Jury

Leo Baumgartner from East Tyrol is a mountain guide, photographer, author and a location scout for mountain safety. His love for the mountains is due to his youth spent on Alpine pastures, which meant simplicity, nature and living with the most essential items. A 53 year-old, who has never been looking for records, but for challenges. Curious, even if it were not the best rocks. This resulted in some first ascents of the Dolomites 7, some ice water falls and some first ascents in Greenland, like in the Tien Shan. New things are always thrilling. In professional terms, the new things since 1997 were more and more screenplays dealing with mountain topics, subjects which normal people would not even think about. What in former times were guests and mountain guide apprentices, are nowadays film crews of 20 up to 350 persons. From advising on screen plays to the construction of jumps, stunts involving falls of humans or cars, he's required for everything. Leo has also been involved in films such as, “Seven Years in Tibet”, “King Arthur”, “Nanga Parbat”, “North Face”, “The Bear”, “The Dark Valley”, “The Grand Budapest Hotel“, as well as television and publicity. His private activities on the mountain are limited to sport climbing, which he exercises with friends, mainly on the new born climbing hot spot near Buzet. From a 5c to an 8c+, on a crème de la crème rock.

“The development of the digital camera technique is a huge gain for mountain films. I am already curious how much emotion they will bring and in which areas they will lead me”, says Leo Baumgartner.

Walter Aeschimann has studied History and German in a second chance education and has finished his post graduate studies of ecology sciences. He grew up on the farm of his parents, and he has worked as a service man for ski
bindings, assembly-line worker, alpine herdsman, and social worker in order to finance his studies, before working in journalism. Today he is living and working as a freelance publicist and historian in Zurich. He regularly writes for the Neue Zu?rcher Zeitung, and is as well texting and photographing for other media, and producing films. He teaches as a university lecturer on the Swiss School of Journalism MAZ in Luzern, and is working on his graduate thesis. He loves
interesting literature and excellent theatre, extended mountain and bicycle tours which can even cross several national borders.

Born 1956, lives in Graz. He holds the position of head of master degree program Communication, Media, Sound and Interaction Design at FH Joanneum. He is a sound and media artist, “tinkerer” of software and electronics. His main instruments are guitar, electronics and software. He holds a PhD in medicine and is visiting professor of sound design at Donau-University Krems, member of the board of directors of the Institute for Media Archeology, president of the Society for Dissemination and Distribution of New Music. He has been working in the field of new media since 1982. He has composed music for computer games, music for theatre, film, media and sound installations. He has presented his works at Ars Electronica, Wiener Festwochen, Steirischer Herbst, the Knitting Factory New York, Sonambiente Berlin, Transmediale Berlin, “See the Sound”, City of Women Festival Ljubljana, Fine senca fine – Venice, Trentino, Budapest, Graz, etc. He is the creator of various CDs under vnm.mur.at and elise.or.at. His hobbies are back country skiing, race cycling, climbing and mountaineering.

Jakub Brzosko is the Artistic Director of the „Spotkania z Filmem Górskim” Mountain Film Festival in Zakopane (Poland). As graduate of both the Cracow School of Arts and the Warsaw University School of Journalism he actively pursues his passions as a filmmaker and journalist. His two films „Halny“ and „Hanka“ were aired by Planete+ in Poland. He is also a mountain rescuer, mountain guide, climber and ski alpinist. He participated in in the biggest ski mountaineering competitions in the world, Pierra Menta in 2004 and Patrouille des Glaciers in 2010. He was also a member of the Polish National Ski Mountaineering Team between 2003 to 2004 and won the Polish Ski Mountaineering Cup in 2003. He enjoys spending his remaining free time sailing on the high seas.