My Favorite Animated Directors
by alexaceves1994 | created - 18 Jul 2016 | updated - 18 Jul 2016 | Public
1. Don Bluth
Director | Anastasia
Don Bluth was one of the chief animators at Disney to come to the mantle after the great one's death. He eventually became the animation director for such films as The Rescuers (1977) and Pete's Dragon (1977). Unfortunately, the quality of animation that Disney was producing at this point was not ...
2. Brad Bird
Writer | The Incredibles
Phillip Bradley "Brad" Bird is an American director, screenwriter, animator, producer and occasional voice actor, known for both animated and live-action films. Bird was born in Kalispell, Montana, the youngest of four children of Marjorie A. (née Cross) and Philip Cullen Bird. His father worked in...
3. John Musker
Writer | Hercules
John Musker is an American animated film director who collaborates with Ron Clements. They directed various Disney animated films including The Great Mouse Detective, The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Hercules, Treasure Planet, The Princess and the Frog and Moana. The Little Mermaid and Aladdin are ...
4. Ron Clements
Writer | Hercules
Ron Clements is an American animated film director who collaborates with John Musker. They directed various Disney animated films including The Great Mouse Detective, The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Hercules, Treasure Planet, The Princess and the Frog and Moana. The Little Mermaid and Aladdin are ...
5. Richard Williams
Animation_department | Who Framed Roger Rabbit
The son of commercial artists, Richard Williams studied at the Ontario College of Art and first worked in animation for Disney Studios in Burbank. His tenure there had a strong influence on his later work but proved somewhat stifling to his own creative flair. In 1955, aged 22, Williams moved to ...
6. Gary Trousdale
Director | The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Gary Trousdale was born in La Crescenta, California. His fascination with animation was fostered as a child, where he drew cartoons from an elementary school age. He planned to become an architect, but decided instead to study animation at CalArts, where he studied for three years. He was hired in ...
7. Kirk Wise
Director | Beauty and the Beast
Kirk Wise was born on August 24, 1963 in San Francisco, California, USA. He is a director, known for Beauty and the Beast (1991), Spirited Away (2001) and Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001).
8. Genndy Tartakovsky
Producer | Samurai Jack
Genndy Tartakovsky was born and raised in Moscow, USSR. He and his family moved to Chicago, IL when he was 7 years old, after his father defected to the US. His interest in comic books and animation led him to study animation at CalArts in Los Angeles. While he was there he produced two student ...
9. Seth MacFarlane
Writer | Family Guy
Seth Woodbury MacFarlane was born in the small New England town of Kent, Connecticut, where he lived with his mother, Ann Perry (Sager), an admissions office worker, his father, Ronald Milton MacFarlane, a prep school teacher, and his sister, Rachael MacFarlane, now a voice actress and singer. He ...
10. Craig McCracken
Writer | Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends
Craig McCracken has been interested in drawing and animation since the age of three. Some of his sources of inspiration are Japanese anime, Super Friends (1973), Pee-wee's Playhouse (1986) and Little Golden Books. After briefly considering a career as a comic book illustrator, McCracken studied ...
11. J.G. Quintel
Writer | Regular Show
James Garland Quintel, or simply JG, was born on September 14, 1982, in Hanford, CA, to Terri (nee Morris) and James Quintel. Growing up in a rather boring town, he and friends would have to entertain themselves to pass time, many of these experiences grew into influences for many episodes of ...
12. Byron Howard
Director | Zootopia
Byron Howard was born on December 26, 1968 in Misawa, Japan. He is a director and producer, known for Zootopia (2016), Encanto (2021) and Tangled (2010).
13. Nathan Greno
Actor | Tangled
Nathan Greno was born in Kenosha, Wisc., on the southwestern shores of Lake Michigan. As a child, he developed a love for drawing, which quickly evolved into a passion for visual storytelling. Influenced by comic books and newspaper comic strips, he started filling tablets of paper full of sketches...
14. Wolfgang Reitherman
Director | The AristoCats
Wolfgang Reitherman was a German-born American animator who was one of Disney's Nine Old Men.
He began working for Disney in 1933, along with future Disney legends Ward Kimball and Milt Kahl. The three worked together on a number of classic Disney shorts.
Reitherman directed several Disney animated ...
15. Hayao Miyazaki
Writer | Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi
Hayao Miyazaki is one of Japan's greatest animation directors. The entertaining plots, compelling characters, and breathtaking visuals in his films have earned him international renown from critics as well as public recognition within Japan.
Miyazaki started his career in 1963 as an animator at the ...
16. Katsuhiro Ôtomo
Writer | Akira
Katsuhiro Ôtomo is a Japanese manga artist, screenwriter and film director. He is best known as the creator of the manga Akira and its animated film adaptation.
In 1979, after writing multiple short-stories for the magazine Action, Otomo created his first science-fiction work, titled Fireball. ...
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