A Blast From The Past: The True Origin of Foldabots

In Loving Memory of

Jose Alfonso "Poch" Tejido

April 16, 1953 to May 7, 2013

  This blog is dedicated to all Folda-Fans in all over the seven thousand islands...

...and especially to the man who made this revolution.

"Part taken from Jomike Tejido's Facebook post, on May 11, 2013, 11:38 am" 

"When I was in the 2nd grade, I showed my dad my paper toy, decepticon Ravage, based on the cassette tape that turned into a beast/dog. He said it was his favorite coz he can flatten it and put it in his pocket. I never asked for the real Ravage toy. It was these little moments of appreciation that made me love art and making things, that eventually led to the creation of Foldabots."

Now, below is the actual drawing of his 'Very First Foldabot' and a picture of the actual model.

Original Hand Drawing by Jomike Tejido back in Grade 2. Resembles a cassette tape which turns into a panther-like robot.

This is how the toy is formed

By the looks of the original drawing, the shape of the cassette tape is not exactly the right proportions as if it is wider than a standard cassette, aside from it was drawn by hand. The result was a nice little paper craft idea, that almost looks like the real thing. The toy doesn't need glue or any other stuff to add, you just need to cut out the pattern and fold some of the parts to make it stand out. Because of this, it gave me inspiration to make my version of his toy, using the Graph Paper Grid I mentioned back in another blog. Aside from this, I also made some other designs from the same concept. The difference is you're going to glue the two sides together since one side has the cassette side and the other is the alt. This is just like Uwak, the red crow sidekick of Lupet. You can also make your designs on the white side of the cassettes.

(Left to Right) Beast-type, Bird-type, Humanoid-type

The cassette design is just a clip art I found in the internet. By the way, there is another set I'll try to make, but this time it's a combiner type. It's a challenge for me to make this inspiration to grow into this great product. So, until then... SEE YOU AGAIN ON THE NEXT BLOG! Don't forget to comment if you have any reactions on my blogs!

AURA-SAN SERIES [COMPLETE]

WHO ARE THE AURA-SANS?

These are Foldabots that are made from watches. There were actually real digital watches that were released back in 2009, it comes in three colors to represent the three units: white, blue, and red. There was a green one though, but it was claimed the unused color... until now.

A BRIEF HISTORY

The Aura-Sans was released back in 2009. The first of the trio was Dakotron, and was published on K-Zone's Summer issue, which also had the special episode of the Foldabots comics where Dakotron is further introduced. Next is Kulog from the June 2009 issue, and then Lobo from the July 2009 issue. They were republished in 2011 for Foldabots Toy Book Vol.4, along with a redesigned Blup figurine.

PATTERN ALTERATIONS FROM ONE TO ANOTHER

As the first of the series, Aura-San 1 is simply a white watch used by Caloy in both the original story and in Foldabots MegaMix. Its alt form is a 'guardian mech' equipped with two robotic pincers for hands, biped concept, and it's the first Foldabot of its kind back then. Aura-San 2 is the first alteration of the previous unit. The most noticeable alteration is the wings are folded out from the two bars. It also has a bill and a tail like most birds. In addition, there is a port where you place a standee piece of Blup and place it on top. Aura-San 3 reuses the leg parts from the first unit and uses it as hind legs. Its wolf design became a standard pattern to some future designs like the Saurobots and the Yelobots. Also, they added this gimmick where you combine these three to form a dragon which was indicated on their original bio pages.

MY TAKE ON A JOMIKE TEJIDO ORIGINAL DESIGN

Now, due to my obsession over the Aura-Sans and trying to make up a good fan fiction, I thought of making something to break this limit--creating new Aura-Sans. I created two new ones at first, one is called Aura-San 4 Tigre, and another Aura-San 5 Pagpag. They were based off both AS2 and AS3. When I thought of combining these with the existing set, which I recreated with the use of graphing paper, I suddenly made a really good super combiner which reminds you of Voltron (the robot made up of five separate lion ships forming in this fashion.) Well, the first designs were almost original though, but there was something wrong about them. After a few trials and errors, I decided to render them for the very first time. It was still a failure. When I got Toy Book 4, I noticed how Kulog really looks like, that was the only error I made before I opened that book. Before that, I made seven more variations, (actually eight, due to the fact I made two six-changer Aura-Sans) which includes several original designs, and a full alteration to the Bakunawa Dragon. Although this idea might be weird, but hey, it turned out very incredible.

AURA-SANS IN FOLDABOTS MEGAMIX

Now, in writing this story, it took me 14 months to finish it, and edited them several times, due to the fact it was for mature audiences. It was my big mistake to have a work that is inappropriate for younger readers. Aside from this, I came up with a few original characters for this story. The first two were Caloy, Miko, and Raya's new friends Boy and Lia. I decided to add in some teenagers in the story for a little twist. The teenagers are based on real people, which were some of my favorite Filipino teenage celebrities. All of the characters' names are also puns I made up.

PATTERNS

I used PowerPoint to make simple Foldabots Toy Patterns like these ones. Now, most of these will come out bigger than the original designs. I also include straps in these patterns if you want them to look like watches. Badly, in my video series, I didn't include the watch straps because they don't do much in the transformation. Anyway, here are the finalized patterns I made.

AURA-SAN 1 [DAKOTRON]

AURA-SAN 2 [KULOG]

AURA-SAN 3 [LOBO]

AURA-SAN 4 [TIGRE]

AURA-SAN 5 [PAGPAG]

AURA-SAN VI [ANIM-OH]

AURA-SAN VII [HIMIG]

AURA-SAN VIII [PAWIKON]

AURA-SAN IX [DAHONIKRON]

AURA-SAN X [DRILL MECH]

AURA-SAN X1 [JET EAGLE]

AURA-SAN X2 [TANK BEAR]

OTHER STRAPS

Now, to wrap up this blog, I'll leave you with this playlist, which contains the whole series which I uploaded for a whole month. I worked hard to made this compilation for everyone to know how I made this idea.



If you have questions to ask, please comment below. Don't forget to share this blog to all your Folda-Friends out there! Next Month, I'll be making another contest for those aspiring Folda-Fans to see their works on this blog and it's going to be called "FOLDABOTS IDOL"!

Foldabots 7th Anniversary Special SURPRISE!

It's that time of year again where we celebrate this occasion--Jomike Tejido's Foldabots turns 7 this year. Aside from Harurot, our Foldabot of the month of May, it is also elections again. To those who are heading to the polls this May 13, please, the future of the Philippines lies in your hands, it is our choice. If those crook politics get their positions in the Senate, who else to blame but us?

Now, as I promised, this will be a surprise for all Folda-Fans, 'cause this is where I'll showcase Foldabot patterns taken from K-Zone Philippines.

I decided to scan two patterns in one image so I can save time scanning these. The other patterns I scanned this Summer are Foldabots Toy Book Volumes 3, 4, and 5. I didn't include the Dark Ages board game pieces from TB3 since I don't want to include them. I also exclude the Saurobots and the Yelobots from TB5, because it's the same patterns ripped from the magazines. Aside from these, I didn't scan Sagip's pattern also from that book, probably I'm a bit lazy to bring him along. Now, I also have many more K-Zone rips at home, but they still have missing parts needed to find. That is why I only have two full combiner sets complete at this point. (Note: I added some patterns awhile ago, and now I decided to remove them in favor.)

Update as of 17 April, 2015: I decided to re-upload them since they're going to be the same in Toy Books 7 and the upcoming 8, which the Sporticons will be included there.

One of which, is the dragon gestalt of the Lutabots--KONTROLION.
Now, Kontrolion is composed of brain-washed Foldabots (except for Gaseratron if you check out his bio from the June 2011 K-Zone issue.) who can form into this abomination. Talking about mismatch over Bakunawa Dragon, Kontrolion has four units who go under the sub-group name "Supremobots", while Bakunawa only has three. I prefer Higantechron to be his enemy since it also has four units as well.
Gaseratron and Kuryenticon are almost made with the same pattern, Gaseratron is an gas tanker hauler truck, while Kuryenticon is a service truck with a ladder. Amihanator is a passenger aircraft without those boosters under the wings. Tigastron's pattern is based on Riles from the Komyutabots.

Gaseratron and Kuryenticon

Amihanator and Tigastron

We move on with the Sporticons. If you want to see the blog I made before, CLICK HERE.
As you can see, they are made with the same gimmick but with different alterations, from hood shapes, door pieces, canopy styles, and tire designs. I didn't add Buhatron because he came out in TB4. (Note: Same as above, I also removed the patterns.)

Rojotron and Verdetron

Violeta and Azurenator

I'm wrapping this blog up with some more updates. In the comic strip, Buhawi uses the Bakunawa Spirit Power to purify the Sporticons, making them turn into Foldabots because of their odd behavior. Meanwhile there will be no Foldabots Tribe Wars for the next two weeks, so then episode 4 will be around on the third or last week of May. OK, that's it for now, and next time I'll be uploading all my CUSTOM AURA-SANS made for Foldabots MegaMix, after I upload all my Aura-San videos on YouTube.