Cindy Hideko Yamauchi was born September 11th at a U.S. Air Base near Tokyo, Japan, where her father worked as a civilian. She showed an interest in drawing from an early age, so her parents enrolled her in several art classes when she was in grade school. Except for these classes, she is basically self-taught—she never attended a formal art school.
She began her art career at the age of sixteen, working part-time as an in-between animator at Studio Musashi. After graduating from high school, she went to work for Kaname Productions, where she worked as an in-between animator for titles such as Plawres Sanshiro, Birth and Windaria. She moved up to key animation as a freelancer until being hired by Studio D.A.S.T., where she worked on titles like Bionic 6 and Battle Royal High School. Over time, her animation career gave her opportunities to work abroad in countries like Canada and Indonesia.
She left the anime industry in her late 20s and moved back to Honolulu to explore other career options and further her education. When Square (now Square Enix) opened a studio there to make computer animated feature films, she took a job as a 3D animator on Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. After that, she moved to San Francisco, where she worked as a producer for Super Techno Arts on the English adaptation of the JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure anime series. These days, she lives mostly in Japan, working for various studios as a chief animation director, key animator and character designer, and is the owner of REGION FREE Japan Artist Network.