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Monthly Poll If you are attending SugoiCon this year, what age group do you belong to? |
(Director) Ichiro Itano's trademark style is so legendary in the anime industry that his peers have nicknamed it the Itano Circus: the air-circus-like corkscrewing display of fighters and missile plumes that Macross made world-famous. Itano started working in the late '70s and early '80s as an animator on the first Mobile Suit Gundam and GAINAX's opening videos for the Daicon sci-fi cons. However, he considered quiting anime for the better-paying truck driver life--until Studio Nue remembered his intricate work and tapped him to be Macross's main mechanical animation director. He has since overseen the action on Megazone 23, Royal Space Force: Wings of Honneamise, Macross Plus, and Battle Royal High School. This year, he has been busy as the director of the popular suspense hit GANTZ and the special effects director for Macross Zero.
(Character Designer/Animation Director) Born in Hiroshima and currently working at Studio Viewn, Kazuko Tadano has helped bring many popular characters and animations to life. Most notably, she has worked as a character designer and animation director for the Sailor Moon and Sailor Moon R television series as well as for the Sailor Moon R movie. She is also known for her work in the Super Beast Machine God Dancougar series and OVA, Sonic Soldier Borgman, Choro Q Dougram, and, of course, Wedding Peach. Aside from these notable accomplishments, Tadano has also worked on many other series, movies, books, CDs, and even video games. She is, without a doubt, a very talented designer and director and we are pleased that she will be joining us at Sugoi Con this year.
(Screenwriter/Writer) The script is a major element of any production and the quality of the writing can help determine the success of the series or movie. As a writer, Takao Koyama is probably best known for his work as screenwriter on the Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z TV series, as well as on 13 of the 14 Dragon Ball Z movies; however, he has also acted as head writer for several other well-known shows such as: Saint Seiya, Heavenly Sphere Shurato, Slayers, Project A-Ko 2, Legend of Basara, the entire Time Bokan series, and the Highschool! Kimengumi movie. In addition to his work as head writer on these projects, he has also worked as a member of the writing staff on the Highschool! Kimengumi TV series, Dr. Slump, Hell Teacher Nube, NG Knight Lamune & 40, and many more. Takao Koyama is certainly a prominent writer in the industry and we are honored to present him as a guest at SugoiCon 2004.
(ADV VA) Douglas Smith is a Voice Actor/Artist personality in the Anime industry. He's voiced in several of ADV's shows like, BubbleGum 2040, Those Who Hunt Elves, Sorcerer Hunters, Dragon Knight to name a few. Doug is most recognized for his role as Kintaro Oe in GoldenBoy. You can see his latest voice over role in Steam Detectives when it becomes available later this year. Be sure to swing by his table and check out his art. Neil Nadelman (translator) Neil Nadelman got his start translating by working on Central Park Media’s Project A-ko and has never slowed down. He has gone on to translate titles such as Gall Force, Grave of the Fireflies, Detonator Orgun, Armored Trooper Votoms, Mobile Suit Gundam, Irresponsible Captain Tylor, and he got the chance to translate his favorite anime of all time, Wings Of Honneamise. Neil has done translating work for companies such as Anime Village, Pioneer, CPM, Manga Entertainment, Software Sculptors and Right Stuf International. Greg Ayres (Voice Actor) Greg Ayres is not your average voice actor. The once "Fanboy" turned VA started working for ADV Films two years ago, and in that time managed to snag two of his favorite roles in anime. He was thrilled to voice the role of his favorite character Son Goku in Saiyuki, then just one year later Kaworu Nagisa in the Director's Cut of Neon Genesis Evangelion. Other roles include Toga in Gravion, Bomb in BASTOF Syndrome, Yuya Asou in SuperGals, Mannen in Pretear, and Shinji Kazama in Full Metal Panic. He can also be heard in other anime titles such as The Legend of the Mystical Ninja, Steel Angel Kurumi, Those Who Hunt Elves II, Panyo Panyo DiGi Charat, Dragon Knight Wheels of Time, Oh Super Milk Chan, and Aura Battler Dunbine. To find out even more information visit Greg's web site at www.gregayres.com . Jan Scott-Frazier (Industry Insider) Jan moved to Japan in 1987 to attend animation school and later went on to work in the anime industry. After working at a number of animation studios in including Artland, Production IG and Atelier BWCA, she become an expert in many different aspects of animation production, such as cel painting, animating, backgrounds, camera and directing. Jan worked on shows like RikiOh 2, Locke the Superman (OVA), Shurato (OVA), Bubblegum Crash (OVA) and Tottoi (feature). She founded a new animation studio - TAO Corp. Ltd. in Bangkok, Thailand. TAO did work on Moldiver, Diary of Mikan, Genocyber and SWAT Kats amongst others. In 1994, Jan moved into consulting work, freelancing for Cambridge Animation Systems, the developers of Animo (a computer assisted (2D) animation production system). Also in 1994, Jan co-founded GENESIS Digital Publishing Company with Izumi Matsumoto (Kimagure Orange Road) where they created the best-selling Comic ON, a CD-ROM manga compendium in which Jan debuted as a manga artist. In 1999 Jan directed episodes of Susie-chan & Marvy (TV) and spent most of the year working on the development of original TV series projects. In 2000, she moved back to the USA to work at Celsys USA on the development of the next generation of the RETAS digital production system. Jan currently continues to develop original projects for television, OVA, music video and feature film release, music videos and commercials as well as translating manga. Jan has traveled extensively throughout Asia and the US teaching animation techniques, speaking at conventions, evangelizing, griping, abusing substances (caffeine and chocolate) and eating far too much. She has also written and co-written magazine articles and textbooks about anime and computer animation.
(American Artist) Robert is an Indiana born, self-taught artist. February, 1990 he got his first art career break when he sent an eight page short story to Antarctic Press' anthology, Mangazine. From that he was asked to work on other assorted AP comics, such as Ninja High School, Mangazine, Not Ninja High School, Again and SB Ninja High School. After working for Antarctic Press for about four years, Robert went on to do freelance work. He teamed with other artists such as Adam Warren on Bubblegum Crisis and Dirty Pair, Phil Foglio's Xxxenophile card game and co-produced a portfolio 'zine with Steve Bennett. His art has also attracted invitation from overseas by a couple of grand Japanese artists, Kenichi Sonoda (Gunsmith Cats, Riding Bean), and KoKoMai (character designer for Japan's Playstation, Crime Crackers) to do work for their own personal dojinishi circles. But it doesn't end there, Rob has done much work for many comic companies, major magazines, an animated TV show, a major toy manufacturer and a very well known video game developer. Robert's biggest claim to fame has to be designing a certain teenage, spiky red hair, high school uniform wearing, video game otaku named Banzai Chibi Chan. For two years Robert designed and drew the magazines' easily excitable, video game addicted mascot for Playstation Magazine, 100% Independent. His work includes a collaboration with Studio Udon and Marvel comics. Released during the weekend of it's opening movie debut, he worked on two childrens books based on Spiderman. His most recent project was a pin-ups for past issues of Anime Invasion. Now, with the help of his wife/partner in crime, Emily, have started thier own company, Studio Capsule. Capsule will be involve in creating a line of underground doujinshis, animations, portfolios and other sorts of Studio Capsule memorabilia. Find out everything that's new with either Studio Capsule or Robert DeJesus www.robertdejesus.com.
DAVE MERRILL has run Anime Weekend Atlanta (AWA) for ten years, and has been doing ANIME HELL longer than that. A veteran of CORN PONE FLICKS, his old-school anime fandom credentials earned him a spot in the documentary OTAKU UNITE. He reviews anime at www.animejump.com and his comics and illustrations have appeared in JUKU, DRUNK TANK, and the annual publication of the FLUKE minicomic festival. A lifelong Georgia native, he recently relocated to Toronto, where he lives with his wife and two cats. Bruce Lewis (Comic Artist) Bruce Lewis is a professional cartoonist, illustrator, writer, and pop culture enthusiast. Among the first comics artists to bring manga influences to American comics, Lewis wrote and drew the Robotech: Invid War Aftermath (1993-1994) series for Marvel's Malibu/Eternity Comics line. Later, Lewis created the Robotech: Hohsq's Story (1995), and Robotech Aftermath: Megaroad (1996) series for Academy Comics; he also wrote and illustrated the four-issue Gall Force: Eternal Story (1994-1995) miniseries for CPM Manga, and colored, lettered, and produced many more CPM comics titles. In the mid-'90s Lewis co-founded of one of America's first independent comics production studios, Studio Go!, and as a part of that group edited, wrote and illustrated Star Blazers: The Magazine of Space Battleship Yamato (1995-1997) for Voyager Entertainment's Argo Press imprint. In 1998, he co-founded and became the first CEO of Cheap Disposable Entertainment, Inc., an independent publishing company specializing in comics and pop culture entertainment. Lewis' most current comics work appears in Cheap Disposable's first release, Juku: A Comics Album (2002) available at the Cheap Disposable Entertainment website at cheapdisposable.com and at amazon.com. Lewis currently heads The Henderson Lewis Company, a multimedia entertainment firm, and is writing his first non-fiction book, Draw Manga, to be published by Barnes & Noble / Chrysalis Books in 2005. He lives with his wife Mundee in suburban Tarrant County, Texas, and can be reached at brucelewis.com. Dan Hess (Comic Artist) Born in New York. Raised in Ohio. Got my BFA, majoring in Computer Graphics, at Syracuse University in 1998, and relocated to Cincinnati, Ohio where I worked in a series of education-oriented software companies until 2004, when I went freelance. While I've been comicking most all my life, I only really got serious about it in 2002, when I started Angel Moxie. My goal, now, is to get something published and distributed nationwide. Well, I've self-published three Angel Moxie books, with plans to publish a Realms of Ishikaze book, but I'm talking major publishing company... find my books in Borders and such. In the meantime, I've kept myself clothed and fed by doing freelance artwork, which I would not recommend, lest you have a good chunk of change saved up first. Visit Mr. Hess at venisproductions.com.
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Animation (SORA) |
