SILENT MANGA AUDITION® THE AWARDS 2015 MASTER CLASS CERTIFICATION CEREMONY REPORT This is the account of the big day, the moment when the top achievers of SILENT MANGA AUDITION® finally gathered in Tokyo to be certified as a proud members of the MASTER CLASS! Held together with Coamix Co., Ltd’s annual New Year’s party, we had 500+ guests from all corners of the Japanese Manga publishing industry. What a great opportunity to introduce our future Manga stars to them 🙂 Let’s start with some video footage from the event! “Message 2015” – A live musical performance, synced to clips of Silent Manga from the last 2 years of SILENT MANGA AUDITION®   This link is for the complete coverage of the event:   If you have not yet seen the opening movie, feast your eyes on it now.   And on to the photo report… The panels in the corridor leading up the main hall. Each master class member had a panel, with a QR code that you could scan with your smartphone to read their Manga. Of course, we had them in print too 😉 A brochure we prepared for this day. Many of the guests were introduced to the SILENT MANGA AUDITION for the first time, and we did our best to gather more supporters in the industry!   It is customary in Japan to have flowers from our partners in celebration. Many of the guests and winners of the domestic Manga-Audition competition were reading the manga. We hope they liked it! The hall is filling up with guests, and the master class members are starting to feel the tension… Or maybe just enjoying the atmosphere! 😉 Young comedians entertaining the guests. There was lots of laughter in the hall! This is the big moment! The MASTER CLASS elites of 2015! I’d also like to send our highest compliments and warmest regards to Ichirou from Brazil and Mikko Raassina from Finland who unfortunately could not make it to the event. I hope we can all be together someday in the future! Japanese politeness and Thai politeness meets tonight 😉 As the 3rd place winner, Dee Juusan from Jordan gave us a great speech. She wrote on her studio wall, “I’ll be there one day…” And she achieved her goal faster than we could have imagined! We are ever so proud to be part of her history. Looking forward to an even more exciting future to come, now that she has joined the MASTER CLASS! In 2nd place, Erwin Prasetya from Indonesia wishes to thank God, for leading him to where he is today. We are also sincerely grateful for the events that lead to us all being under one roof tonight. We may come from different backgrounds, but right now we are all feeling the same, embracing the joys of Manga! And in 1st place, Vincent Lange from Germany received the last certificate from our representative director, Nobuhiko Horie. He gave a speech not only for himself, but also on behalf of every artist who entered our humble competition. Everyone at the committee is so thankful for his sincere appreciation. We were bursting with pride! We had a great musical performance by Takehiro Kunugi and his band, synced to the videos of silent manga, making a wonderful summary of the events that took place in the two years of running SILENT MANGA AUDITION®   Horie-san had this to say before the performance: “SILENT MANGA actually speaks a lot, not via dialogue, but in your own minds. We don’t use spoken words for communication, we use details like facial expressions and gestures, and so when the characters move their mouths, you hear their words in your own native language. Every time this movie is played, there is a new version of the original, in different languages and cultures. Today, we hope you will have your own version of the story to take home with you. Enjoy the show” To play the video from the “FUSION OF SILENT MANGA AND MUSIC” performance, click image below :   No need for words I’m sure. Now it’s our judges’ turn at the mic. Tsukasa Hojo sensei is so impressed by the winning silent manga and is looking forward to more original manga that comes from different parts of the world.  He also says he has more questions than answers to give. I’m sure he got some answers, and many new questions, as we talked on and on… Ryuji Tsugihara sensei talks about how he felt when the SILENT MANGA artists made him realize the original power of Manga. What an honor to finally give him something back, after all he has given to the world. Tetsuo Hara sensei’s jokes make the crowd burst into laughter! And he gives the strongest of endorsements to the award winners, future winners and every contestant of SILENT MANGA AUDITION®, in style! We are back again, for the photoshoot. Our man Horie-san is back on the mic, to give a little speech on “How manga became successful, and how it will spread throughout the world.” Mocchi and Taiyo will be covering that in upcoming videos! Mr. Miya, the president of North Stars Pictures Inc., concludes what has been an amazing night. After the event, the committee members joined the MASTER CLASS to try out some more Japanese delicacies in the town of Kichijoji and a tour of Tokyo the next day, which we hope to report to you soon 🙂   Our sincerest thanks to all our partners, and every one of the guests, who attended the event to celebrate our proud winners, from both the domestic Comic-Zenon manga award, MANGA-AUDITION and the SILENT MANGA AUDITION®. Together with our contestants, future contestants and readers, we sincerely hope to make this an even greater world-wide movement! What did you think of our event report? LIKE it if you want to be part of it, and share it on Facebook, twitter or an SNS of your choice! Chairman Mocchi and manager Taiyo will checking the official Facebook page! Here is a summary of the event in video footage.