Interview: Shael Gaelick

The creator behind the story TL-17G, Shael Gaelick

Kamipress: What do you think about when making a Kamishibai story?
Shael: "Well, I usually think about two things, conveinence and content, I mean, I don't want to make a story intimidating and large. The content I try to leave out as much cursing as possible, with the TL series, I tried to think up things that people could get a good laugh out of, and with the new one I'm working on, I'm thinking mostly of how to get a good story line going with it."

Kamipress: What is the hardest part (for you) about making a Kamishibai story?
Shael: "For me there's no real hard part except to keep the file size down minimal. The most annoying part for me is the "programming" if you dare to call a text file a program."

Kamipress: What's your favorite part of making a Kamishibai story?
Shael: "Seeing people's reactions to it, and choosing the perfect music to fit in the background, I acctually made one of the songs for two of my Kamishibai stories."

Kamipress: How did get into Kamishibai?
Shael: "Otakuworld toys first drew me in, then when I ran out of games and screen savers to explore, I checked out other parts of otaku, including Kamishibai, (at the time there was probably about 5 stories at most)"

Kamipress: What are some of the things that influenced TL-17G?
Shael: "Well, first off, the robot was named Nitris, then, through writing a serious series of books (non-kamishibai) I made about 54 main characters, one of them names TL-17G, and even that name has meaning to it. It's sort of a code I made, TL is Teal, 17 is my girlfriends favorite number, and G is the 7th letter of the alphabet and 7 is my favorite number, it's kind of weird, but it serves its purpose."

Kamipress: Who are some of your favorite Kamishibai artists?
Shael: "Quova Hime and Batchix are probably my favorites, but there's also a few others."

Kamipress: So what are some of the Kamishibai you're considering for the future?
Shael: "Right now I'm working on Æliå, it has TL in it along with a few otehr robots, it goes off the odd Beanie baby hatred plot of the TL series."

Kamipress: What are your favorite animes?
Shael: "Tenchi Muyo, Ghost In The Shell, Super Atragon, Bubble Gum Crisis Tokyo 2040, DBZ, Sailor Moon, Plastic Little, Dirty Pair, and also Ruin Explorers (I also like the one based on FF5, but I don't remember the name of it.)"

Kamipress: What's the with the beanbabies?
Shael: "I don't know, I've always hated those things, they're too cute. Acctually, I hated their popularity more than anything, sewn cloth with beans inside, it just doesn't sound that cool. Thank God that they've finally started to loose popularity."

Kamipress: So do you have any additional comments, concerns, or thoughts for us?
Shael: "Comments- I like Cheese, Concerns- What if it gets moldy, Thoughts- I hope this isn't put up on the interview."

"Interesting fact, I was never going to write a kamishibai story because I can't draw, but that stupid Kamishibai story, "Henry" by Jason Rakosik inspired me to render. I only call it stupid because it triggers my Kamishibai pet peeve, an incomplete series with a lack of story line, but hitting grandma was fun in that story."

"Extra Note: Shael Gaelick is only a pen name, my real name is Seth Lester, and soon the art will be done by Crescent Technologies instead of Vortex. Vortex is my artistic Pen name or "Brush Name" as you might say."

Thanks for your time Shael.



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