# Yasuko Watanabe (color designer)

Yasuko Watanabe (Japanese: 渡辺康子, Hepburn: Watanabe Yasuko) is a Japanese color designer and colorist.

## Early life

Watanabe was part of her high school's anime research club when she found a particular interest in the use of colors in anime and decided to get a job as a colorist in the industry. After graduating high school, she went to Yoyogi Animation Academy [ja] and graduated in 2000.

## Career

She joined Shaft the year as a cel-colorist (analog) and digital colorist. Much of her early work consisted of doing the coloring for outsources given to Shaft, before gradually shifting into in-house production as Shaft itself shifted to in-house production. In 2004, Shaft split its digital coloring and compositing teams into their own department, Digital@Shaft, which Watanabe became a part of. Her first work as a color designer was also an outsource, however: Shattered Angels, which was produced by studio TNK, contacted Shaft for color design work, and both she and her senior (Hitoshi Hibino) did the color designs for the show. It wasn't until seven years later, in 2014, that she made her debut as a color designer in-house at Shaft with Hanamonogatari (with Hibino). The following year, she made her debut as solo color designer on Gourmet Girl Graffiti.
In 2022, Shaft opened a new studio in Shizuoka Prefecture with the hopes of expanding the company's production capacity outside of Tokyo. In order to set up operations and train new staff, several members of the main Tokyo branch would need to transfer to Shizuoka to perform these duties. Shaft's CEO, Mitsutoshi Kubota, offered Watanabe the opportunity and, despite having never lived in Shizuoka Prefecture, she agreed to the transfer and became a studio chief.

## Works

This is an incomplete list.

### Teleivison series

| Year | Title | Director(s) | Studio | Color designer | Other role(s) |
| 2007 | Shattered Angels | Tetsuya Yanagisawa | TNK | Yes | No |
| 2014 | Hanamonogatari | Akiyuki Shinbo Tomoyuki Itamura | Shaft | Yes | |
| 2015 | Gourmet Girl Graffiti | Akiyuk Shinbo Naoyuki Tatsuwa | Shaft | Yes | |
| 2015 | Nisekoi: | Akiyuki Shinbo Yukihiro Miyamoto | Shaft | Yes | |
| 2015 | Owarimonogatari | Akiyuki Shinbo Tomoyuki Itamura | Shaft | Yes | |
| 2016–2017 | March Comes In like a Lion | Akiyuki Shinbo Kenjirou Okada | Shaft | Yes | |
| 2017 | Owarimonogatari II | Akiyuki Shinbo Tomoyuki Itamura | Shaft | Yes | |
| 2017–2018 | March Comes In like a Lion 2nd Season | Akiyuki Shinbo Kenjirou Okada | Shaft | Yes | |
| 2019 | Zoku Owarimonogatari | Akiyuki Shinbo | Shaft | Yes | |
| 2021 | Pretty Boy Detective Club | Akiyuki Shinbo Hajime Ootani | Shaft | Yes | |
| 2025 | Ninja to Koroshiya no Futarigurashi | Yukihiro Miyamoto | Shaft | Yes | |

### OVAs/ONAs

| Year | Title | Director(s) | Studio | Color designer |
| 2016 | Koyomimonogatari | Akiyuki Shinbo Tomoyuki Itamura | Shaft | Yes |
| 2016 | Nisekoi: | Akiyuki Shinbo Yukihiro Miyamoto | Shaft | Yes |
| 2016–2017 | The Beheading Cycle: The Blue Savant and the Nonsense Bearer | Akiyuki Shinbo Yuki Yase | Shaft | Yes |
| 2019 | Ikebukuro | Yukio Takatsu | Shaft | Yes |
| 2021–2022 | Assault Lily Fruits | Shouji Saeki | Shaft | Yes |
| 2024 | Monogatari Series Off & Monster Season | Akiyuki Shinbo Midori Yoshizawa | Shaft | Yes |

### Films

| Year | Title | Director(s) | Studio | Color designer | Other role(s) | Ref(s) |
| 2025 | Virgin Punk: Clockwork Girl | Yasuomi Umetsu | Shaft | Yes | | |