Kyle Balda

Kyle Balda
Kyle Balda
	Balda in 2015.
Born	March 9, 1971 (age 53); Tucson, Arizona, U.S.
Alma mater	California Institute of the Arts
Occupations	Animator; film director;
Years active	1994–present
Employer(s)	Pixar Animation Studios (1996-2002); Illumination (2010—present)

Kyle Balda (born March 9, 1971) is an American animator and film director, best known for co-directing the Illumination films The Lorax (2012), with Chris Renaud; Minions (2015) and Despicable Me 3 (2017), with Pierre Coffin; and Minions: The Rise of Gru (2022), with Brad Ableson and Jonathan del Val. He previously worked as an animator for Industrial Light & Magic before moving to Pixar where he worked on three of their films.

Early life

Balda was born in Tucson, Arizona, to a Maltese mother.^[1] He studied at the California Institute of the Arts in the early 1990s and dropped out after two years for a job he was offered.^[1]^[2]^[3]

Career

During his time at CalArts, Balda was hired by LucasArts as an intern to create the animated opening credit sequence for the graphic adventure game Day of the Tentacle.^[4]

He started his career as an animator by working at Industrial Light & Magic, in films including The Mask as graphics animator, Jumanji as animation supervisor, and Mars Attacks! as character animator.^[2] He also worked at Weta Digital once in New Zealand, on the 1996 film The Frighteners, animating the character of the Grim Reaper for the film.^[2] Later Balda started working at Pixar; where he was credited as an additional animator in A Bug's Life, as directing animator in Toy Story 2, and as animator in Monsters, Inc..^[2] In 2010, he joined Illumination Entertainment in Paris, and worked in Despicable Me as the head of layout. Balda has also directed several short films and lectured at different animation schools.^[2]

In 2012, Balda made his directorial debut at Illumination as co-director of The Lorax, along with Chris Renaud.^[3]^[5] The film was released domestically on March 2, 2012, by Universal Pictures and grossed over $348 million with a budget of $70 million.^[6]

In 2015, Balda directed another Illumination animated film, Minions, this time alongside Pierre Coffin.^[5]^[7]^[8] The film was released domestically on July 10, 2015, by Universal and has grossed over $1.1 billion.^[9]

In 2017, Balda co-directed Despicable Me 3. In his role as co-director he pushed for the film to have a more vibrant color palette than its predecessors.^[10]

On June 7, 2024, it was announced Balda would make his live-action directorial debut with Three Bags Full: A Sheep Detective Movie, a film adaptation of Leonie Swann's book of the same name, set to be produced by Amazon MGM Studios.^[11]

Personal life

Balda currently resides in the Oregon coast.^[12]

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Notes
1994	The Mask	Graphics animator
1995	Jumanji	Animation supervisor
1996	Mars Attacks!	Character animator
1996	The Frighteners	Character animator
1998	A Bug's Life	Additional animator
1999	Toy Story 2	Directing animator
2001	Monsters, Inc.	Animator
2010	Despicable Me	Layout supervisor
2012	The Lorax	Co-director
2012	Forces of Nature	Director
2015	Minions
2015	Competition
2016	Weenie
2017	Despicable Me 3
2022	Minions: The Rise of Gru
2026	Three Bags Full: A Sheep Detective Movie