Steve Martino

Animation director Steve Martino was interested in art and design when he began college, but it wasn't until he was introduced to the new field of computer graphics that he realized what was missing from his studies. The Dayton, Ohio native had earned his bachelor's from Ohio State University when he heard a speech by animation pioneer Chuck Csuri on the burgeoning industry of computer animation. The fascinating new technology offered a problem solving element to the world of art and design that Martino found exciting, and he decided to enroll the program Csuri ran at OSU. He emerged in 1989 with a master's degree from the program. Martino soon moved to Los Angeles to pursue a professional career in the realm of animation and visual effects. He was hired by 20th Century Fox's Blue Sky Studios in 2001, and earned his first major credit on a feature film as the art director for "Robots" (2005). In 2008, he made his directorial debut, co-directing "Horton Hears a Who!," which he followed up four years later, directing "Ice Age: Continental Drift" (2012). In 2015, Martino signed on as the director for a big screen adaptation of the popular comic strip "Peanuts" (2015).