was a pioneering

animator An animator is an artist who creates multiple images, known as frames, which give an illusion of movement called animation when displayed in rapid sequence. Animators can work in a variety of fields including film, television, and video games ...

who helped develop the art of

anime is Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside of Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, in Japan and in Japane ...

in Japan. Studying the animation techniques of Sanae Yamamoto, Murata produced dozens of mostly educational films at the Yokohama Cinema studio featuring such characters as Momotarō and

Norakuro is a Japanese manga series created by Suihō Tagawa, originally published by Kodansha in '' Shōnen Kurabu'', and one of the first series' to be reprinted in tankōbon format. The titular protagonist, Norakuro, or Norakuro-'' kun'', i ...

. Along with

Noburō Ōfuji was a Japanese film director and animator. One of the most notable auteurs of anime (one of the industry's most prestigious awards, the Mainichi Film Awards' Ōfuji Noburō Award, is named after him), he worked primarily with cutout and silhoue ...

, he was renowned as a master of

cutout animation Cutout animation is a form of stop-motion animation using flat characters, props and backgrounds cut from materials such as paper, card, stiff fabric or photographs. The props would be cut out and used as puppets for stop motion. The world's e ...

.Official booklet, ''The Roots of Japanese Anime'', DVD, Zakka Films, 2009. Among his students were such animators as

Yoshitarō Kataoka Yoshitarō, Yoshitaro or Yoshitarou is a masculine Japanese given name. Possible writings Yoshitarō can be written using different combinations of kanji characters. Here are some examples: The characters used for "taro" (太郎) literally means ...

Selected filmography

*''

Dōbutsu Orinpikku taikai is a Japanese animation film from 1928. It was directed and animated by Yasuji Murata for Yokohama Cinema Shōkai. Plot At the Olympic Games of animals, the most diverse species of animals compete in the sporting disciplines. Monkeys do gy ...

'', 1928 nimal Olympics*''Tarō-san no kisha'', 1929 aro's Train*''Saru Masamune'', 1930 he Monkey Masamune*''Oira no yakyū'', 1930 *''Sora no Momotarō'', 1931 *''Norakuro gochō'', 1934

References

External links

* * 1896 births 1966 deaths Japanese film directors Japanese animators Silent film directors Articles containing video clips {{animator-stub