The New York Anime Festival has announced that artist Yoshitaka Amano, whose credits include Final Fantasy, Vampire Hunter D, and Sandman, will appear as a Guest of Honor at the New York Anime Festival, which will be held at the Jacob Javits Center in Manhattan from September 26-28th.  Amano joins the author of the hugely successful Vampire Hunter D novels, Hideyuki Kikuchi and translator Kevin Leahy at the festival.  The appearances of all three are sponsored by Dark Horse Comics, the North American publisher of the Vampire Hunter D novels (Volume 11 is out in October).

Amano began his career as a character designer with Tatsunoko Productions where he created designs for the groundbreaking Gatchaman (Battle of the Planets) and Casshern.  After 15 years at Tatsunoko, Amano became a freelance illustrator and provided the illustrations for a number of novel series including Hideyuki Kikuchi’s Vampire Hunter D, Kaoru Kurimoto’s Guin Saga, and Yoshiki Tanaka’s The Heroic Legend of Arslan.  Amano also collaborated with Neil Gaiman on Sandman: The Dream Hunters and with Mamoru Oshii on the anime film Angel’s Egg.