Early life

Davis began animating as a child using his parent's 8 mm camera to film action figures in stop motion. His interest in animation began when watched a stop motion film called Icharus at a film festival. He worked on the stop motion film The Bermuda Triangle in 1981 while still attending Southern Methodist University, where he graduated in 1984.

Career

K&H Productions

Soon after his graduation Davis joined the animation company K&H Productions, working with 2-D animator Keith Alcorn. Soon, Davis made the transition from claymation to 2-D animation with Alcorn's help. K&H did production work for commercials, public-access television cable TV animation, and film festivals. K&H Productions declared bankruptcy in early 1987; that same year DNA Productions was founded.

Jimmy Neutron

Davis came up with the idea for Jimmy Neutron (then named Johnny Quasar) sometime during the 1980s and wrote a script titled Runaway Rocketboy (later the name of the second pilot) which was later abandoned. While moving to a new house in the early 1990s he stumbled upon the script and re-worked it as a short film titled Johnny Quasar and presented it in SIGGRAPH where he met Steve Oedekerk and worked on a television series as well as the movie.

The Ant Bully

Main article: The Ant Bully (film)

In 2006, he directed the film The Ant Bully after being approached by Tom Hanks to direct the film. Production on the film made Davis resign from production of Jimmy Neutron in January 2003. He gave his position away as Executive in charge of production to Steve Oedekerk. He also directed the movie's Video Game.

Planet Sheen

Davis co-created Planet Sheen in 2010 with Keith Alcorn and Steve Oedekerk. It is a spin-off of his show The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius.

Proposed Neopets Film

Davis was set to direct an upcoming feature film based on Neopets with Warner Bros., together with producer Dylan Sellers and writer Rob Lieber. It was originally set to release on April 20, 2009, but was changed to 2011 and later changed to winter of 2012, before finally being cancelled with no other projects announced.

Nominations

In 2000 Davis was up for an Emmy along with 8 others in the category Outstanding Animated Program (For Programming More Than One Hour) for Olive, the Other Reindeer.

In 2002 Davis was nominated for an Oscar along with Steve Oedekerk in the category of Best Animated Feature for Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius, bust lost to DreamWorks Animation's Shrek.

Filmography

Year	Film	Job
1981	Bermuda Triangle	Director, Animator as John Davis
1984	Blood Sucker from Outer Space	Visual Effects (uncredited)
1989	Scaredy Cat!	Special Thanks as John A. D.
1990	Macon County War	Composer
1992	The Tale of Nippoless Nippleby	Actor (voice of Nippoless Nippleby)
1993	Basic Values: Sex, Shock & Censorship in the 1990s	Composer
1995	Johnny Quasar (Jimmy Neutron prototype)	Director, Writer, Animator
1997	Santa vs. The Snowman (TV)	Director, Producer, Writer, Animation Supervisor, Technical Director
1999	Olive, the Other Reindeer (TV)	Animation Director, Animation Executive Producer, as John Davis
2001	Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius	Director, Producer, Writer, Animation Director, Actor (voice of Octapuke Kid/Guard/Bennie)
2001	The Making of 'Jimmy Neutron'	Self
2002	Santa vs. the Snowman 3D	Director, Producer, Writer, Animation Supervisor
2002-2006	The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius (TV)	Creator
2004	The Jimmy Timmy Power Hour (TV film)	Creator: The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius, Producer
2004	Jimmy Neutron: Win, Lose and Kaboom (TV film)	Creator, Producer
2006	The Ant Bully	Director, Producer, Screen-Writer, Actor (voice of Ant #19)
2006	The Ant Bully (VG)	Director
2010-2013	Planet Sheen (TV)	Based on characters created by, as John Davis
2012 (cancelled)	The Lost Tomb: A Neopets Adventure	Director, Co-Producer
2014 (cancelled)	Ring-Co	Director, Producer, Writer
2016	Smart	Director

Astrophotography

Since about 2007, Davis has become a recognized astrophotographer, publishing high-resolution, generally wide-field images in astronomy magazines, and in NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day.

In 2009, Davis largely founded and continues to lead APSIG, the Astrophotography Special Interest Group, associated with the Texas Astronomical Society of Dallas.

[ Source: Wikipedia ]