Jeff Chiba Stearns is an Emmy® nominated and Webby award winning animation and documentary filmmaker. Born in Kelowna, BC, of Japanese and European heritage, he graduated from the Emily Carr University of Art and Design with a degree in Film Animation in 2001. Soon after he founded Meditating Bunny Studio Inc., a Vancouver based boutique animation studio specializing in the creation of animated and documentary films aimed at both children and adults that combine different philosophical and social elements together to create humorous, entertaining, and inspiring stories. Jeff also specializes in old school animation techniques like classical animation, stop motion, and pixilation.

His short and feature length films, Kip and Kyle (2000), The horror of Kindergarten (2001), What Are You Anyways? (2005), Yellow Sticky Notes (2007), Ode to a Post-it Note (2010) and One Big Hapa Family (2012) have screened in hundreds of film festivals around the world, garnered 32 awards, and broadcast internationally.

In 2010, he was awarded the Emily Award from the Emily Carr University of Art and Design for outstanding achievements of an alumni. As well, he was awarded the Cultural Pioneer Award by Harvard University in 2011 for his continued exploration of multiethnic identity in his work. Jeff just finished a new short animated film, Yellow Sticky Notes | Canadian Anijam, and is currently directing his second feature length documentary entitled Mixed Match about the complexities multiethnic people face when trying to find bone marrow matches. On top of filmmaking, he is also a past college animation instructor who has written articles for national publications and lectured around the world on topics of multiracial identity, cultural awareness, filmmaking, short film distribution, and animation.

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