Anime director Tsutomu Shibayama (Doraemon) and sound director Susumu Aketagawa (Princess Knight, Akira) were announced (pdf) as recipients of the Merit Award given as a part of the yearly film awards held by the Japanese Agency for Cultural Affairs on Thursday.
 
Tsutomu Shibayama was born in 1941 and entered Toei Doga (now Toei Animation) in 1963, later moving to A Production (now Shin´ei Doga) in 1966. He worked as an animator on programs such as Obake no Q-Taro and Kyojin no Hoshi, and eventually worked his way to the position of director. Shibayama was also a founding member of the anime studio Ajia-do. He is well-known for his work as director of numerous Doraemon films, and is currently an adviser at Ajia-do. He recently supervised the 2011 Gekijō-ban Anime Nintama Rantaro Ninjutsu Gakuen Zenin Shutsudō! no Dan movie.
 
Susumu Aketagawa was also born in 1941 and entered Mushi Productions in 1963, and would later go on to become a founding member of Group TAC, as well as a founder of the sound production company Magic Capsule. As a sound director, the person in charge of all sound in a work of anime other than dialogue and music, he worked on titles such as Princess Knight, Akira, Phoenix 2772 - Space Firebird, as well as more recent titles such as Shugo Chara! and Guin Saga. He began working as a visiting professor at Kyoto Seika University´s Faculty of Anime in 2009.
 
In previous years, anime art director Shichiro Kobayashi and directors Hiroshi Sasagawa and Gisaburô Sugii have received the award.