Stephen McDannell Hillenburg who was born in August 21, 1961, is an American animator, writer, producer, actor, voice actor, and director. Now, he is known as the creator of animated Spongebob Squarepants. He also have his own company, called United Plankon Company. He graduated from Savanna High School in Anaheim, California. Then, he enrolled in Humboldt State University and graduated in 1984 with a degree in natural-resource planning and interpretation. He was a marine biology teacher at Orange County Ocean Institute from 1984–1987. In 1987 Hillenburg decided to worked as animator. He made several short films and two of which were awarded and played in animation film festivals international. In 1992, he earned a Master of Fine Arts from the California Institute of the Arts.
Joe Murray, creator of Rocko's modern Life, met Hillenburg at an animation festival and asked Hillenburg if he would be a director on the show, Hillenburg agreed. Hillenburg joined the Nickelodeon animated series as a writer, producer and storyboard artist. While working on Rocko's Modern Life, Hillenburg became friends with Tom Kenny who would later become the voice of SpongeBob, and future SpongeBob collaborators Doug Lawrence, Martin Olson, Paul Tibbit and others.
In 1998, Hillenburg pitched the show to Nickelodeon, using an aquarium, character models, a theme song and the storyboard that would become the pilot episode, Help Wanted. The main character's name was originally SpongeBoy, but since the name was copyrighted, he changed it to SpongeBob. Nickelodeon executives bought the pitch and the series premiered on May 1, 1999, and the following episodes started on July 17, 1999.
The Spongebob Squarepants Movie was released in the U.S. on November 19, 2004. The film was intended to be the series finale. In 2005, it was announced that SpongeBob would be continuing with a fourth season in May. Stephen Hillenburg was rumoured to have left the series; however, he did not actually leave the show but still serves as an executive producer for the show.
