Avell Enterprises managing director and project manager M. Danial talked with CBI publisher John Michael Helmer recently about his work with the company as well as Cesega Comics…
JMH: Where were you born and raised?
DANIAL: I was born inIpoh, Perak and raised inKuala Lumpur,Malaysia.
JMH: How long have you been working in the comics field?
DANIAL: 5 years.
JMH: You mentioned you are an editor for Avell Enterprise. What kind of challenges do you face daily?
DANIAL: I need to make sure my artist in a different part of job work as a team. Sometimes, there will be a few errors with anatomy, weird pose, and important details missing, it is part of my job to find those error and discuss it with my artist to fix it. Since the author/lead artist is my elder brother (Sunny Raen), it is hard for me to handle him professionally, most of the time regarding dateline matter.
JMH: What is it like working for Avell Enterprises?
DANIAL: Challenging, exciting, fun and enjoyable. I really love working in this field, it’s my passion to work in comic industry, I feel very proud to work for Avell Enterprise.
JMH: What titles do you currently publish?
DANIAL: Currently, we only publish 1 mainstream title called Cesaga (Celestial Saga) an adventure story about Celestials people that came down from the sky city (Aurea) to Earth in order to restore peace from the antagonist called Darkseeds (Puaka). What make Cesaga interesting is, we include our own cultural story, folklore, and also history where we try to entertain and educate at the same time to our readers.
JMH: Talk about the creative teams at Avell Enterprises?
DANIAL: Not long ago we only had 3 artist working for Cesaga production, thanks to Dato’ Aziz we now have 6 different artist working for Cesaga today. Each of them are my backbone in completing Cesaga chapter to meet the dateline.
JMH: What future projects are in the works at Avell Enterprises?
DANIAL: We’re planning to take Cesaga to the next crucial step, that is to make the animation from the comics series. Since it require lots of man power and expensive equipment, I’m preparing a proposal to get an animation grant for that purpose. If everything goes well, we might develop the brand to the higher level like producing Cesaga merchandise and console games. I hope we get lots of support from our readers to successfully achieve this dream ^^ as additional to that, the artist is also plan to create another saga comic as part of his project at Avell Enterprises, not so soon though, maybe 3-4 years from now.
JMH: Have you written, drawn or lettered in your career? If so, what were the projects/comics?
DANIAL: Well, I used to draft a novel based on Cesaga comic books but it turn out to be on hiatus for a long time since I need to work hard to promote and sell Cesaga comics. I only manage to complete around 5 pages T_T I really really hope I can find some free time to finish the novel and send it to a good publisher. I have a big dream of turning that novel to a blockbuster movie 
(I need to come up with excellent story than my brother since he always rejecting my opinion 
)
JMH: How can readers get copies of your books?
DANIAL: The books is available at Amazon and Cesaga website (www.cesaga.com). But since we’re still working on to upgrade the website, the books is only available at Amazon for this moment. Please drop by when the website is up later, need support from all comic reader out there!! ^^ All the previous and latest volume of Cesaga will be put on the website 
JMH: How do fans and creators get in touch with you?
DANIAL: Most of them contact me through my gmail (cesagaweb@gmail.com), for those who want to get in touch with me they can always contact me through my business email at business@cesaga.com or send me a letter to my office; No 111, Pangsa Murni, Section 6C, Wangsa Maju, 53300, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. If they has something serious to discuss just give me a call at +60169279717. Again, I hope they will come and visit my website to share or leave their feedback about Cesaga.
JMH: Danial, CBI appreciates your time. ALL the best!
DANIAL: Thank you CBI! I had great time doing this interview and share my little experiences with others! Somehow it feels like my hard work for the pass 5 years is showing the result when people start to notice us. Will update you guys with more stuff if I had the chance to do the interview again. TERIMA KASIH!
DANIAL: Be sure to follow Cesaga until the end. I know there is lots of mistake in the first volume, but we’re improving a lot from that mistake and I as a comic reader myself, I personally think that the next volume storyline is getting far more exciting and the drawing has become more and more details. I want to thanks all of our readers and fans that show their support to us in lot of different ways. For those who like to start they own comic books, don’t be scare, you will face some ups and down journey in the process, and that will only makes you stronger than before. I met lots of nice people on this journey, there is also time when it gets really really tough and hard for me to continue this business, since I had put all my effort and my passion to it, I never thought of giving up. I wish you all the best and once again Thank you.
DANIAL: TERIMA KASIH!!! THANK YOU!!
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About the interviewer –
John Michael Helmer is the Publisher and CEO of Red Leaf Media, LLC. Red Leaf Media operates: www.ComicBookInterviews.com & www.RedLeafComics.com.
John’s creator-owned properties include: The Leaf, Canada’s Greatest Hero, Sky Watcher, G.I.s versus Zombies, McSorly, RCMP, The Armor Guardians, The Huskie, Dune, Master Spy!, and many others.
John can be reached at: jhelmer@comicbookinterviews.com and redleafcomics@gmail.com
