is a Japanese

voice actress Voice acting is the art of performing voice-overs to present a character or provide information to an audience. Performers are called voice actors/actresses, voice artists, dubbing artists, voice talent, voice-over artists, or voice-over talent ...

from

Iwate Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region of Honshu. It is the second-largest Japanese prefecture at , with a population of 1,210,534 (as of October 1, 2020). Iwate Prefecture borders Aomori Prefecture to the north, Akita Prefectur ...

. She is affiliated with

81 Produce is a voice talent management firm in Japan founded on 3 February 1981 (thus the year is the company's namesake). A hybrid CD-ROM featuring voice talent data for members of 81 Produce was released on 19 October 1997. The company is located in Sh ...

Career

When Okuno graduated from high school, she told her parents that she wanted to go to a voice-acting vocational school; however, her parents were against the idea, and she ended up enrolling in a four-year university affiliated to her high school. She went on to pass the 2nd Anison Vocal Audition of

Avex is a Japanese entertainment conglomerate led by founder Max Matsuura and headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. Founded in 1988, the company manages J-pop talents like Ayumi Hamasaki and internet sensation PikoTaro. It has also shifted into other busi ...

and

's Wake Up, Girls! AUDITION held in September 2012. Since 2013, she has been active as a sub-leader of voice-acting unit ''

Wake Up, Girls! ''Wake Up, Girls!'' is an anime series produced by Ordet and Tatsunoko Production and directed by Yutaka Yamamoto. A film titled opened in Japan on January 11, 2014, and a television series aired in Japan between January and March 2014. T ...

''. In January 2014, she made her voice-acting debut as Kaya Kikuma in the anime series ''

''. In 2015, she won the Special Award at the

9th Seiyu Awards The 9th Seiyu Awards ceremony was held on March 7, 2015 at the JOQR Media Plus Hall in Minato, Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. For ...

on ''Wake Up, Girls!''. In 2018, she voiced the character of Unzen Inori, who won second place at the Onsen Musume Yunohana Collection 1st General Elections (in the group-unaffiliated division), and had the opportunity to make her debut as a solo artist. She will be the voice provider for an upcoming Cevio AI/SynthesizerV voicebank, Hanakuma Chifuyu.

Personal life

Okuno was born in

Morioka is the capital city of Iwate Prefecture located in the Tōhoku region of northern Japan. On 1 February 2021, the city had an estimated population of 290,700 in 132,719 households, and a population density of . The total area of the city is . ...

, Iwate. She has an older brother. A fan of Sailor Moon since childhood, she would often channel

Kotono Mitsuishi is a Japanese voice actress, actress, singer, and narrator. She was affiliated with Arts Vision and Lasley Arrow, but is now freelance. Mitsuishi lived in Nagareyama, Chiba. She graduated from high school and entered the Katsuta Voice Actor's Ac ...

; she later watched

Neon Genesis Evangelion , also known simply as ''Evangelion'' or ''Eva'', is a Japanese mecha anime television series produced by Gainax and animated by Tatsunoko, directed by Hideaki Anno and broadcast on TV Tokyo from October 1995 to March 1996. ''Evangelion' ...

, becoming enchanted with Mitsuishi's performance as

Misato Katsuragi is a fictional character from the Gainax-created media franchise ''Neon Genesis Evangelion''. In the eponymous anime television series, Misato is head of the operations department of the special agency Nerv, and is in charge of directing and ...

, and developed a fervent desire to meet Mitsuishi in person one day. Okuno's favourite band is

Mr. Children , commonly referred to by their contracted nickname , are a Japanese pop rock band formed in 1989. Consisting of Kazutoshi Sakurai, Kenichi Tahara, Keisuke Nakagawa, and Hideya Suzuki, they made their major label debut in 1992. They are one of t ...

. She is a fan of the

Hanshin Tigers The Hanshin Tigers (Japanese: 阪神タイガース ''Hanshin Taigāsu'') are a Nippon Professional Baseball team playing in the Central League. The team is based in Nishinomiya, Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan, and is owned by Hanshin Electric Railway ...

and of the now-retired player

Norihiro Akahoshi is a retired Nippon Professional Baseball player from Kariya, Aichi, Japan. He played as an outfielder for the Hanshin Tigers. Akahoshi announced his retirement on December 9, 2009. During the 2009 season, he was first deactivated in early Jul ...

. She enjoys

arts and crafts A handicraft, sometimes more precisely expressed as artisanal handicraft or handmade, is any of a wide variety of types of work where useful and decorative objects are made completely by one’s hand or by using only simple, non-automated re ...

and playing with animals such as cats and dogs. Her special skills include playing the piano and speaking

Tōhoku dialect The , commonly called 東北弁 ''Tōhoku-ben'', is a group of the Japanese dialects spoken in the Tōhoku region, the northeastern region of Honshū. Toward the northern part of Honshū, the Tōhoku dialect can differ so dramatically from standa ...

Filmography

Television Animation

* ''

Dramatical Murder is a Japanese BL visual novel developed and published by Nitro+chiral. It was originally released on March 23, 2012 for Windows PCs as a first press edition, with a regular edition released on April 27, 2012. A sequel titled ''Dramatica ...

'' (2014), Female B (ep 5) * ''

Hanayamata is a Japanese manga series by Sō Hamayumiba. It was serialized in Houbunsha's ''seinen'' manga magazine ''Manga Time Kirara Forward'' from April 2011 to February 2018, with its chapters collected in ten ''tankōbon'' volumes. An anime tel ...

'' (2014), Yaya Sasame * ''

'' (2014), Kaya Kikuma * ''

When Supernatural Battles Became Commonplace aka InoBato is a Japanese light novel series written by Kōta Nozomi with illustrations by 029. SB Creative has published it in thirteen volumes from 2012 to 2018 under their GA Bunko imprint. A manga adaptation with art by Kōsuke Kurose w ...

'' (2014), Middle Schooler * ''

Dance with Devils is a Japanese anime television series. It began airing in October 2015 and has been licensed in North America by Funimation. A manga began serialization in ''GFantasy'' in September 2015. Plot Ritsuka Tachibana, a seemingly normal school ...

'' (2015), Schoolgirl A (eps 1-2, 5) * ''

Hacka Doll the Animation is a Japanese anime television series based on DeNA's news app ''Hacka Doll'' for iOS and Android devices. The anime is produced by Creators in Pack, with collaboration support by Trigger. The series of anime shorts aired on October 2, 2015 ...

'' (2015), Hacka Doll #2 * '' Saekano: How to Raise a Boring Girlfriend'' (2015), Azusa Satomi * ''

Shomin Sample , short for , is a Japanese light novel series by Takafumi Nanatsuki. The light novel has been published by Ichijinsha since December 2011. Eleven volumes have been published. A manga adaptation began serialization in Ichijinsha's ''Comic Re ...

'' (2015), Maid (eps 3, 9); Misaki Yamada (ep 5); Ojōsama * ''

Hundred 100 or one hundred (Roman numeral: C) is the natural number following 99 and preceding 101. In medieval contexts, it may be described as the short hundred or five score in order to differentiate the English and Germanic use of "hundred" to de ...

'' (2016), Karen Kisaragi * '' Schwarzesmarken'' (2016), Operator A *''

Death March to the Parallel World Rhapsody is a Japanese light novel series written by Hiro Ainana. It began serialization online in 2013 on the user-generated novel publishing website Shōsetsuka ni Narō until it was acquired by Fujimi Shobo. The first volume of the Light Nove ...

'' (2018), Tama *'' So I'm a Spider, So What?'' (2021), Filimøs/Kanami Okazaki *''

Girls' Frontline ''Girls Frontline'' () is a mobile strategy role-playing game for Android and iOS developed by China-based studio MICA Team, where players control echelons of android characters, known in-universe as T-Dolls, each carrying a distinctive ...

'' (2022), Scarecrow

Original Video Animation (OVA)

Original Net Animation (ONA)

* '' Wake Up, Girl ZOO!'' (2014), Kaya Kikuma

Theatrical Animation

* '' Wake Up, Girls! Seven Idols'' (2014), Kaya Kikuma * '' Wake Up, Girls! Seishun no Kage'' (2015), Kaya Kikuma * '' Wake Up, Girls! Beyond the Bottom'' (2015), Kaya Kikuma * '' New Initial D Legend 3: Dream'' (2016), Sayuki

Video games

* '' Wake Up, Girls! Stage no Tenshi'' (2013), Kaya Kikuma * '' Hacka Dokkan'' (2014), Hacka Doll #2 * '' Hanayamata Yosakoi Live!'' (2014), Yaya Sasame * ''

Granblue Fantasy (Japanese:グランブルーファンタジー, Hepburn: ''Guranburū Fantajī)'' is a Japanese social-network game and role-playing video game developed by Cygames for Android, iOS and web browsers, which first released in Japan in March 2014 ...

'' (2015), Bridgette * ''

Miracle Girls Festival is a crossover rhythm game developed by Sega for the PlayStation Vita. It was released in Japan on December 17, 2015. The game uses the same engine and gameplay as the '' Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA'' series of rhythm games, and features charac ...

'' (2015), Kaya Kikuma * ''Thousand Memories'' (2015), Hacka Doll #2 * ''Uchi no Hime-sama wa Ichiban Kawaii'' (2015), Komahime Chikorin Gambit * ''Yome Collection'' (2015), Hacka Doll #2 * ''Drift Girls'' (2016), Marei Hinohara * ''

'' (2016), Dreamer, Scarecrow * ''

Kirara Fantasia is a Japanese seinen manga magazine published by Houbunsha which mainly serializes four-panel manga. The magazine is sold on the ninth of each month and was first published as a special edition of ''Manga Time'', another Houbunsha magazine, on M ...

'' (2017), Sasame Yaya * ''

The King of Fighters All Star ''The King of Fighters All Star'' is a beat 'em up role-playing game developed by Netmarble Games and published by SNK. It was first released in Japan on July 26, 2018, for the iOS and Android. The game is a retelling of SNK's ''The King of Fight ...

'' (2020), Pretty Zero (Original), Pretty Zero (Clone) * ''ALTDEUS: Beyond Chronos'' (2020), Coco Coconoe

Dubbing

* ''

The Final Girls ''The Final Girls'' is a 2015 American comedy horror film directed by Todd Strauss-Schulson and written by M.A. Fortin and Joshua John Miller. The film stars Taissa Farmiga and Malin Åkerman, with supporting performances from Adam DeVine, Tho ...

'', Mimi (Lauren Gros)

References

External links

Official agency profile
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Okuno, Kaya 1991 births Living people Japanese video game actresses Japanese voice actresses 81 Produce voice actors 21st-century Japanese actresses Voice actresses from Iwate Prefecture