Ausora; the Kickstarter

Taken from the official Kickstarter page! Ausora

It all started on the last day of my prior Wednesday Cartooning class. Empty sketchbooks, coloring books & a Pokémon manga were given out as farewell gifts. Later in the class, this was asked:

“Aaron Man, I have a quick question. Do you know of any publishing companies that'll, like, take kids work & print them?!”

“You’re looking at one,” I responded, smirking.

This is where I come in! In the summer of 2014, I dived feet-first into the realm of independent book publishing with my first book “Strawberry Dough.” It follows the main character, Squishy the Sugar Glider, a curious marsupial creature who takes his species name way too seriously and travels with a loyal doughnut on his wrist. He also has an intense sweet tooth. In the autumn of 2015, a new 4- book series “Strawberry Dough: Season’s Sweetings” began with the “Autumn” book and is ending with “Summer” in June 2016.

And once the summer of 2015 hit, I completed the first book of “SolForce!” This series is based on the dozens of characters I’ve created dating back to pre-school. The stories are pure detective action comedy, following an ever-growing team of hotshot crime fighters from all across the globe (and beyond), as they band together to safeguard all of toonkind in the tropical mecca of Sunshine City USA from mad bio-engineers and/or their shadowy creations.

By the time “Strawberry Dough” and “SolForce” began making the rounds with me to numerous schools and book expos in New York City and the Bay Area, one thing became clear to me: The kids I met were deprived of art. To make matters even more endearing to me, so many of them have untapped potential as cartoon and comic creators in their own right. And much like me when I was a shy, skinny-as-a-twig elementary student, they simply want the adults in charge and even their own peers to take them seriously as growing artists!

This, folks, is the reason behind the campaign for Ausora! Ausora aims to serve as a workshop and small publishing outlet for the graphic novel projects my students and I create. What led me to believe that this idea can indeed work was simply viewing what a couple of groups were able to produce under my wing.

The first project at bat was “The Muji Story,” a 24- page black and white comic created by two of my highly dedicated (and wacky) fourth grade students Alice and Jenna.

Starting in the fall of 2016, I aim to work with students as both private and group lessons depending on the comic project they’d like to take on. Season to season, these projects will be collected into a compilation called “The Ausora Blender,” with winter being the first release. A temporary cover will be created for a campaign update. Inspired by the many creations of my 15 students from my Spring 2016 Cartooning class alongside Cartoon Network’s What-A-Cartoon! program from the 1990s, the reason for these compilations is to also view which comic projects would you, the reading audience and backers, would love to see a fully- made graphic novel project completed alongside the “Strawberry Dough,” “SolForce,” and “Muji” books! As you’ll see in the reward tiers, those with elementary and middle school students will have a chance to pitch their own comic ideas to me. This is an attempt to get as many fun and creative ideas into the “Blender” compilations and who knows, their ideas may turn into a small graphic novel too!

Then, of course, comes the use of funds. Simply put, the private classes and production and distribution of the books are key. The first 50% of the funding will contribute to the numerous classes I plan to teach starting in autumn. Classes will range from 4- 12 students. The next 25% will hit the points of printing, shipping and handling for each package. Thanks to my relationship with the following outlets, the well-to-do folks of Blurb and the Book Patch will handle all of the book printing, while Redbubble and Vistaprint will handle the posters, stickers, postcards and bookmarks respectively. The good news is that the completed graphic novels won’t take much time to print, since the PDF’s are all done! 15% will cover additional shipping costs covered through the various reward tiers, with 10% allocated for Kickstarter fees.

With Ausora, my students and I strive to provide a unique brand of entertainment for all ages for years to come. And all the while, we hope to empower artful youth who can’t wait to solidify all of the ideas in their big and brainy heads on paper with that new book smell. Thank you for considering backing and supporting this Kickstarter! I need you to help me and my students make this project a reality.

Student Showcase! "The Muji Story"

There are many times in which the Winds of Fate will pull you in a direction that doesn't quite meet your game plan. Usually, it's by nature that we all will plan against reality since we believe it's ALL in the palm of our hands.

Thankfully, that's not the case!

Once my two Cartooning classes were underway in autumn of 2015, I dipped my bare cold feet into rather warm water. Both classes were composed of deeply impressionable elementary school students, all of which had either an inkling or fine reasoning as to why they wanted to learn the ways of the Cartoonist. Take it from this slim fit jazz buff; I was impressed.

While my K- 2nd grade group took a few weeks to warm up to my existence, my 4th- 6th grade group couldn't help but peek at my book projects -especially SolForce- at least once a class for inspiration. Midway though the semester, I noticed that I was slowly but surely giving the students revised character designs, story ideas and even comic titles! Of the ten students, only a few of them produced concrete ideas to take them a step further.

Allow me to introduce you to two of my Cartooning proteges: Jenna and Alice!!

Starting out as close friends since the 1st grade -their words, not mine-, Alice and Jenna joined my first Cartooning class already in love with three things: animals, magic, and comedy. When asked on the first day of class what were their favorite comic or cartoon characters, both replied Calvin & Hobbes; I almost teared up. Oddly enough, talking with them both together made me consider how much in common they have with my 5th grade- self. In the olden days of my youth, Pokemon, Harry Potter, and SpongeBob SquarePants were my pop culture obsessions. They ended up having a huge pull on my art style and storytelling, just as much as the Looney Tunes, Pink Panther and Garfield comics had on me since I picked up the Crayola crayons in pre- K. 

Working alone for the first seven weeks of class, Jenna created an assortment of animal characters for a household setting that included a trouble-making beagle, a wildly sweet cockatoo and a shy kitten. Me and her often debated on names; the cockatoo's name being Snowy was fitting, but Spot for the beagle I thought was too... common! So, I suggested a name with more weight on it like Magnus! Jenna brings that incident up every chance she gets. Oh, the hilarity.

Alice created characters more for the forest. Her first was a rascally rabbit named Flora. The others were a wildcat, a bluejay bird and a fish that I redesigned as a mud-skipper. Look; when I meet anyone of any age with a genuine love for animals, I try to expand to expand their vocabulary even if the next sentence is "I DON'T WANT HER TO BE A DOG. SHE'S A PUPPY!"

Fast forward to week eight of the class, the duo told me that they wanted to make a comic together. I assumed that they wanted to make new characters, so I let them roam free for 30 minutes. And this is what they came up with:

Yes. Within 40 minutes, this character concept and story summary were drawn and written by them! What I managed to get out of them was this: there's a school of monsters that all look and act similar, but out of the blue an evil sorceress casts a spell on them all which causes the monsters to mutate with differing animal body parts. Now, they embark on a quest to find that sorceress to reverse the spell! 

Huh!.... The idea hooked me, especially for a comic that can have continuing stories. So, I told the girls that I'm taking home their summary and character for some editing. -they hate that word, by the way- Later that Thursday night, this ended up being the revised summary and character design.

At first, I thought I took too many liberties with the character design. "How can two 4th graders draw something like this?!" I thought in the WAY back of my cynical adult brain... But after witnessing the passion Alice and Jenna had for creating something original and telling a story, all of those doubts were dropped that night. And I even helped give the monster species a name: the Muji. The main character I thought should have a name that's youthful and connecting like its creators, so I named him Kee! His circular spiked body type and bat wing- crab arm fusion served as the basis for the Muji designs.

Next week, I presented them the revisions... and their excitement flew sky high. Within minutes, we were drawing out comic thumbnails! As a parting gift for the semester, I drew them a visual concept of the Muji comic:

This, of course, led Jenna to asking a very peculiar question when all of the other students left the room: "Can we, like, make this into a book like your stuff?!"

I looked at her mom with a big smirk and asked "When can we start?"

Folks, this is what led to Alice and Jenna being my "first clients" in comic creating. After a few weekend classes thanks to their mothers, Margot and Noelle, and another full ten week semester, I'm happy to present their first book, The Muji Story! 

Donned with 24 black and white pages, the three- chapter book follows the band of parasite- like creatures that after exposed to a hex casted by Ali- Tabada, an evil sorceress-in-training, mutate as combinations of animals, and now must find a remedy to reverse the hex!

The Muji Story, according to the duo, was only the beginning. Over their summer break, not only do we plan to work further on "Book 2" of the Muji series, but they're also joining me at my first book expo in the Bay Area: the Bay Area Book Festival!! We'll be located in Teen Town, since our projects are all- ages graphic novels. I'm beyond excited to see what the future has in store for my students and I.

Or... just call us "AJA" if we're all spotted together. 

Dial 'M' For Moleskine

Take a look at the image below.

This mocha latte was dripping in whipped cream from a Sunday brunch with a fellow author friend and future collaborator. All the while talking about our current endeavors and watching waiters, I felt some need to sneak out my ruled Moleskine journal.... to draw it. She even took the sketch to her Instagram page!

 

And the latte was drunken within an hour. My loyalty to coffee has no limit.

 

Look again at the ruled lines on the picture. Even more so, what and how it was drawn. My Moleskine journal is often saved for the unsolicited thoughts of my artistic path within a day to a week, not for rough 5- 15 minute sketches with ink only. And yet, that's what has been going on for the past four weeks! This latte was just the beginning; my BART and MUNI rides to work were about to become much more... inky.

The process started on a Tuesday. One thing's for sure; if I'm drawing someone a seat away from me, I tend to keep my eyesight four seconds on target. Sure, glasses allow me to hide my eyes thanks to a pair of lenses on a single frame, but consider having to look UP every few seconds! That's the real challenge.

 

Many of you who have been following me for quite sometime know that I'd rather start a sketch with a Col-Erase pencil and iron out the details later with an inkpen and brush pen. Something about carrying around this thinly veiled journal etched one thought into my brain:

 

Don't think.

 

 

Ten minutes later, I entered a MUNI train and sat parallel to a preschooler and her nanny. What you see above is a culmination of drawing kids; they never stop moving. She was pretty exhausted by the time I finally caught her pose! 

 

Next day, a mysterious figure walks onto the BART. Outside of her skateboard and overly buttoned backpack, I couldn't tell you anymore about this woman. One thing's for sure; I refused to darken in the hood. My ink reserves itself!

 

On the adjacent path from my BART seat on the same ride, this side profile started out on a contour line basis. There was a chance to use all of the page for his dozed-off newspaper reading, but a close-up worked just fine. Since I wanted to indicate the different material on him, hatching was used for his hair and cross-hatching for his jacket. Again, saving ink. 

 

This three-part page took place on the MUNI train a half hour afterwards. Anything that puts my cone of vision to the test I'll happily accept, especially when they're more than nine feet away! All of that said, and the hooded figure on top gave off his tired and irritated vibe on my sketch of him. Doing quick studies of people in public is a good way to work on your psychiatric training, hence how I was able to catch the second face to the left. The sun was in her eyes once we hit West Portal (I think). As for the last figure, I'll just go on a limb and say that he was going to the beach that day.

 

Here's my final piece, with a somewhat different approach.



 

 

It was the Saturday morning before Valentine's Day, and folks were already recovering from Super Bowl City with an entourage of hearts and red clothing. Unless, you were like me and you were going to work. Based on the all-black attire this sleepy head was wearing, she probably couldn't bear to think of the imminent pain to endure until that coffee break. Oh, and my cone of vision was only two feet away! The brush pen was used thanks to that; outside of the clothing folds, I wanted to focus on the shading since the image began to abstract in my brain as I was reaching the Montgomery station.

 

The portrait party has come to an end for now, but the Moleskine journal still has a little life in it for a few more. Somewhere on the table, my mixed media sketchbook is dancing due to its inevitable return. Who knows? Maybe I'll make room in my bag for both!

 

 

Or... just churn some fat.