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Date of Birth
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21-August-1961
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Place of Birth
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Lawton
(Comanche County, Oklahoma, Area code 580)
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Nationality
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United States of America
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Also know as
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Stephen McDannell Hillenburg, Stephen Hilleburg, Stephen Hillenberg, Steve Hillenburg, Stiven Hilenberg, Steven Hillenburg, Stephen Hilleburg, Stephen McDannell Hillenburg, Stephen Hillenberg, Steve Hillenburg, Steven Hillenburg, Hillenburg, Stephen, Stephen McDannell Hillenburg, Stephen McDannell "Steve" Hillenburg
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Profession
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Animator, Television Director, Television Producer, Screenwriter, Voice Actor, Marine biologist, Film director, Film Score Composer
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Stephen McDannell Hillenburg is an American marine biologist, animator, director, writer, producer, storyboard artist, and occasional voice-over artist, associated with several animated television series, best known for creating the Nickelodeon animated series SpongeBob SquarePants. Born in Lawton, Oklahoma, Hillenburg moved to Orange County, California when he was a year old. He was raised in Anaheim, California and attended the Humboldt State University, earning a bachelor's degree in marine resource planning and interpretation in 1984. He decided to apply at the California Institute of the Arts in 1992 to pursue an animation career.
Hillenburg worked for various jobs before landing on the career as a marine biology teacher. For three years in the mid-1980s, Hillenburg taught marine biology at the Ocean Institute in Dana Point. A few years after graduating from CalArts, Hillenburg met Joe Murray, the creator of Rocko's Modern Life, and was offered a job as a director of the series. He then joined the show as a writer, producer, and storyboard artist. He began developing SpongeBob SquarePants into a television series in 1996 upon the cancellation of Rocko's Modern Life, and turned to Tom Kenny, who had worked with him on that series, to voice the titular character. SpongeBob SquarePants premiered on May 1, 1999, which has since aired 188 episodes. Hillenburg directed the film adaptation of the series, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, for which he received an Annie Award for Directing in a Feature Production nomination in 2005. Once the film was completed, he resigned from the show as the showrunner and appointed staff writer Paul Tibbitt to take over the position. He is currently working on the sequel film as the executive producer and story writer. In 2009, Hillenburg stated that he is developing two other TV projects.
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