Yoshiyuki Sadamoto


 * For the Japanese TV presenter, see Mie Sadamoto.

Yoshiyuki Sadamoto (貞本 義行) (born January 29, 1962, in Tokuyama (now Shunan), Yamaguchi Prefecture, Japan) is a Japanese character designer, mangaka, and one of the founding members of the Gainax anime studio. Before the studio was founded under the official name (it was originally called Daicon Film), he served as animator on the second animated project, the Daicon IV opening animation. His first assignment as character designer in Gainax was for Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honneamise, released in 1987. He also worked as animator on Gunbuster and Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water, and he came back to this specialty for the first episode of Diebuster (also known as Gunbuster 2 or Top wo Nerae! 2). He is also the character designer of the best known Gainax anime series, Neon Genesis Evangelion, as well as the author of its manga adaptation (which is also Sadamoto's first full-length manga work).

In addition to his work on Evangelion, Sadamoto did character designs for Nadia, FLCL, .hack//Sign, Diebuster, The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, and Summer Wars. His first artbook is entitled Alpha, and presents a collection of illustrations by Sadamoto that were made before Evangelion (including Nadia and The Wings of Honneamise).

In 2003, Viz published a collection of his works, entitled Der Mond (German for "The Moon"). Other artbooks that include some of Sadamoto's works are Die Sterne (German for "The Stars") and Groundwork of FLCL.

Sadamoto is also the author of a short manga named Route 20 that was derived from an aborted anime project. He was also author of two manga one-shots, Dirty Work and System of Romance. He is currently serving as co-creator and character designer for the .hack game franchise.

Sadamoto also worked as an artist for the cover of Eric Clapton's album Pilgrim.

According to Yasuo Otsuka, who guided Sadamoto as a newcomer, there are only three people whom he regarded as more skillful than himself that he has met during his career. One of them is Yoshiyuki Sadamoto. The other two are Sadao Tsukioka who became a visual creator, and award-winning director Hayao Miyazaki.

When Otsuka met the three men, he seems to have felt that he was taking off his hat to them at once. However, he thinks that only Miyazaki completely mastered a genuinely superior animation technique at present. He guesses, "A too excellent person might despair in the group work".

In recent years, Sadamoto has concentrated primarily on comics and on illustration work. Since the early 1990s, his animation work has consisted primarily of character design and supervision, although this may be changing with his involvement in 2007 as key animator on episode 27 of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, and animation director and key animator on Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone.