Makoto Shinkai

Shinkai features cats in his movies, this is because Shinkai's favorite pet animal, which is why his first film is about a cat.

Shinkai's most commonly used genre is romance, most notably used in Your Name and The Garden Of Words, but he also includes fantasy or sci-fi elements into his movies as well, such as using body swapping in Your Name and atmokinesis in Weathering With You.

Shinkai also includes trains in his films, using them for backgrounds and for ways in which the characters move from one place to another.

Shinkai uses hyper detailed and vivid backgrounds, allowing him to utilized lighting in a magnificent way.

Shinkai also incorporates cellular telephones in his works, to give his films a more realistic feel.

Shinkai's character's are usually in a long distance relationship. This is shown primarily in 5 Centermeters Per Second and Your Name, this is because the 2 protagonists live very far apart, one in Tokyo and another in a fictional town of Itomori, while in 5 Centermeters Per Second, the 2 main characters send letters to one another.

Shinkai sometimes bases his movies on works he has done in the past, as The Garden Of Words was based on a manga Shinkai himself created.