Page 15 - MidWeek - Dec 21, 2022

FROM PAGE 14
DECEMBER 21, 2022 MIDWEEK 15
WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE TOY?
“Except for my (Ryan’s World) toys, probably Rubik’s Cube. My record is not that fast, like 40-something seconds, but other people at my school can solve it in 30 or 20 seconds.”
FAVORITE FOOD?
“Sushi or Vietnamese banh cuon.”
FAVORITE BOOK?
“Holes.”
FAVORITE MOVIE?
“There’s also a movie for Holes. I really like it.” FAVORITE TV SHOW?
“I used to watch Kid Danger a lot.”
FAVORITE SUPERHERO?
“I guess Red Titan because that’s like me. (Red Titan is a character in the Ryan’s World Universe.)”
FAVORITE VIDEO GAME?
“Minecraft. It’s really fun.” FAVORITE SUBJECT?
“Math. I really like adding numbers and multiplying.”
FAVORITE YOUTUBER?
“I don’t really have a favorite because I watch hundreds of different ones, but my favorite topics are gaming videos, mostly about Roblox and Minecraft.”
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP?
“Either a gaming developer or a 3D artist or animator.”
HOW DO YOU LIKE LIVING IN HAWAI‘I?
“It’s really nice. We can go outside because Hawai‘i has one of the lowest COVID rates. I used to hike Diamond Head a lot. It’s really fun with my family.”
WHAT MESSAGE DO YOU HAVE FOR YOUR FANS?
“If they want to do YouTube, you should always do the topic of the video of what you want to do. It makes the video more fun and entertaining when you are very happy about it.”
WHAT IS SOMETHING PEOPLE WOULD BE SURPRISED TO KNOW?
“I really like roller coasters and anime.”
WHAT IS AT THE TOP OF YOUR WISH LIST?
“What I would want the most is a new graphics card (for computers).”
Kajis Are Living Their Own Toy Story
Shion, who is Japanese, and Loann, who is Viet- namese, say Houston is still home base for them. It’s where their families live and their company is head- quartered. But they’re also enjoying life in paradise, creating new memories on and off the camera.
“When we decided maybe we should go to Hawai‘i, we actually took Ryan with us here to check out the place and see if he likes it,” says Loann. “He ended up loving it. He loved hanging out at the beach. He was trying to surf, and I was like, ‘What do you think about moving here?’ He was like, ‘Oh, that means I can go to the beach all the time,’ so it just worked out.”
(Inset) The family’s Christmas tree sports a plush doll: Ryan’s World Red Titan. (Above) Ryan Kaji and his twin sisters, Emma and Kate, have outside interests beyond their involvement in the family production company, Sunlight Entertainment. ANTHONY CONSILLIO PHOTOS
Currently, Ryan, Emma and Kate attend the same school. In his free time, Ryan swims, plays tennis, enjoys rollerblading and started going to the gym with his friends (yes, he’s growing up). He also has been taking “circus class” for the past couple of years, learning juggling, card tricks and magic tricks.
“A lot of our videos, he’s in the beginning part or it’s an animation or a compila- tion of his previous videos, so the cadence of us actual- ly producing new content really is once a week, and because our videos aren’t scripted it doesn’t take too long to make.”
“We found it fascinating because we didn’t have any equipment or any editing skills ... but somehow it captured their minds.”
There also is the Ryan’s World brand side of the business, producing toys, video games, clothing and more, as well as collabora- tions, such as a toothpaste and toothbrush with Col- gate, cereal with Kellogg’s and sneakers with Skechers.
Emma has jumped into ka- rate, and together with Kate, they do swimming, gymnas- tics and piano lessons.
“There’s one video where we tried flashlights as studio lights,” remembers Shion. “We’re flashing the flash- lights on Ryan’s face and only his face is lighting up.”
“We have a lot of new ex- citing projects for next year that we cannot say in detail just yet but there are a lot of projects in connection with Hawai‘i,” shares Shion. “Now that we moved to Ha- wai‘i, we’ d like to contrib- ute to the community here, and there are many projects that we’ re right now work- ing on that has to do with Hawai‘i.
They also all serve as cre- ative directors for the fam- ily’s production company, Sunlight Entertainment.
“We always get the ques- tion of how Ryan balances his time,” notes Loann. “Since we moved to Ha- wai‘i, we only film 1-2 hours a week, and mainly on the weekends so he’s able to have a lot of time doing ex- tracurricular activities that he enjoys and hanging out with friends. That’s our No.
“It was about four months after that (first video) we felt, OK, this is really big, we have to get support,” re-
Now, the Kajis have a team of over 35 employees (including video editors, animators and videogra- phers) working at Sunlight Entertainment, which they formed a year after launch- ing their YouTube channel.
“We are working togeth- er with a company based in Hawai‘i,” he adds. “We’d love to help promote the culture and community and bring more awareness of how great Hawai‘i is.”
151 priority: education and
“We film (on our iPhones) in Hawai‘i and send it to them and they edit,” reveals Shion. “That’s why we’re
making sure that he still has a childhood.
calls Shion, who worked as a structural engineer. “We were getting a lot of expo- sure around the world and a lot of kids just waiting for new videos ...
able to move here. We real- ized a lot of editors can just do it remote. There are a lot of new staff members we hired outside of Houston, some of them live in New York, California, Colorado ... we were able to recruit a lot of good talent from all over the place.”
R
Earnings at $27 million. In 2017, he became the young- est person to ever make a Forbes top earners list with $11 million. And just two years before that was when Loann posted that very first video on YouTube of an adorable 3-year-old Ryan picking out a toy at Target. Initially called Ryan Toys- Review, the channel was renamed to Ryan’s World and evolved from videos of Ryan opening toys to a mix of fun things like pretend play, science experiments, music videos, skits, chal- lenges, DIY arts and crafts, and more.
Shion and Loann started researching ways to im- prove video quality and con- sidered investing in equip- ment, but they didn’t have a budget back then. They used a green tablecloth against a wall for a green screen, and put a shower curtain over the table to make it white.
ecently, Forbes listed Ryan in its 2022 Top Creators
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