西尾鉄也

Nishio graduated from Nagoya Designer Academy and started his career at Anime Spot, a subcontracting studio, after being refused in interviews with several animation studios. He debuted as an in-betweener on Osomatsu-kun and as a key animator on Laughing Salesman. It's on Yu Yu Hakusho that Nishio came into his own as an animator, developing weighty and realistic movements influenced by Satoru Utsunomiya. Thanks to the ability demonstrated there, he was chosen to design the characters for Ninku. After working as character designer and chief animation director on Jin-Roh he permanently joined Production I.G. where he became known, together with Hiroyuki Okiura and Kazuchika Kise, as "The Three Gods of I.G." Masashi Kishimoto requested for Nishio to be the character designer of the Naruto anime. In August 2020, he was promoted to company director of Production I.G alongside Takayuki Gotou, a co-founder of the studio.