Yasuo Ōtsuka

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Yasuo Ōtsuka (大塚康生, Ōtsuka Yasuo^?) is an animator who worked with Toei Animation and Studio Ghibli. Born 1931, Ōtsuka first got into drawing when he was a little kid and saw trains carrying off soldiers to the war. He got so enamoured of trains that he would keep drawing them with greater detail as he aged. This led to a later fascination with machinery that is pervasive throughout much of his anime work. When he was young, he strove to become a political cartoonist, but first worked as a bureaucrat until falling very ill. During his time in the hospital Ōtsuka went through a psychological transformation and after his release from the hospital encountered a newspaper ad that was looking for an animator for the then new Toei Animation. Ōtsuka took the offer and passed a test that Toei's head animator Yasuji Mori administered to all applicants.

He was one of the Toei animators involved in experimenting with frame-rate modulation in animation. This experimentation lead to what is commonly called the "money shot" style, where more important scenes are animated more fully than others. In addition he was a mentor to both Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata and worked with them on many of their early projects. He was offered several times to direct, but refused, possibly due to the difficulties he saw Isao Takahata encounter during the production of Hols: Prince of the Sun. Though his own description that he stated in a documentary about him is that he was in awe of Takahata's abilities as a director in Hols, so much an awe that he felt inadequate in comparison.

Ōtsuka is currently running a school for animators in Japan, and recently Studio Ghibli produced a documentary about the animator titled Yasuo Ōtsuka's Joy of Animating.