[9] In 1927, he shot Minoru Inuzuka's jidaigeki films Children's Swordplay and Melee, both starring Kazuo Hasegawa and Tsuyako Okajima,[25][26] as well as Toko Yamazaki's The Bat Copybook, Mad Blade Under the Moon, and Record of the Tragic Swords of the Tenpo Era.

[28] The creation proved to be a success, although it did not guarantee total safety: one day, while Tsuburaya and an assistant were preparing the crane in order to film a scene, the structure collapsed, sending him plummeting to the ground of the studio.

[34] From February to August 1935, he traveled to Hawaii, the Philippines, Australia, and New Zealand on the cruiser Asama in order to shoot his directorial debut, Three Thousand Miles Across the Equator, a feature-length propaganda documentary film.

[13][36][37] In March of the next year, Tsuburaya's directorial debut, the theatrical play Folk Song Collection: Oichi of Torioi Village, was released: it was an adventure film concerning a condemned romance and featuring political tones.

[33][39][46] During an interview for the August 1960 issue of American Cinematographer, he broke down the creative process behind Son Gokū, saying: "I was called upon to create and photograph a monkey-like monster which was supposed to fly through the air", adding: "I managed the job with some success and this assignment set the pattern for my future work.

Tsuburaya directed its effects, which he created with the assistance of navy-provided photographs of the Pearl Harbor attack: in the process, he also worked with future Godzilla collaborates Akira Watanabe and Teizō Toshimitsu for the first time in his career.

[48][54] After watching The War at Sea from Hawaii to Malaya, Honda became interested in special effects and believed Tsuburaya's work in General Kato's Falcon Fighters was inferior in scope, but the art and gunpowder technology had enhanced.

[65][66] The U.S. occupation officials reportedly expelled him assuming he had access to classified documents when creating the comprehensive miniatures featured in The War at Sea from Hawaii to Malaya, which led them to inaccurately conclude that he was a spy.

[92] After failing to renegotiate with the Indonesian government for the production of In the Shadow of Glory, producer Tomoyuki Tanaka began to consider creating a giant monster (or kaiju) film, inspired by Eugène Lourié's The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953) and the Daigo Fukuryū Maru incident.

[93] During preproduction, Tsuburaya considered using stop motion to depict the titular monster but, as stated by special effects crew member Fumio Nakadai, had to employ the "costume method" because he "finally decided it wouldn't work".

[70][113] About 60% of Rodan's ¥200 million budget was spent on Tsuburaya's effects, which included optical animation, matte paintings, and extremely elaborate miniature sets created to be destroyed or flown over by its namesake monster (played by original Godzilla suit actor Haruo Nakajima).

Allegedly inspired by his own dreams, Tsuburaya created the eponymous giant, moth-like kaiju, which would go on to become one of the icons of Japanese fantasy cinema, alongside Godzilla and Rodan, and appear in numerous films thereafter.

[159] Though the overall budget for Mothra allowed the effects department to create the largest-scale miniature set ever constructed for a Toho production,[160][161] Tsuburaya was displeased with some of the sequences shot for the film, including some composite cuts of the Shobijin.

[171] Producer Tomoyuki Tanaka, assured from the box office success of Mothra and The Last War,[172] gave Honda and Tsuburaya their greatest budget yet and 300 days to shoot Gorath, their next science fiction epic.

[175] On May 15, the director appeared on NK Educational TV's program Japanese Standards; in July, he finished directing the effects for The Story of Shim Cheong [ko], a South Korean-produced film that was never released in Japan.

[177] The script's early drafts were sent back with notes from Toho asking for the monster antics to be as "funny as possible";[178] Tsuburaya embraced this approach, seeking to emotionally appeal to children and expand the genre's audience.

[179] Many of the sequences for the battle between the two monsters were purposefully filled with humorous details, but the approach was not favored by most of the effects crew, who "couldn't believe" some of the things Tsuburaya asked them to do, such as Kong and Godzilla volleying a giant boulder back and forth.

[8] Shortly after completing The Siege of Fort Bismarck in April 1963, he began pre-production work on Matango, another film created in cooperation with Ishirō Honda,[8] which was the final entry in the Transforming Human Series.

[207] This film, directed by Senkichi Taniguchi from a screenplay by Mothra and King Kong vs. Godzilla writer Shinichi Sekizawa, included an acclaimed choreographed chase sequence between a wizard and a witch, created via animation and matte photography, which gained Tsuburaya another Japan Technical Award for Special Skill.

[263] Tsuburaya and writer Tetsuo Kinjō decided to take the barebones concept of Ultra Q about civilians and scientists haggling monsters: they came up with the idea of a group, tentatively named the "Scientific Investigation Agency" (SIA), formed to deal with kaiju and supernatural phenomena as the focus of the new show.

[223][232] With monsters now available to watch at home weekly, children fewer asked their parents to take them to the theater: consequently, Tsuburaya Productions' triumph in television was diverting box-office money from Toho's kaiju films.

[223] Also in 1966, Tsuburaya worked once again with Honda for the kaiju film The War of the Gargantuas, produced in collaboration with Henry G. Saperstein, which centered on scientists investigating the appearance of two giant hairy humanoids who eventually fight each other in Tokyo.

[282] Concerning a team of secret agents established by a prosperous industrialist to oppose the acts of a military organization, referred to as "Q", Mighty Jack was aimed at a more mature audience, in contrary to the Ultra series and Booska the Friendly Beast.

[283] Due to pressure from Fuji TV, the series declined rapidly after the release of its first episode on April 6, 1968, as a consequence of its poor quality: many teleplays were filmed without revision, effects work frequently lacked time, and reshoots were often unattainable.

[291] On September 15, 1968, the week after the final episode of Ultraseven was broadcast[292] and just over a month after Admiral Yamamoto was distributed to Japanese theaters by Toho,[290] the director's following project for Tsuburaya Productions, Operation: Mystery [ja], began airing on the TBS, where he served as the show's supervisor.

[306] Tsuburaya and several of Toho's effects crew members spent the majority of 1969 working together to create Birth of the Japanese Islands, an audiovisual exhibit simulating earthquakes and volcanoes, which was set to be part of Mitsubishi's pavilion at the Expo '70 in Suita, Osaka Prefecture.

"[308] Ignoring his doctor's recent advice to reduce his workload due to declining health,[190] Tsuburaya started displaying symptoms of unstable angina, and he collapsed while visiting the Naruto whirlpools during the shooting sessions for the Expo '70 film presentation.

[309] He was subsequently sent to Mishuku Hospital [ja] in Meguro to continue his recovery, but refused to remain there, as he expected to complete Birth of the Japanese Islands on schedule: instead, he accepted an offer to recover and receive medical treatment at Ukiyama Villa on the Izu Peninsula in Itō, Shizuoka,[310] where he was instructed to cancel any assignments.

[317] During his stint as a cinematographer in the early 20th century, Tsuburaya closely researched international cinema in order to incorporate some of the techniques and improve his innovative style;[6] some of these films include: The Lost World (1925), Metropolis (1927), and King Kong (1933).

For his portrayal in the 1989 television drama The Men Who Made Ultraman [ja], an unidentified renowned Toho actor who had been starring in many of the company's box office hits since before Godzilla (1954) was initially cast as Tsuburaya.