Trivia

In 1963, while still head of the special effects department at Toho, he established his own independent production company, Tsuburaya Special Effects Productions. The company started off making science fiction/fantasy productions, requiring many special effects, for television. His sons became heavily involved with the company. Their most successful creation, and one of their earliest, was "Urutoraman: Kuso tokusatsu shirizu" (1966) which they were able to sell internationally under the title "Ultraman." The series would have various television and feature film incarnations going into the 21st century. The company would later be renamed as simply Tsuburaya Productions.

His first job was at Tsugishima Manufacturing where he was able to save enough money to fulfill a long-time ambition by attending the Nippon Flying School in Haneda.

As a trained qualified pilot, he was able to fulfill his military obligation by working as an air courier.

Is regarded as the "Father of Tokusatsu." ("Tokusatsu" is the Japanese term for "special effects").

Among his final works included exhibits for Expo '70 (the world's fair being held that year in Osaka). He died in January before the fair opened.

He was a pilot and had a personal interest in flying. This has been cited as the reason his flying sequences (planes, flying saucers, and even flying monsters as in "Sora no daikaiju Radon" (1956)) were created with special attention to detail and often utilized a "pilot's-eye view." His special effects cinematographer, Sadamasa Arikawa (Teisho Arikawa) was also a pilot and shared his passion for flying which also contributed to the quality of these sequences.

He created the famous Toho Company, Ltd. logo, which has been faithfully recreated in the early 1980s, and in 1992 (for Toho's 60th Anniversary).

When several studios merged and Toho established their Tokyo Studios, an area on the lot was specifically devoted to "special techniques" (special effects). Tsuburaya was put in charge of this department and became Japan's first "Director of Special Techniques (Special Effects).".

Because of his expertise in virtually all phases of film production, during World War II he did extensive work on films that would later be regarded as propaganda. Because of this work, the American Occupation Forces blacklisted him from working in the Japanese motion picture industry.

At the height of special effects productions at Toho, Tsuburaya's department had over 200 full time employees.

It was not until 1957, after the production of "Sora no daikaiju Rodan" (1956) (U.S.: "Rodan") that Toho formally organized their Special Techniques Department with Tsuburaya as an official department head.

He was known to intentionally add less convincing effects for purposes of humor. The most infamous example occurred with Frankenstein vs Baragon in which his staff begged him to use a better effect to depict a horse, but Tsuburaya chose a faker looking effect because he felt it was too funny.