A graduate of Wesleyan University, Bay spent his twenties working on advertisements and music videos. His first projects after film school were in the music video business. He created music videos for Tina Turner, Meat Loaf, 'Richie, Lionel' , Wilson Phillips, Donny Osmond and the DiVinyls. His work has won him recognition and a number of MTV award nominations. He also filmed advertisements for Nike, Reebok, Coca Cola, Budweiser and Miller Lite. He won the Grand Prix Clio for Commercial of the Year for his Got Milk/Aaron Burr commercial. At Cannes, he has won the Gold Lion for The Best Beer campaign for Miller Lite, as well as the Silver for Got Milk. In 1995, Bay was honored by the Directors Guild of America as Commercial Director of the Year. In 1995, he also entered into feature films when his first movie Bad Boys, starring Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, grossed more than $160 million worldwide. His follow-up film, The Rock, starring Sean Connery and Nicolas Cage, was also hugely successful making Bay the director du jour.
Pearl Harbor (2001): $25,000,000 (Director's Gross Earnings)
Bad Boys (1995): $100,000 (directing fee)

Dated Playboy centerfold Jaime Bergman (45th Anniversary Playmate). Educated at Pasadena's Art Center College of Design, CA. Owns mastiff hounds named Mason and Grace, after characters in The Rock and Armageddon. "Movieline" revealed in 2001 that Bay's father was John Frankenheimer. Frankenheimer, who always denied paternity, took a DNA test in the 1980s which was negative. Bay still maintains Frankenheimer was his father, and has countered that DNA work was less sophisticated at the time. Shot over 1 million feet of film for Pearl Harbor. Used only about 20,000 feet for the final, 9-reel cut. Was rejected by USC's film school. In Bad Boys, Bay paid $25,000 (one quarter of his fee) for the climax explosion scene. The initial shot was made impossible by a rainstorm, and the production company refused to pay for another try. Member of Propaganda Films. Actors have often noted that he places more importance on the visuals than on his characters and actors. He is also known to do very few takes of intimate character-driven scenes, as he prefers to spend more time on action sequences and visually-interesting moments. Directed the music video for Richard Marx' hit "Angelina" in 1989. All his films up to and including Armageddon made him the youngest director to reach the billion dollar mark world wide. Since the age of 26, Bay has won every major commercial directing award, including the Gold and Silver Lions at Cannes. He won the Grand Prix Clio for Commercial of the Year for his "Got Milk/Aaron Burr" commercial, which also won him the Museum of Modern Art Award for Best Campaign of the Year. Has worked with producer Jerry Bruckheimer on all of his films, except The Island. Filmed the movie Armageddon with an eye towards Middle America. Has a love for Americana. Is known for his high grossing action-packed movies. All of his movies after Bad Boys_ have grossed more than $100 million, except The Island, which flopped. Studied under film historian Jeanine Basinger at Wesleyan University; Basinger later provided audio commentary, along with Bay, for the Pearl Harbor DVD. As a teenager, he worked at ILM in the storyboard department for films like Raiders of the Lost Ark. He is a very close friend of writer/director George Lucas from whom he often seeks advice. He is a very good friend to Don Michael Paul and even lent him some aerial shots from The Rock to Paul's movie Half Past Dead. Ranked #47 on Premiere's 2005 Power 50 List. Had ranked #54 in 2004. He shot the dynamic shots of the thrown dice in the gambling scenes for _Adrian Lyne_ 's Indecent Proposal. He later "repossessed" the shots for a montage in Armageddon. President of The Institute for the Development of Enhanced Perceptual Awareness, a commercial and music video production company. The Rock is his favorite of the films he has directed. Sean Connery is his favorite actor that he's ever worked with. Two films, Armageddon and The Rock, are in the Criterion Collection. Uses a Mark V director's viewfinder while shooting a film. The viewfinder is often prominently featured in photographs of him, hung around his neck. It is engraved with his name and the names of every film he has directed.