Yutaka Yamamoto

Yamamoto Yutaka was born 01 September 1974 in Osaka, Japan. After graduating from the Department of Literature at Kyoto University he began working for Kyoto Animation. During his time at Kyoto University he belonged to the local animation club and was responsible for producing the independent Tokusatsu film Onnen-sentai Ressentiment in 1997, a homage to Anno's Aikoku Sentai Dai Nippon and partly an allegory on the ideas presented in Neon Genesis Evangelion. When at Kyoto Animation, he was working at Animation Do, the Osaka branch of the studio. His first work was on the interactive story video game Dancing Blade and its sequel Dancing Blade 2 Tears of Eden. Generator Gawl and Power Stone were the first anime series he worked on. He gained wide recognition with the visual "dancing" openings for Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu and Lucky Star. Lucky Star was also his debut as director, however, after only four episodes he was replaced as director because "he was not ready yet". Following his leave in June 23, 2007 he became a freelancer and shortly after established an own animation studio, Ordet, together with several former co-workers from Kyoto Animation/Animation Do, including Matsuo Yuusuke and Kadowaki Satoshi. The studio being relatively small currently works closely with Hal Film Maker and A-1 Pictures, and have been producing episodes for Sketchbook, Persona, Kemeko DX and Kannagi. Moreover Yamamoto became the director for Kannagi, marking his first full series as a director. //AniDB