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(written from a Production point of view)

Joseph "Joe" Bruce Bauer (born 19 August 1961; age 62), occasionally also credited as "Joseph B. Bauer", is a visual effects (VFX) coordinator and supervisor. Starting his motion picture industry career in late 1993, he worked, teamed up as VFX coordinator with David Stipes, on three seasons of the Star Trek television franchise, which included the seventh season of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and the first and second seasons of Star Trek: Voyager. Bauer was given the opportunity to hone his skills by serving as a VFX supervisor on two episodes, The Next Generation's "Preemptive Strike" and Voyager's "Resolutions" (coincidentally also his last work for the franchise), without ever being permanently elevated into the position.

Along with the rest of the VFX team, Bauer won an Emmy Award for Star Trek: Voyager's pilot episode "Caretaker" in 1995. For that episode, Bauer made a noticeable contribution when he built the enlarged forward section of the Kazon Predator-class vessel, that was used for the climatic ramming scene in the last act. (Star Trek: Communicator issue 105, p. 59) Aside from this he has tactical operations officer Joe Bauer named after him.

Career outside Star Trek[]

Following his work on Star Trek, Bauer worked as VFX supervisor on projects such as Double Team (1997), Knock Off (1998), The Thirteenth Floor (1999), Frailty (2001), Final Destination 2 (2003), Blade: Trinity (2004), Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007), Outlander (2008), Get Smart (2008), Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore (2010), and the horror remake Fright Night (2011).

In 2011 he was the executive producer, writer, and director of the short drama Ambush on which he worked with Eden FX visual effects artist Fred Pienkos. From 2013 onwards, Bauer worked as VFX supervisor on the television series Game of Thrones (2011-2019), as of 2015 arguably the most successful production in television history ever by far (thereby becoming one of the very few former Star Trek production staffers to have become involved with this production, if not the only one), (co-)earning him five consecutive "Outstanding Special Visual Effects" Emmy Awards, addended with a sixth one in 2019 for the series' last season. [1] This last win actually put Bauer on equal footing with his former Star Trek mentor Dan Curry, the all-time most Emmy Award winning Star Trek staffer with seven wins.

Upon completion of Game of Throne, Bauer joined Jon Favreau's series The Mandalorian – the highly successful live-action series that arguably brought the Star Wars franchise back from the brink – as the senior VFX supervisor for its second season in 2020. The series' third season earned Bauer a coveted VES Award in 2021, complementing the five Bauer had previously won for Game of Thrones. Bauer had already become acquainted with Favreau when he served in a similar function on the latter's 2003 fantasyfilm Elf.

Star Trek credits[]

Awards for Star Trek[]

Emmy Award[]

As Visual Effects Coordinator, Joe Bauer has received the following Emmy Award in the category "Outstanding Individual Achievement in Special Visual Effects" for his work on Star Trek:

International Monitor Award[]

As Visual Effects Coordinator, Joe Bauer has received the following International Monitor Award in the category "Film Originated Television Series - Best Electronic Special Effects" for his work on Star Trek:

  • 1996 for VOY Season 2, shared with Dan Curry, David Stipes, Michael Backauskas, Edward L. Williams, Scott Rader, Don Greenberg and Adam Howard

External link[]

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