It was a bit of a pickle to find point of comparison, anime budget information are hard to come by, more so to find a trustful source... so Oshii's Ghost in the Shell was budgeted at 600 millions ¥ if wikipedia can be believed.
It was announced next to Katsuhiro Otomo’s Steamboy, Bandai Visual plan was to push foward the technologies involved in creating animation in Japan, after they noticed the adavance Hollywood had taken with CG Animation.
She became a regular later on, starting with Konomimi (2004). She is also a regular on projects where Yoshihiko Umakoshi is involved like Mushishi and more recently on the new Doremi movie.
Her crown achievement finally getting a directing job on boys-love movie Doukyuusei.