For someone so young, Leah Cooper has a great, quirky sense of humour.

You can see it in her eyes, just bubbling under the surface as she talks to you.

Take a look at her film-making skills, though, and her surreal take on life really comes to the fore.

It is no surprise when she reveals that her hero is the notoriously dark and quirky film director Tim Burton.

“He is just awesome,” said 12-year-old Leah.

Maybe Burton had better watch out, with the likes of Leah just waiting in the wings to become the next big short film director.

Leah, of Trafalgar Road, Colchester, has just beaten hundreds of other youngsters from across the UK to make the final four of this year’s CBBC Me and My Movie award, in association with Bafta.

At the end of this month she will go to the Electronic Arts Bafta Children’s Awards in London where her short film will be screened and she will find out if she has won.

It is one thing making films to go on internet site You Tube, but quite another having your work screened in front of such a large audience in one room.

The reality of what was going to happen suddenly dawned on her. “Oh, God,” she said, putting her hands up to her face. “I’m nervous and excited. I’m freaking out.”

Considering she left her competition entry until the last minute, literally, it is lucky Leah’s film got considered at all.

She arrived home from school and realised she had just two hours to write, film, edit and upload her entry to make the deadline.

She disappeared upstairs and the result was The Prank, a surreal short film about a cheeky wooden mannequin who decides to play a prank on the Queen, who just happens to be a one-eyed crystal bauble.

It is visibly striking in its simplicity and pays homage to Leah’s love of all things surreal.

“I had to rush it and I could have made it better, but it doesn’t really matter now,” she said. “It was really fun when I finished it and I had a real feeling of accomplishment as I was really happy to do it in time.”

For her proud parents James and Katherine, Leah’s success is no surprise.

“She has always been a very artistic girl,” said Mr Cooper. Her mother added: “She is naturally talented and it has always shone through since she was a toddler.”

Leah’s film-making is just a natural progression from being good at drawing, to doing artwork on the computer, to stop-frame animation and now movies. Leah has outgrown her first basic film software, preferring now to use semi-professional editing software.

Her film-making began when she got a webcam about three years ago. Whereas other children her age simply use webcam to see their friends on chatrooms like MSN, Leah, a pupil at Philip Morant School, Colchester, had other ideas.

The result was a short animation film called Mr Wormy.

“Oh, he suffered a series of misfortunes,” smiled Mr Cooper, looking over at Leah. “and met a tragic, horrible end”.

Leah explained that in her first animated short film, Mr Wormy kept getting “squished” in different ways, the last being “squashed by hand gel”.

Leah giggles again, and you know her sense of fun is at work again.

“She has always had a wickedly, dry sense of humour and a bit dark sometimes,” added Mr Cooper.

Watch some of her clips on You Tube and you can see what he means.

Take her Blankets series, for example. It is rubbish, said Leah, and is meant to be rubbish. It is her parody of TV show Friends and nothing really happens.

It is bad, nothing really does happen, but it can’t but help make the viewer smile at its quirkiness.

Then there is Leah’s horror film trailer featuring a toy bunny. Very funny.

Her parents find it amazing what her imagination dreams up.

For Leah, it is much more simple than that.

“I just like random stuff,” she said.

Fingers crossed, let’s hope the Bafta judges will, too.

TWO MINUTES THAT COULD CHANGE LEAH'S LIFE

Leah Cooper is one of four young film-makers who have been nominated in this year’s CBBC Me and My Movie award, in association with Bafta.

The award inspires and enables children across the UK to make their own films and tell their own stories as part of a BBC Learning film-making initiative.

The initiative was featured on Blue Peter throughout the year, with each presenter creating their own short film to demonstrate the production process.

Children aged between six and 14 years submitted more than 500 original two-minute short films.

All four nominees will attend the annual EA Bafta Children’s Awards on November 30 at the London Hilton, Park Lane, where their films will be screened to a star-studded audience.

The winner will be announced on the night.