Orko Shoji

Chie Shoji (東海林 智恵), known by her stage name as Orko Shoji, is a Japanese film director, music composer, graphic artist, translator, animator, mangaka, video game designer, YouTuber and DeviantArtist. She is the daughter of the late Osamu Shoji, who was also a music composer.

Orko is well-known for her art focusing on the, and. She is currently a member of Hemu-Hemu Production since 1980.

Bio
Orko was born on September 5, 1960 as Chie Shoji in Morioka, Iwate Prefecture.

In 1977, Chie and her family went to Minato, Tokyo, which is her residence. Due to her tomboyish and adventurous personality, she gained her stage name "Orko Shoji". One year later, she started her film directing career and started making short and feature-length films. The first film directed by her is Altering The Fog in her feature film directorial debut.

In 1980, Orko was employed by Hemu-Hemu Production. She also started her music and art career. Her music style is electronic, new age, smooth jazz and dance.

On June 3 of the same year, Orko went to Orlando, Florida and met Finnish businessman, film producer and director, studio executive and voice actor Orko Heikkinen to join forces with him to found a home video distributor called Orko Video, which not only distributed martial arts films, public domain cartoons and silent films but also produced low-budget direct-to-video films.

In 1995, Orko started her video game career under the name of Eiko Tomizawa (冨澤 栄子) for PCs. She designed and published her own video games in her own "www.orko-shoji.jp" website which she created back in 1992.

On September 5, 2000, Orko created her DeviantArt account in her 40th birthday, under the username of "Unbanshee". She is one of the earliest DeviantArtists living in Japan. Her deviations consisted of synthwave, vaporwave and 1980s.

On February 17, 2005, during YouTube's early days, she joined YouTube under the name of "Toucanoe". Orko is one of the earliest Japanese YouTubers. Her first video was "My First Video (and Hello There!)" (俺の最初の動画 Ore no saisho no dōga), in which the animation in the video was produced via Gome Pictures. The video has reached 170,000 views, 40,000 likes, 53 dislikes and 100 comments (even including from foreigners).

On January 2, 2009, Orko joined GameJolt under the name of Shoji Production Co., Ltd. (東海林製作株式会社) and published her video games she designed back from 1995 to 2002.

Filmography

 * Altering The Fog (1978)