Roger Lee Keynote Speaker

Roger Lee is an award-winning Lighting and Compositing Artist and Director of Cinematography at Walt Disney Animation Studios.

Lighting in animation plays an important, though often overlooked, role as they accentuate and highlight movements. Having perfected this craft over the last 20 years, Roger enjoys using innovative and stylized lighting techniques to draw audiences into what is happening on the big screen. 

Prior to Walt Disney Animation Studios, Roger worked for Lucasfilm where he worked on projects such as ‘Star Wars: The Clone Wars’ TV series and at Walt Disney Television, Singapore. Currently at Walt Disney Animation Studios, Roger has worked on films like ‘Encanto’, ‘Raya and the Last Dragon’, ‘Frozen’, ‘Moana’, ‘Zootopia’, ‘Big Hero 6’, and ‘Wreck-It Ralph’ to name a few. 

Lee has been credited for his work on multiple award-winning animated films which have won five Oscars, three Golden Globes and four Annie awards for “Best Animated Feature”. He has also worked on Daytime Emmy-winning animated television series and commercials that have won PromaxBDA awards. 

Passionate about design innovation, Roger enjoys creating unique looks and lighting styles for different genres of animated shorts and feature films. In the animated film ‘Jing Hua’, directed by Jerry Huynh, Roger experimented with the Eastern watercolour style to create a unique and realistic “Chinese Ink Painting” look. This style was entirely different from “Far from the Tree” where Roger was Director of Cinematography and used mostly Western watercolour techniques.  

Born in Singapore, Roger did not have many avenues to study animation and work opportunities were scant but that did not stop him from pursuing his passion. Despite the many challenges he faced getting his career to kick off, Roger Lee never gave up on his dream and eventually secured a job at Walt Disney Animation Studios with an opportunity to work on ‘Wreck-It Ralph’ in 2012. 

Lee hopes to one day advocate for Singapore’s film and animation industry and be a source of encouragement for local talents. He is currently based in Los Angeles, California, with his wife and three kids.