Akiyuki Shinbo

is a Japanese animator, director, writer, and storyboard artist. Best known for his works with Shaft, he has attained international recognition with the studio for his unique visual style and storytelling methods.

Born in Koori, Fukushima Prefecture, Shinbo began his career in 1980s as an animator, and became known while at Studio One Pattern in the mid-to-late 1980s, which worked extensively as a subcontractor for Pierrot and Madhouse. In the early 1990s, Shinbo became a freelance creator and worked across multiple series at both studios as an episode director. He debuted as a series director with the J.C.Staff television series ''Metal Fighter Miku'' (1994), and over the next several years, Shinbo would develop his artistic directorial style and work with various industry creators as a freelance director and storyboard artist; his works from this time include ''The SoulTaker'' (2001), ''Le Portrait de Petit Cossette'' (2004), and ''Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha'' (2004).

In 2004, Shinbo was invited by newly appointed Shaft president Mitsutoshi Kubota to join the animation studio as a director. Since his debut with '' Tsukuyomi: Moon Phase'' (2004), he has mentored various directors and won numerous awards for his productions with the studio. His notable directorial works with Shaft include the ''Monogatari'' series (2009–2018), '' Puella Magi Madoka Magica'' (2011), and '' March Comes In like a Lion'' (2016–2018).

Early life

Shinbo was born on September 27, 1961, in Koori, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan, to Akio Shinbo. The town was small and didn't have many bookstores, and his parents didn't buy him much manga, so his only source for reading manga came from the ''Weekly Bokura Magazine'', which ran from 1969 to 1971. He was a fan of the publication's '' Tiger Mask'' prior to its move to ''Weekly Shōnen Magazine'', but noted that he was broadly influenced by the magazine in general. Go Nagai's manga at the time would use shifting red and blue-colored panels, which Shinbo stated is likely the reason that he uses similar colored frames. He found himself becoming attracted more towards anime, especially with the release of ''Space Battleship Yamato'' in October 1974 during his first year of junior high school and '' Galaxy Express 999'' a few years later.

After high school, he attended in Tokyo, which he said he moved to in-part to study anime, but also to simply move away from the countryside he grew up in. He wanted to become a manga artist for some time, but after moving to Tokyo said that there were much better artists than him. He said that one of his earliest friends from when he moved to Tokyo, Kazuki Takahashi, who was later the author and artist of ''Yu-Gi-Oh!'', exemplified what kind of a person would be a professional. During his studies, Shinbo couldn't watch much anime, but he was a fan of the works that involved Osamu Dezaki, Akio Sugino, and Yoshinori Kanada, so he asked his brother to record episodes for him to watch when he could.

During his second year, the students of the college would tour studios and join them for jobs, and Shinbo thought it might be interesting to direct 'strange' works, but to become a director at the time usually meant becoming a (sometimes called "production advancement"), which was a job he had no interest in, so he thought that becoming a director was impossible.

Career

Early career

After graduating from college, Shinbo entered the industry as an animator in the early 1980s with Bebow, the studio founded by Tomonori Kogawa, and shared a room with colleague Hirotoshi Sano. Afterwards, he joined Kaname Production for a brief period of time, but quickly left soon afterwards to join Masahito Yamashita's animation collective Studio Oz. He joined the group sometime during their rebranding to Studio Tome, and in 1984 they reorganized again into Studio One Pattern. For about three years, he and Shinsaku Kozuma shared a room as members of Studio One Pattern. Although not much is known about Shinbo's time as an animator, Kozuma has stated that he was good at drawing. In 1990, he debuted as an episode director on Pierrot's '' Musashi, the Samurai Lord'' television series after Studio One Pattern colleague (and mentor) Masahito Yamashita had heard that Pierrot was looking for directors on the series and had recommended Shinbo. Around that time, he began to work primarily with Pierrot, and two years later joined the studio's production team for ''Yu Yu Hakusho'' (1992–1994). Shinbo directed 19 episodes of the series and storyboarded 13 (some of which he did both for) under the series direction of Noriyuki Abe, who had served as an episode director on ''Musashi, the Samurai Lord''. In particular, Shinbo's involvement with the series is noted for his work on the Dark Tournament arc, which is sometimes regarded as the first appearance of his unique visual directorial style. Speaking of his motivations in producing the series, Shinbo spoke highly of animation director Atsushi Wakabayashi, whom he said was the driving force behind his work, and storyboard artist Motosuke Takahashi, whom Shinbo called a "mentor" figure who had taught him much about directing. Shinbo's involvement with ''Yu Yu Hakusho'' lessened over time.

During the middle of ''Yu Yu Hakusho''s production, he was hired to direct J.C.Staff's anime-original television series ''Metal Fighter Miku'', the studio's first ever televised work. Nippon Victor producer Hiroyuki Birukawa was tasked with finding a new director for the project due to the series' original director leaving the project; and after looking around for a bit, he watched the 74th episode of ''Yu Yu Hakusho'', which Shinbo had storyboarded and directed, and thought that the director of the episode was "amazing." Although he didn't know how to pronounce Shinbo's name correctly, and misread it as "Niibusa" when attempting to hire him as the director, Shinbo was eventually chosen to replace the first director. Shinbo had already been contacted about the work prior and was supposed to storyboard an episode; and since he hadn't directed a series before, decided that there weren't very many opportunities like it and took the offer. Birukawa was specifically interested in Shinbo's usage of colors and his ability to surprise the audience, though Shinbo noted that as a first time director it was difficult for him. As the previous director had left during pre-production, the series was in a state of semi-completion, with up to episode three's storyboards already completed; and with a new director on board, that meant that Shinbo needed to make corrections to the storyboards that already had corrections from the previous director. Since it wasn't his own work, and he was attempting to create a flow with his own tastes and style, it was difficult for him to bring out his own tastes. Shinbo noted that he had to find himself as a series director and understand how to not only include his own tastes in the work, but also put together that work in the first place. His motivation was lowered by the fact that he was making so many storyboard corrections, and he says that he thought he would've been fine with simply going through the process of directing all of the episodes himself. According to himself, he saw episode 11 of the series, and noted the work of director Naohito Takahashi and animation director Yuriko Chiba, and thought to himself that he couldn't "lose to this"; and so for the final episode, he directed and storyboarded it himself with the motivation of not being outdone by anyone, and Birukawa stated that he believed the episode was produced perfectly.

In 1995, Shinbo directed the sixth and final episode of Madhouse's '' Devil Hunter Yohko'', which he later cited as a major point in his development as a director. The episode received a mixed critical reception. From 1996 to 1999, he directed original video animations (OVAs) at several studios. The first of these OVAs, '' Starship Girl Yamamoto Yohko I'' (1996), spawned its own animated franchise consisting of a sequel OVA series in 1997 and a 26-episode television series in 1999, all of which received mixed to positive critical reception. Also in 1996 he directed '' Debutante Detective Corps'' at Daume, initiating his first of two projects with the company; as an initial project with Daume, however, the OVA was panned by reviewers. In 1997, he directed his first project with Tatsunoko Production: a reboot of the 1974 superhero series '' Hurricane Polymar'' titled ''New Hurricane Polymar''; Shinbo later noted the series as where he learned the composition techniques of "smacking" and "dabbing". He then returned to J.C.Staff to produce '' Galaxy Fräulein Yuna Returns'' (1996), a sequel series to the 1995 OVA directed by Yorifusa Yamaguchi, where Shinbo had served as storyboard artist.

Before Shinbo was asked to direct ''New Hurricane Polymar'', character designer Yasuomi Umetsu had done two previous projects at Tatsunoko with a separate director, but felt no love for them. Umetsu instead decided to ask J.C. Staff to help produced the series and lend a director that they were working with, leading to Shinbo's involvement on the project. Shinbo himself was a fan of Tatsunoko's older works, specifically the original ''Hurricane Polymar'', and the two were able to bond while working on the series relatively easily. Working on the project itself, Shinbo had the vision of giving it the atmosphere of something like ''Hellboy'' or other American comics, which Umetsu stated that he believed the team succeeded in creating.

Shinbo again worked with Madhouse on an OVA adaptation of Saki Okuse's ''Twilight of the Dark Master'' manga in 1997, and again with J.C.Staff and T-Up to produce a 3-episode OVA adaptation of Hitoshi Okuda's ''Detatoko Princess'' manga series. During production of ''Detatoko Princess'', he decided that he wanted to direct with a "simple and frivolous" philosophy and said he "hate making ordinary stuff." He worked for the final time with Pierrot in 1999 with the 4-episode original series ''Tenamonya Voyagers''.

Early 2000s

In 2001, Shinbo returned to Tatsunoko Production (aided by Tatsunoko VCR, Tatsunoko's digital subdivision) with the OVA series ''The SoulTaker''. Shinbo admitted that while working on the series, he focused more on making unique shot compositions and imagery than creating a story, and instead left all organization of the narrative to scriptwriter Mayori Sekijima, who had worked with Shinbo on three separate series prior to ''The SoulTaker''. The series also marked his second collaboration with character designer Akio Watanabe. ''The SoulTaker'' received both praise and criticism for his direction and the series' art design by reviewers; despite the criticisms, Mike Toole of ''ANN'' said that the series was important for being "the start of Akiyuki Shinbo's long transformation" as a director.

With ''The SoulTaker'' complete, Shinbo took a brief hiatus from the mainstream anime industry; in 2001, he directed a short music video spin-off of the '' Triangle Hearts'' series, which started his relationship with Seven Arcs. For the next 3 years, he mainly focused on producing adult hentai series under the pseudonym with AT-2 (the adult video brand of studio Arcturus, at the time a subsidiary of Seven Arcs). Shinbo's hentai OVAs during this time have also been lauded for their visual aesthetics, with one blogger referring to them as "unhinged and downright batshit crazy", and one series, ''Nurse Me!'', was particularly important for being the first time Shin Oonuma worked as an episode director under Shinbo, a relationship that continued through Shaft.

Along with the various hentai series produced by Arcturus, Shinbo was hired to direct the Seven Arcs series '' Triangle Heart: Sweet Songs Forever'' (2003), which Masaki Tsuzuki had created. The series served as a starting point for the creation of ''Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha'' the following year, which featured the return of Seven Arcs, Shinbo, and Masaki Tsuzuki. ''Nanoha'' received praise for its atmosphere, themes, and uniqueness from reviewers. Tim Jones from '' T.H.E.M. Anime Reviews'' noted that the series tended to focus more on physical fighting, rather than the usual magical girl trope of fighting with long-range magic attacks, despite having many of the genre's usual tropes. While Carl Kimlinger of Anime News Network criticized the series for having a more mature tone than its characters ages should have represented, online magazine ICv2, conversely, stated that the series had become immensely popular in the United States among "hardcore" fans due to the characters' adversaries containing more realistic social issues not found in other series of the same genre. Despite his criticisms of the series, Kimlinger praised the series' usage of multiple art-styles, which he found gave the series an "undeniably appealing" look. The success of the series spawned a franchise that consists of four television series and four theatrical films, albeit all other entries in the franchise did not involve Shinbo.

Around the same time, SME Visual Works producer Masaotoshi Fujimoto and Shinbo had concepted ''Le Portrait de Petit Cossette'' (2004), which once again incorporated Shinbo's direction with writer Mayori Sekijima, character designer Akio Watanabe, animation studio Daume, and art director Junichi Higashi (the latter of whom Shinbo had worked with on ''Tenamonya Voyagers''). The series also marked the first time Shinbo worked with composer Yuki Kajiura. Fujimoto discovered Shinbo while he was looking for "unusual" directors, and had found out about Shinbo while watching various series; ''Cossette'' was intended to be a project that "showcased Shinbo as an auteur", according to Fujimoto, and it was the first time Shinbo himself had directed and storyboarded every episode. ''Animestyle'' magazine editor-in-chief Yūichirō Oguro, in his interview with Shinbo, likened the series to ''The SoulTaker'', calling the atmosphere of the two series "exactly the same." Viewers praised the series' style, with admiration emphasized on the color design and "inventive imagery and camera tricks."

Shaft

Team Shinbo (2004–2010)

In 1995, then-Shaft company director and producer Mitsutoshi Kubota asked Shinbo to direct the studio's first original work ''Juuni Senshi Bakuretsu Eto Ranger'', but due to conflicts with his schedule was unable to. Although unable to participate in ''Eto Ranger'', Shaft was later gross outsourced to for an episode of Shinbo's ''The SoulTaker''; reminiscing on the series, Shinbo commented that he was impressed with their work on the episode. Later, after Shaft's founder, Hiroshi Wakao, retired as representative director of the company, Kubota succeeded him as president, and having seen Shinbo's work on ''Le Portrait de Petit Cossette'' and ''The SoulTaker'', became interested in working with Shinbo full-time. Kubota intended to transform Shaft into a studio with recognizable characteristics and visual flairs distinct from others in the industry, and Shinbo was a director he believed could work towards that goal.

Shinbo's first project as series director with Shaft was '' Tsukuyomi: Moon Phase'' (assisted by Toshimasa Suzuki), an adaptation of Keitarō Arima's manga. Shinbo believed he shouldn't add much of his signature style to the series due to the change in genre from his previous works ''The SoulTaker'' and ''Le Portrait de Petit Cossette'', and that he should instead focus on "making things properly", but was asked by the series' sponsors to add some of his aesthetics anyway. The series, which Shinbo said had the theme of " moe", was challenging for him due to the fact that he didn't understand "moe" at the time, so he took great care in receiving help from staff members more experienced with the aesthetics of moe. In creating the series itself, Kubota knew that Shinbo had worked several times with scriptwriter Mayori Sekijima, and so they asked him to write the series composition for the series as well; afterwards, Shinbo decided that the visual aspect of the series would need more solidification, so Nobuyuki Takeuchi (who worked with Shaft often) was asked to take on the role of "visual director." Most of the core directing staff for Shaft's projects for the next several years also worked on the project to some degree: the core Team Shinbo (Shin Oonuma and Tatsuya Oishi) and Ryouki Kamitsubo served as episode directors, among other roles; and Naoyuki Tatsuwa participated as a key animator. Oonuma was directly contacted by Shinbo to join him at Shaft due to the former's knowledge on utilizing digital technology; and since Oonuma seemed to be particularly fond of "gal games" and "moe" anime, his contributions with those aesthetics helped Shinbo in directing ''Tsukuyomi''. Oishi had previously worked with Shaft as an animator several times in the past, as well as with Shinbo as a key animator on an episode of ''Yu Yu Hakusho'', so his connections with both made sense for his working on Tsukuyomi; however, Shinbo asked Oishi to direct the sixth episode of ''Tsukuyomi'', which was a new experience for Oishi. Shinbo attributes ''Tsukuyomi'' as being the foundation for his experimentalism with Shaft, saying that without the work's out-of-the-ordinary approach, it would not have been possible to collaborate with other like-minded people; and it was because of that approach that they gained recognition, thus allowing for creators such as Oishi, Tatsuwa, and Oonuma to come together.

''Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha'' also served as the vessel for the eventual collaboration between Shinbo and animator Kazuhiro Oota. Oota, who was a fan of Shinbo's prior works (''Tenamonya Voyagers'', ''Starship Girl Yamamoto Yohko'', and ''The SoulTaker''), was given the opportunity to act as animation director for two the series' outsourced episodes (episode 4 and 7).. He later found out that Shinbo was directing ''Tsukuyomi'' at the same time as ''Nanoha'', and watched the first episode which he said was closer to Shinbo's usual colors than ''Nanoha''. He also found out that an acquaintance of his worked at Shaft, and got that person's phone number to join the ''Tsukuyomi'' team and Shaft. At that point, Shinbo was already aware of Oota having praised his work on ''Nanoha'' as being some of the best outsourced episodes he had been given while working on a TV anime, and was surprised that Oota had wanted to join Shaft to work on Tsukuyomi with him. For his work on ''Tsukuyomi'', Shinbo chose Oota to be the character designer of his next work at Shaft.

In 2005, Shinbo and Oonuma worked together as series co-directors for the first time with ''Pani Poni Dash!''. In animating ''Pani Poni Dash'', Shinbo wanted to expand on the visual cross-cutting (in which buildings are spliced on the camera as if it was a stage production) techniques Nobuyuki Takeuchi used in ''Tsukuyomi'', while also expanding on other experimentalist ideas from the series. He wanted to expand on the idea of staff members showcasing their own abilities and keeping a consistent direction, which he compared to '' Time Bokan'' (1975). Although eyecatches were not new to either Shaft or Shinbo, the idea of using them consistently arose when the planners from King Records asked the staff to include the character Behoimi in every episode, but because she did not show up often early on in the story, it was decided that they would instead put her in the eyecatches. Shinbo attributed part of ''Pani Poni Dash!''s success to King Records' producer on the project (Atsushi Moriyama) and the head of TV Tokyo on the project, who he said would fight for Shaft's ability to use certain references and parodies, thus giving the team a certain degree of freedom in using them.

Between 2006 and 2009, Shinbo directed several more television series and OVAs with various in-house and freelance directors. In 2006: '' Negima!?'' with Oonuma; in 2007: '' Hidamari Sketch'' with Ryouki Kamitsubo, '' Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei'' by himself (assisted by Naoyuki Tatsuwa), as well as serving as a supervisor on Oonuma's own series '' Ef: A Tale of Memories'' and its sequel ''Ef: A Tale of Melodies''; in 2008: '' (Zoku) Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei'' and its sequel ''(Zan) Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei'' with Yukihiro Miyamoto (again assisted by Tatsuwa), and ''Hidamari Sketch x 365'' by himself (assisted by "production director" Tatsuya Oishi); and in 2009: ''Maria Holic'' with Miyamoto; as well as ''Natsu no Arashi!'' with Oonuma, and its sequel ''Natsu no Arashi! Akinai-chū'' with Oonuma and Kenichi Ishikura. Between 2008 and 2010, the studio also produced a series of ''Negima! Magister Negi Magi'' OVAs with several guest directors working under Shinbo including Miyamoto, Tomoyuki Itamura, Hiroaki Tomita, Kōbun Shizuno, Tomokazu Tokoro, and Tatsufumi Itō, and a series of '' Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei'' OVAs directed by Shinbo and Miyamoto (assisted by Tatsuwa as well).

Although the two had never worked together before, manga author Jin Kobayashi attended Shinbo's drinking and book reading sessions, where they would read other works. Eventually, it was decided that Shaft, Shinbo, and Oonuma would make an adaptation of Kobayashi's ''Natsu no Arashi!'' work. Shinbo felt that one of the most particular aspects of the series was its portrayal of summer (thus, "natsu" in the title), so he asked Oonuma to come up with a way of emphasizing the summer heat. After he discussed with the art team, Oonuma decided that the shading and lit areas by the sun would have substantially different contrasts in order to bring out a feeling of harsh heat from the sunlight. Shinbo himself contributed to the look of the lighting itself, in which it often taking the form of linear, geometric shapes, a style Shinbo said was influenced from the work of art director Yuuji Ikeda on ''Marude Dameo'' (1991), a series which Shinbo worked on as an episode director. Although he had used such a style in previous works, ''Natsu no Arashi!'' was his first time implementing it across an entire series.

In producing ''Maria Holic'', Shinbo and the staff (such as chief unit director Yukihiro Miyamoto and assistant director Naoyuki Tatsuwa) made the conscious decision of directing the series using some of the tecniques headed by Dezaki, such as Dezaki's shots, which show the subject three times for dramatic effect. ''Maria Holic'', which was produced with much of the same staff as ''Zetsubou-sensei'', also utilized stylistic influences from Dezaki's works; in particular, Shinbo wanted to take from the aesthetics of shōjo manga like ''Aim for the Ace!'' and '' The Rose of Versailles''.

In April 2008, an anime adaptation of Nisio Isin's novel ''Bakemonogatari'' was announced. Shinbo was originally on the project as its only director, but requested that Tatsuya Oishi work with him as series director due Oishi's stylistic affinity for interesting colors and his ability to use cool lettering and Kanji in the animated medium, which Shinbo thought would be beneficial in adapting a novel. He believed that keeping the dialogue more-or-less the same, despite the amount of dialogue in the work, would be interesting as an anime; though, this philosophy in making the work proved to be somewhat problematic, as Shinbo thought of producing the series as a 12-episode work, and although there was enough content to add another episode in the ''Suruga Monkey'' arc, that would end up adding an extra episode (nevertheless, 3 extra episodes were produced months later serving as the finale to ''Bakemonogatari'' and, more specifically, the ''Tsubasa Cat'' arc). Akio Watanabe, with whom Shinbo had worked with on ''Starship Girl Yamamoto Yohko'' and ''Le Portrait de Petit Cossette'', was brought onto the project as character designer and chief animation director. ''Bakemonogatari'' received cult fame and was widely praised for its aesthetics upon its initial release, and is regarded by some critics as the series that pushed Shaft "into fame", with writers from Funimation describing it as a "hit." Whereas most of the studio's works prior to ''Bakemonogatatari'' have been described as being light-hearted comedies (such as the '' Hidamari Sketch'' franchise, ''Pani Poni Dash'', and '' Tsukuyomi: Moon Phase''), the series was described as being more "episodic" and darker in nature. Stylistically, ''Bakemonogatari'' was praised and is considered to be a "visually striking" production by various critics, and in 2017, the Tokyo Anime Award Festival selected ''Bakemonogatari'' as the best anime of 2009. The series was also an immediate financial success, as indicated by the 6th BD release breaking records for the number of copies sold on its first day.

''Madoka Magica'' era (2010–2013)

Around the time when ''Bakemonogatari'' was announced, Shinbo had expressed his desire to produce a magical girl series to Aniplex producer Atsuhiro Iwakami, which spawned the initial development of '' Puella Magi Madoka Magica''. During the early planning stage, Iwakami decided on an original project to give Shinbo more freedom with his direction, and to develop an anime that could appeal to a wider audience than the usual demographic that the magical girl genre was aimed towards; in other words, Shinbo and Iwakami intended for the series to be accessible to "the general anime fan." Gen Urobuchi and Ume Aoki were contacted to work on the project as the scriptwriter and original character designer, respectively, and the four – Shinbo, Urobuchi, Aoki, and Shaft– became collectively known as the "Magica Quartet." The team agreed that the work would have a copious amount of blood and a "heavy" storyline that was unique in comparison to other magical girl series. Yukihiro Miyamoto, who had been serving as a director with Shaft since 2008, primarily on the ''Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei'' series, was put on the project as series director alongside Shinbo, and animation troupe Gekidan Inu Curry, who had also been working on ''Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei'', were brought on to design the "Alternate Space" world.

Released in 2011 to critical acclaim, ''Madoka Magica'' has been cited by several critics as one of the greatest anime series of the 2010s, and one of the greatest anime series of all time. Shinbo won the best director awards at the 11th Tokyo Anime Award, and the 2011 Newtype Anime Award for his work on ''Madoka Magica''. In 2017, Shinbo was also chosen by Japanese critics as one of the greatest anime directors of all time for his work on ''Madoka Magica''. The series was also a financial success and broke the record for the number of BD volumes sold on the first day (a record previously held by Shinbo's ''Bakemonogatari'') with its 1st BD release, which the series broke again with the following release, and ultimately garnered over () from the sales of related goods by 2013.

Shinbo attributed his success with the series to the culmination of projects that he had been involved with up until that point, especially with Shaft. One series he noted in particular was the '' Ef'' series which –although not involved with as a director, but rather as a supervisor– he described as exemplifying that beautiful or cutely drawn characters can mix with a story of heavy themes.

While producing the ''Madoka Magica'' franchise, Shinbo and Shaft continued production on a number of other series concurrently. In 2010: '' Hidamari Sketch x Hoshimittsu'' with Ishikura, ''Dance in the Vampire Bund'' with Masahiro Sonoda, '' Arakawa Under the Bridge'' and its sequel ''Arakawa Under the Bridge x Bridge'' with Miyamoto, ''Katte ni Kaizō'' with Naoyuki Tatsuwa, and ''And Yet the Town Moves'' by himself (albeit assisted by Tatsuwa). In 2011, he co-directed ''Ground Control to Psychoelectric Girl'' with Miyamoto, the sequel to ''Maria Holic'', '' Maria Holic Alive'', with Tomokazu Tokoro, and he directed ''Hidamari Sketch x SP'' and '' Mahou Sensei Negima! Anime Finale'' by himself (the latter was assisted by Kenichi Ishikura). In 2012, he directed ''Hidamari Sketch x Honeycomb'' with Yuki Yase, and this year marked the continuation of the ''Monogatari'' series with ''Nisemonogatari'' and ''Nekomonogatari: Black'', with director Tomoyuki Itamura replacing Tatsuya Oishi as Shinbo's co-director. In 2013, Itamura returned for ''Monogatari Series Second Season'', with Yase and Tatsuwa being featured as series directors for the ''Kabukimonogatari'' and ''Onimonogatari'' arcs; Yase also co-directed the final OVA series in the ''Hidamari Sketch'' anime franchise, and Shinbo solo-directed (with assistance from Tatsuwa) ''Sasami-san@Ganbaranai'' as well.

Shinbo interpreted the source material for ''And Yet the Town Moves'' as being inspired by and written like an older manga series. For that reason, he wanted to direct the series as if it was an older series, using less-common techniques in the modern era of the time like people reflected in objects and fish-eye lenses.

In making ''Ground Control to Psychoelectric Girl'', Shinbo noted that both himself and the novel's original author, Hitoma Iruma, were male, so he thought the series would've been more interesting if it was instead composed (organized, referring to the ''series composition'' writer) from the perspective of a woman. Eventually, Yuniko Ayana was hired to be the series composition writer by request of Shinbo.

Mid-to-late 2010s (2014–2018)

In 2014, Shinbo directed ''Nisekoi'' with Tatsuwa, '' Mekakucity Actors'' with Yase, and the final arc to ''Monogatari Series Second Season'', ''Hanamonogatari'', with Itamura. Five months later, at the end of 2014, ''Tsukimonogatari'', the first arc in ''Monogatari Series Final Season'', was released. Throughout the next several years, Shinbo continued to direct series with Shaft's other directors, including ''Gourmet Girl Graffiti'' (2015) with Tatsuwa, ''Nisekoi:'' (2015) with Miyamoto, '' The Beheading Cycle: The Blue Savant and the Nonsense Bearer'' (2016–17) with Yase, '' March Comes In like a Lion'' (2016–18) with Kenjirou Okada, the film ''Fireworks'' (2017) with Nobuyuki Takeuchi, and '' Fate/Extra: Last Encore'' (2018) with Miyamoto.

Manga author Chika Umino was a fan of Shinbo's works with Shaft and stated that she did not want an adaptation of ''March Comes In like a Lion'' unless it was a Shaft-Shinbo production. Her editor from Hakusensha, Ryou Tomoda, asked about getting an adaptation from the director and studio, but was told it would be impossible. However, the son of shogi player Torahiko Tanaka, Makoto Tanaka, who worked at Tohokushinsha Film, was a fan of Umino's manga as well, and approached Tomoda in adapting the anime. From there, Tomoda met with Aniplex CEO Atsuhiro Iwakami about the prospects of a Shaft-Shinbo adaptation, and Iwakami met with Kubota and Shinbo about the possibility, which they agreed to. Umino had originally wanted the series to have a similar aesthetic to ''Bakemonogatari'', which she stated she was a big fan of, but Shinbo said that it wasn't a good idea; instead of the ''Bakemonogatari''-esque background art Umino had in mind, the series was made with a watercolor-style.

The second arc to ''Monogatari Series Final Season'', ''Owarimonogatari I'', was released in 2015, adapting the first two of three volumes of the original ''Owarimonogatari'' novel. Every year thereafter, new series in the franchise were produced, with ''Koyomimonogatari'' being released in 2016, and ''Owarimonogatari II'' being released in 2017, all of which were co-directed with Itamura. At the same time, however, Tatsuya Oishi had been busy working on the ''Kizumonogatari'' trilogy, which had started 4 to 6 years prior, and also involved Shinbo as chief director. The same year as ''Kizumonogatari III'' and ''Owarimonogatari II''s release, however, Itamura left the studio, and Oishi seemingly disappeared from the anime industry. Both director's absence as co-directors led to Shinbo directing ''Zoku Owarimonogatari'', the final novel in ''Final Season'', by himself. The series, initially released as a film in 2018, is the only arc in the ''Monogatari'' series directed solely by Shinbo, solely by one director, and the first time he had directed a project without assistants or co-directors since 2011 and 2004 (''Hidamari Sketch x SP'', and both ''Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha'' and ''Le Portrait de Petit Cossette''). In 2019, he stated that the ''Monogatari'' series was his life's work, and that he intended to continue adapting the series and Nisio Isin's other novels.

Hiatus and return (2019–present)

Shinbo and studio Shaft took a hiatus from major animation works in 2019. The only major product from the team that year was the televised release of ''Zoku Owarimonogatari''. The following year, they returned for the adaptation of the spin-off ''Madoka Magica'' series '' Magia Record: Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story''. Despite the return of Shaft, the series was not directed by Shinbo; instead, Doroinu (one of the two members of Gekidan Inu Curry), who was partially responsible for the original ''Madoka Magica''s alternate space design, served as chief director, and Shinbo served as animation supervisor. Shaft directors Yukihiro Miyamoto (who directed the original series and film trilogy with Shinbo), Kenjirou Okada, and Midori Yoshizawa all served as directors under Doroinu.

Shaft's next work, '' Assault Lily Bouquet'', however, did not feature any involvement from Shinbo whatsoever, the first time since 2007 ('' Kino's Journey: Country of Illness -For You-'') that he was not involved with one of the studio's large projects. In 2021, he returned to the director's chair with an adaptation of Nisio Isin's ''Pretty Boy Detective Club'', which he co-directed with Hajime Ootani. In April of the same year, it was announced that '' Puella Magi Madoka Magica: Rebellion'' (2013), the final film in the ''Madoka Magica'' trilogy remake, would receive a sequel with Shinbo returning as chief director, and the second and third seasons to ''Magia Record'' was announced to be airing in July, again with Doroinu chief directing and Shinbo acting as animation supervisor.

Works

Style

Shinbo listed Hiroshi Motomiya, Ikki Kajiwara, Go Nagai, and Shotaro Ishinomori among the manga authors that he liked, and stated that their works, such as Kajiwara's ''Tomorrow's Joe'', were big influences on him. Their usage of brightly colored backgrounds and compositions influenced the way he in which he, prior to directing, thought he could make a work visually interesting; the overarching narrative of ''The SoulTaker'' protagonist Kyosuke Date looking for his sister was inspired by Motomiya's manga ''Ore no Sora''; and the set designs for '' Tsukuyomi: Moon Phase'' were inspired by the television series ''Kitaro Tareuchi Family'' and ''It's Time''. Mystery elements found in ''The SoulTaker'' and ''Le Portrait de Petit Cossette'' were also broadly influenced by the written works of Edogawa Ranpo, whom Shinbo had started reading from while in elementary school. Shinbo attributed Nagai's usage of color in some of his older manga, such as ostentatious red-and-blue paneling, as influencing his own colored panelling later on.

One of Shinbo's earliest influences from the anime industry itself was director Osamu Dezaki whom he, and fellow director Kunihiko Ikuhara, have been described as being direct descendants of Dezaki's particular affinity for exaggerated and grandiose compositional staging. This ties in with Shinbo's emphasis on visual representation, style, and "good pictures" in his works, rather than a focus on traditional storytelling or strong narratives, to which he has said that he "hates making ordinary stuff." As a director, he's stated that his style is not entirely the product of his own innovation, but rather a mix of his own experimentations, as well as techniques and ideas from those he has worked with throughout his career, for example: on ''Yu Yu Hakusho'', Shinbo worked with Motosuke Takahashi (who was a storyboard artist on the series) and attributes Takahashi as being a "mentor" to his development as a director; the realistic qualities in his characters have been attributed to influence by Yoshimitsu Ōhashi, whom Shinbo worked with during production of the sixth episode of Devil Hunter Yohko; and, later on in his career, Shinbo's employment of "dabbing" and "smacking", visual techniques that place an object in front of the subject for composition, which became a recognizable part of his style, was a technique he learned from Mamoru Sasaki while working on '' New Hurricane Polymar''. Artistic motifs unique to Shinbo include chess-like designed columns and colored backgrounds but uncolored or desaturated foreground characters; also unique to Shinbo is the use of stained glass, which he uses for effect in both serious, psychological sequences, as well as more comedy-orientated scenes.

Many of the techniques Shinbo began employing at Shaft weren't just his own, however, as much of his own style comes from animators, producers, and other directors. Shinbo's own style is largely the basis for Shaft's signature style, but Shinbo's style itself is not the sole foundation for the studio's productions, as it's more of a "collaboration between Shaft and SIMBO 'sic''.html" ;"title="sic.html" ;"title="'sic">'sic''">sic.html" ;"title="'sic">'sic''. This style has been described as including pictures taken from real life cut into scenes, art shifts, beat panels (despite working in the animation medium), kabuki sound effects, textures that remain stationary when the textured object moves, showing symbols or defining parts of a character (ahoge, hair decorations, foreheads, or other symbols) in place of character shots during dialogue, written text in place, precise use of fan service, and head-turning cinematography (head-tilting). Shinbo stated that he felt it to be unnecessary to add "mob" characters (characters in the backgrounds that don't interact with the cast) and tends to avoid adding them at all in his series. However, he said that he sometimes went against this; for example, in ''Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei'', he included faceless background characters, and added Kanji text, floral patterns, and other stylizations that he attributed to colleague Tatsuya Oishi (which was inspired by Shinbo's "faceless" characters). Shinbo has also sometimes made the conscious decision of directing using tecniques headed by Dezaki, such as Dezaki's shots.

Much of Shinbo's early style was founded on abstract coloring, and Oonuma he noted in a 2007 interview between himself and Shinbo that the most influential aspect of Shinbo's style on him was the "power of color." However, Shinbo said he had stopped using such abstract colors in his works, part of which was due to his trust in Hitoshi Hibino, a veteran color designer at Shaft.

Shaft was very open to Shinbo's experimentation, to which he stated that they "put up with my requests wonderfully", which gave him and the staff newfound creative control and availability for artistic expression over their projects. Prior to working at Shaft, Shinbo already had a philosophy of "mix ngparticipating staffer’s feelings, not only mine", so the studio's work ethic matched well with his ideas, and has also stated that it's the opinions of the staff and the studio's atmosphere that contribute to the works he directs more than himself; though, Masahiro Mukai, who worked under Shinbo on ''Puella Magi Madoka Magica'' and ''Arakawa Under the Bridge'', noted that many of the decisions Shinbo made as a director were solely based on whether or not he thought certain ideas were cool, or whether or not he had grown tired of them.

Other artists Shinbo likes or has taken inspiration from include Yukinobu Hoshino (in particular his black-and-white pattern style), Hokusai, Tadanori Yokoo, Pablo Picasso, Egon Schiele, Gustav Klimt, and Andrew Wyeth.

Influence and legacy

Throughout his career, Shinbo has both mentored and influenced numerous creators throughout the industry both in and out of Shaft. In the 90s and early 2000s, he influenced the likes of Masashi Ishihama, Yasuhiro Takemoto of Kyoto Animation, and Shintarou Inokawa.

At Shaft, however, rather than influencing industry creators, Shinbo has directly mentored them. Toshimasa Suzuki, a former employee from Shaft who continues to freelance with the company as a director, referred to Shinbo as the catalyst for the studio's identity as a . Among the directors he has mentored and influenced at Shaft are: Toshimasa Suzuki, Keizō Kusakawa, Shin Oonuma, Tatsuya Oishi, Nobuyuki Takeuchi, Koutarou Tamura, Kenichi Ishikura, Takashi Kawabata, Ryouki Kamitsubo, Shinichi Omata, Masahiro Mukai, Yuki Yase, Naoyuki Tatsuwa, Tomoyuki Itamura, Yukihiro Miyamoto, Hajime Ootani, and Kenjirou Okada.

Notes

General notes

Works cited

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References

Further reading

* "Negima!?" (November 2006). ''Newtype USA''. p. 10.

External links

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Akiyuki Shinbo anime works in Media Arts Database

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shinbo, Akiyuki
Japanese animators
Japanese storyboard artists
1961 births
Anime directors
Living people
People from Fukushima Prefecture