas, and keep going until the pieces make sense.
01 / A LITTLE ABOUT ME
I figure things out.
I bring ideas to life.
I keep exploring.
A FEW WORDS. A BIGGER PICTURE.
I’m Ivan Ilanić, originally from Rijeka, Croatia, and now based in Reykjavík, Iceland — a problem solver, creator, and adventurer. I’m drawn to questions I can’t answer straight away, ideas I can build into something real, and places that give me a new perspective.
Programming is one way I make sense of things. I like taking a problem apart, understanding what matters, and working toward a solution that feels clear and useful. Photography and film give that curiosity a visual language: a way to notice details, tell stories, and make something people can connect with.
Adventure is part of that same instinct to explore. Travel gets me out of familiar routines and gives me a reason to look more closely. Whether I’m working on a project, behind a camera, or somewhere new, I want to keep learning by doing.
See what I’m creatingCreator
I turn curiosity into something tangible: a piece of code, an image, a film, or a personal project. I care about how it works and how it feels.
Adventurer
I make room for unfamiliar places and unplanned moments. They give me fresh perspectives, stories to bring home, and reasons to create again.
02 / THROUGH MY EYESPHOTOGRAPHY & VISUAL STORIES
The world,
as I see it.
Small moments. Wide-open spaces.
A reason to look a little closer.
BEHIND THE FRAMEA LOOK INSIDE THE EDIT
First, I see a frame.
Then, the possibilities.
The little notes in my head
before I touch a slider.
LOADING THE FRAMEMy frame · The thoughts behind the edit01 / HOW I SEE IT
WHAT I’M THINKING
There’s detail hiding in the tires and under the vehicles. I want to bring it back without flattening the whole frame.
A soft mask and a little more light on the vehicles give the eye somewhere to land.
I’d pull the surroundings down slightly so they support the subjects, instead of competing for attention.
I’d raise the exposure through a soft gradient from the upper right, giving the light a direction without adding a visible flare.
There’s detail hiding in the tires and under the vehicles. I want to bring it back without flattening the whole frame.
Choose a step to explore the edit without animation.
03 / THE LONG WAY HOMELess ordinary.
The travel journal
AN OPEN INVITATION TO EXPLORELess ordinary.
More outside.
For unfamiliar places, new opportunities,
and a little room for the unexpected.
THE TRAVEL JOURNALOPEN PLANS. OPEN POSSIBILITIES.
Room for
the unexpected.
I love travelling with enough room in the plan for something unexpected. A new place, a conversation, or an opportunity I hadn’t considered can change the direction of a trip—and that’s part of what I enjoy.
Being outside my comfort zone isn’t always easy, but it makes me pay attention. I learn to be more adaptable, meet people with different perspectives, and say yes to experiences I might otherwise miss. I want to stay open to what a place can teach me, even when it isn’t what I expected.
I don’t need every turn mapped out.
New perspectivesOutside my comfort zoneOpen to opportunities
A place or a story to share?NO FIXED PLANS01 — 03
A little further up
The long way round
Into the unfamiliar
NO FIXED PLANS04 — 06
Better with company
Say yes to the detour
Outside the comfort zone
NO FIXED PLANS07 — 09
A quieter world
Look up, stay a while
Another kind of perspective
NO FIXED PLANS10 — 12
After the city lights up
Something around every corner
No hurry to get there
NO FIXED PLANS13 — 15
One more moment
New faces, new stories
A familiar little landmark
NO FIXED PLANS16 — 18
An unexpected hello
Sharing the view
Room for the unexpected
18 moments. No fixed plans. Choose a photo to see the whole frame.
A FEW PINS IN A BIG WORLDSTILL PLENTY LEFT TO SEE
Places that became
part of my story.
From Rijeka to Reykjavík,
with a few detours along the way.
DRAWING THE WORLD…
Drag to explore, or choose a place. Use the arrows to turn the globe.
Countries I’ve been toWhere I’m fromWhere I live
10countries
25places & regions
+ 1territory · Gibraltar
ON THE GLOBE
Reykjavík
Where I live now.
64.15° N · 21.94° WA personal travel map. Country outlines: Natural Earth. Regional markers are approximate.
04 / BENEATH THE SURFACESCUBA DIVING · A PERSONAL JOURNEY
Where I find
my quiet.
A calmer mind.
A different world.
Wanna hit another dimension, your should try scuba diving. I would even compare it to Ricks portal gun HAHA!!
As a kid I was surrounded by the sea, that led to unhealty oppsesion with breath diving, discovering the underwater world was an incredible never ending novel of fish, weird looking sea objects and grass. Then one day I saw a bunch of dudes in blacksuits and big tanks on their back. I asked my dad who are those pals. Its the divers son, the ultimative exploreres of the sea. From that day, I was hooked.
I have completed my Open water and Advanced Open Water diver license and how next big step is the DiveMaster.
THE JOURNEY SO FAR
- 01
Open Water Diver
Completed
- 02
Advanced Open Water Diver
Completed
- 03
Divemaster
Next goal · this summer
05 / CHASING WINTERSNOWBOARDING · A LONG-AWAITED LOVE
Some dreams.
Worth the wait.
A board. A mountain.
A reason to keep going.
Snowboarding was something I wanted to do long before I could afford to go. As a kid, it was out of reach financially. Getting to ride now means more to me because I know how long I waited for it.
I’ve fallen in love with the feeling of being on a board: finding a rhythm through turns, riding powder, and challenging myself on black runs. I like that there’s always something to work on, whether it’s riding switch, putting a trick together, or committing to a jump.
ON MY BOARD
Always building on it.
- 01Frontside 180s
- 02Backside 180s
- 03Butter 360s
- 04Riding switch
- 05Hitting jumps
FAVORITE TERRAIN
Powder / Black runs
THE NEXT CHAPTER · IN THE COMING YEARSFrom rider
From rider
to instructor.
In the coming years, I want to work toward becoming a snowboarding instructor. It’s a chance to keep progressing and, one day, help someone else find their confidence on the snow.
A DIRECTION I WANT TO GROW IN06 / A CURIOUS MINDPROGRAMMING · PEOPLE · CYBERSECURITY
Always asking
what if?
From writing the code
to questioning how it works.
01_why_i_build.md
A laptop. An idea. A way to make a difference.
What made me fall in love with programming was noticing a problem and realising I could do something about it. I could disappear into a question, take it apart, and build something that made someone’s day a little easier.
There’s something extraordinary about that freedom. With a simple laptop and freely available tools, you can start turning an idea into something useful. You don’t need a factory or a huge budget to create something that could change the world—or the lives of the people around you.
Start with a problem worth understanding.
02_the_human_side.md
The interface is part of the conversation.
I’ve always enjoyed the parts of UI design where programming meets human psychology. What do people notice first? What makes a decision feel obvious? How can an interface help someone feel confident instead of lost?
That’s where building becomes more than making something function. I like thinking about attention, feedback, and the small choices that make an experience feel natural. Understanding the person using a solution matters as much to me as understanding the code behind it.
Understand the person on the other side of the screen.
03_break_to_understand.md
Sometimes understanding starts with breaking things.
At Reykjavík University, I was a cybersecurity organiser. I enjoyed solving Capture the Flag challenges and experimenting with ways IoT devices could be broken in a learning environment. Asking how something could fail made me look much more closely at how it worked.
That curiosity also led to Defend the Flag, my thesis on defensive cybersecurity challenges. I’m interested in the whole loop: investigating a weakness, understanding its consequences, and finding a way to make the system more resilient.
Question assumptions. Understand the failure. Build a defence.
04_a_new_direction.md
The tools changed. So did my direction.
Honestly, the arrival of AI took much of the joy out of programming for me. Watching an LLM handle coding tasks faster than I could, while often following familiar conventions, changed my relationship with something I used to love. Writing the code itself stopped feeling like the part I wanted to pursue most.
But fast output still needs scrutiny. AI-generated code can introduce vulnerabilities, and convincing-looking solutions still need someone to question, test, and understand them. That draws me toward cybersecurity and creating useful solutions, more than a career centred on software engineering alone. I still want to solve problems. I’m finding a different place to put that energy.
Current direction → cybersecurity + meaningful solutions.
ObserveBuildQuestionImprove
07 / PROBLEMS INTO POSSIBILITIESPRODUCTS / LEARNING / SMALL BUSINESSES
Real problems.
Things I build.
A useful question.
A thoughtful way forward.
From finding a happy hour to learning cybersecurity or running a small business, I’m interested in the places where a clearer digital experience can make a difference.
01 / HAPPY-HOUR DISCOVERY / REYKJAVÍK
Beerluga
A better answer to “where next?”
The problem
Happy-hour times, prices, and locations are scattered across venues. Finding an offer that fits your plans can take more searching than it should.
My approach
I built Beerluga to bring that information together on an interactive map of Reykjavík. It helps people explore bars, compare drink prices, filter by time and price, and see which happy hours are active.
Take a closer look
Making the information useful in the moment.
The app distinguishes active, upcoming, and later offers, with logic for day-specific schedules and happy hours that cross midnight. Location support and bar details connect the map to the decision someone is trying to make: where to go next.
02 / DEFENSIVE CYBERSECURITY / BACHELOR’S THESIS
Defend the Flag
Making cyber defense hands-on.
The problem
Beginners often encounter cybersecurity through offensive challenges. I wanted to make defensive skills—finding weaknesses, prioritizing fixes, and securing systems—engaging and approachable through practical learning.
My approach
For my bachelor’s thesis at Reykjavík University in 2026, I designed and implemented narrative-led defensive challenges in local Ubuntu virtual machines. A cyberpunk terminal guide, progressive hints, and automated system checks help learners work through SQL injection and system-configuration problems.
Take a closer look
Designing a learning loop around defensive decisions.
A system-state checker tracks mitigations, while a narrative watcher delivers guidance and feedback. Defense in depth, prioritization, and immediate response shape the learning path. The thesis documents two challenge instances—SQL injection and Ubuntu administration—and a reusable template for designing more. Evaluating the challenges with learners from different backgrounds is a next step identified in the thesis. The accompanying React/Django project explores the separate team-based web model described in the paper.
03 / PRACTICAL DIGITALIZATION / KAZUNI NINA
Small businesses, more digital
Less friction in the everyday.
The problem
A small business needs to be easy to find, explain what it offers, and keep track of customer requests. Those everyday jobs can become harder when information lives in several places.
My approach
I help bring that work into clearer digital experiences. One example is Kazuni Nina, a storefront project for handmade kazuni, with a product catalogue, a multilingual interface, and pickup or delivery requests.
Take a closer look
Starting with how the business actually works.
The project gives the seller tools to manage listings and appointment availability while customers can make purchase requests without creating an account. English, Croatian, and German interfaces make the storefront more approachable. The focus is a manageable request workflow, rather than adding complexity for its own sake.
08 / THE NEXT CHAPTER STARTS WITH A CONVERSATION
Good things start
with a hello.
Have an idea, a project, or something we could create together? I’d love to hear about it. I’m always happy to jump in and collaborate.
EMAILilanicivan@gmail.com
INSTAGRAM@ivan_ilanic