Izumi Takemoto is a mangaka born January 19, 1959 in Tokyo, though he grew up in Saitama. He studied business at Nihon University.

Science fiction has always been his thing—he got hooked on Edgar Rice Burroughs early on, and that influence shows up across most of his work. He's also known for being a serious cat person. Cats pop up constantly in his manga, even though he didn't actually own one until 2003. When he finally got his own cat, he drew on those experiences for Aru Hi no Zwei.

What makes Takemoto stand out is his soft, distinctive art style. He's one of the rare mangaka working across three of Japan's four major markets—shōjo, shōnen, and seinen—which isn't something most artists pull off. He's also done character design work for various computer and console games.

He's not nearly as well-known outside Japan as he deserves to be. As of the mid-2000s, none of his works had made it to North American or European publishers, though that gap has been slowly closing as more manga gets exported internationally.