Giancarlo Volpe was born on July 7, 1974, graduating from the School of Visual Arts in 1997. After graduating Volpe worked as an animator for Humongus Entertainments various video games such as Pajama Sam 2: Thunder and Lightning Aren't so Frightening and Putt-Putt Enters the Race. Volpe later moved to Film Roman, working as a character layout artist and assistant director for the Mike Judge animated comedy series, King of the Hill.

Volpe came to promence for directing 19 episodes of Avatar: The Last Airbender, including "The Drill" for which he won an Annie Award. The next project Volpe worked on was directing Star Wars: The Clone Wars. This CGI animated series was followed up by Green Lantern: The Animated Series, airing on Cartoon Network for 1 season and 26 episodes