Hideki Hamasu

Hamasu's animation mainly focuses on character acting, and his scenes often feature minimal camerawork with a heavy emphasis on expressive facial and body animation. Much like Kouichi Arai, he was heavily influenced by Junichi Hayama and the late '80s realism. Early in his career he was employed at Toei Animation, and was thus a recurring presence in the studio's OVA works such as Xanadu, Crying Freeman and Vampire Wars. His rising prominence during the early '90s allowed him to participate on Ghost in the Shell, and from thereon he has been in high demand for feature films.

In 1993, Hamasu animated the car chase on Satoshi Kon’s episode of the JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure. The scene impressed Kon enough for Hamasu to end up as a character designer and animation director on Perfect Blue. He was also set to serve a similar role in Millennium Actress, but was replaced in the role by Takeshi Honda due to having contracted a severe tendon inflammation. He appeared on all of Kon’s films, as well as Paranoia Agent until the director's passing.

More recently he has mostly worked on Ghibli and Hosoda's films.