Leo Baker

Leo Baker
Born	Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Occupation	Writer, Director

Leo Baker is a writer and film director. Leo was the sole animator of the 2011 Oscar Award winning short animation The Lost Thing. Between 2013 and 2016 Leo co-directed a feature documentary film The Will To Fly about the life and sport career of Olympic freestyle aerial skier Lydia Lassila.

Leo began working in the film industry in 1998 and worked as a Clapper loader on TV commercials and feature films. During the later period of working in the camera department, Leo became strongly drawn to modern visual effects(VFX) after working on a variety of VFX heavy productions. In 2003 Leo transition to work within VFX, specialising in the animation department.

In 2007, Leo worked for Passion Pictures Australia on the animated film adaptation of Shaun Tan's picture story book, ‘The Lost Thing’. Leo worked closely with director Shaun Tan and Producer Sophie Byrne and one other VFX artists Tom Bryant working remotely from Scotland. In 2010 Leo completed animating The Lost Thing and it won many international awards, including the 2011 Academy Award™ for Best Animated Short Film, the 2010 Annecy Cristal, and the 2010 Grand Prix for Best Short Film at the Melbourne International Film Festival.

In 2011, Leo was awarded a Fellowship by The Winston Churchill Memorial Trust of Australia, to travel internationally researching methods for sustainable production and creative culture in the animation industry. Leo travelled to Japan, Hong Kong, USA, Canada, UK, France and Germany to research this study.

In 2013 Leo commenced working on the feature documentary The Will To Fly with partner Katie Bender (co-director and producer). Together they spent 3 years crafting the film, one of Australia's first feature length sport documentaries, about the life and tumultuous sport career of freestyle aerial skiing Olympic Champion, Lydia Lassila.

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