Person: Itano Ichirou

Itano Ichirou was born March 11, 1959 in Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. He is an animator and anime director perhaps best known for creating a style of action sequences called "Itano circus" (板野サーカス). The technique was first seen in Choujikuu Yousai Macross and it refers to a highly stylized and acrobatic method of depicting aerial combat and dogfights; as well as depicting a missile volley with meticulously animated spiraling smoke trails and erratic trajectories.

Itano started his career as an in-between animator in Studio Musashi while still being in high school. He was invited by Hamatsu Mamoru to work on Kidou Senshi Gundam and around that time he was also promoted to do key animation. Next he joined the newly established animation studio Bebow. In 1982 he was asked by Kawamori Shouji to join Artland and work on Choujikuu Yousai Macross, Itano accepted. On Macross, he was mainly responsible for mechanical animation direction and in this particular work is where he created the fast and acrobatic combat scenes between the mechas otherwise known as "Itano circus". In 1986 he made his debut as the main director for an anime with Megazone 23 Part II: Himitsu Kudasai to which he once again also contributed as the mechanical animation director. In the same year he left with a few other Artland animators to form D.A.S.T Corporation. In 2011 D.A.S.T was dissolved, Itano had moved on to work as an advisor in Graphinica.