Biography

Emily Limyun Dean was born in the US and grew up in Bungendore, rural New South Wales, Australia. She began drawing at age 3 and making short documentaries, music videos, and animations at age 12. Her first film was a documentary for a high school science project.

During an internship at a Sydney-based advertising agency at age 15, Emily began working as a Runner on TVCs. When Emily's drawing skills gained the attention of the company's founder, Emily began story boarding professionally for commercials and infomercials throughout high school and the early years of university.

In 2005, Emily enrolled in the University of Sydney to study a Bachelor of Arts degree in English and History. During that time she took night classes at the Australian Film Television and Radio School (AFTRS) in Art Certificate training and worked on Australian low-budget independent live action short films and TV series. In addition, Emily worked as an extra on the Australian TV Soap Home and Away.

In 2009 Emily graduated from the University of Sydney with First Class Honours in Australian History and Distinction in English. In 2010, Emily wrote, directed and animated her first festival-released animated short film called, Forget Me Not, based on her family's experience with Alzheimer's Disease. Forget Me Not was nominated for an Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts (AACTA) Best Short Animation Award in 2012, and was included in the Australian National Film and Sound Archive's Permanent Collection, Young Australian Directors' Showcase.

Emily studied at California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) before training in the Story Department at Pixar Animation Studios. Following Pixar, Emily went to work as a Story Artist at Animal Logic and Warner Bros in Los Angeles on The Lego Batman Movie (2017), The Lego Movie Sequel (2019) and Scooby-Doo (2020).