Meet the founders behind Cabblow Studios, Kabelo Maaka and her clinician mother, Dr. T. The duo has combined their talents in animation, medicine, and innovation to make educational cartoons on health issues.
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00:00Ever heard of medical animation? Well, this mother-daughter duo has carved out a
00:05unique niche for themselves in the animation industry. We use the charm of
00:10animation to simplify really difficult, sometimes boring and overwhelming
00:17medical concepts. Meet the talented founders of Cabello Studios, Cabello and
00:26her clinician mother, Dr. T. Since 2017, this formidable force has
00:30combined their talents in animation, medicine and innovation to make medical
00:35information available to the public in the form of cartoons, both educational and
00:40entertaining. She's the medical, I'm the animation. She was looking for a job, right?
00:45She didn't want to be a statistic, that's what she always says, I didn't want to be a statistic.
00:49So then I said, okay, let's start a studio, but have a unique selling point. Enter the
00:56market and create medical animation. And she was like, no, but I went to school to do
01:02film. I want to make movies. I want to make movies. I said, no, this is a business. So in
01:07order to differentiate yourself, let's do something where one, I can be involved and
01:12two, it will be an easy entry into the market. So we decided on doing medical
01:17animations. With over 30 years of experience as a clinician and training in anesthesiology
01:25and public health management, why did Dr. T. find it important to leave that and co-found
01:30the studio with her daughter? Well, it was not my plan. I think when I had her as a daughter,
01:38I just, you know, and she told me she wanted to be an animator. I was going to support her
01:43in everything that I could. I mean, I took her to open days at universities overseas. I took her to
01:48Disneyland. I took her to university just so that she could know how about the industry. But my plan
01:53was never, ever, ever, ever to work with her. But then she's an only child. You know, I went to a
02:00medical school and I also did a bit of financial management. I've done directorship work. So I
02:06understand the world of business. And so at the beginning, I was just trying to be, you know,
02:10a mummager just to try and get her work so that she can then do her work. But then I realized
02:15business administration is something else and I needed to get involved. So I just got involved
02:21out of the love of a mum for a daughter. Their first short film released in 2019 tackles type 2
02:27diabetes and the complications of diabetes. It has so far been screened in over 22 festivals worldwide.
02:34My aunt had diabetes, my grandmother had diabetes, and my great-grandmother even had diabetes.
02:40diabetes. And it all kind of came together into this animated documentary actually, where
02:48we took my grandmother's voice, my aunt's voice, turned them into cartoon characters and
02:53told their story about how they've struggled and overcome diabetes. The film is called Three
02:59Teaspoons of Sugar. And everybody's like, oh, are you saying we must have three teaspoons? No,
03:04no, it's because there's three women in my family who had diabetes. This is how it starts. We use it for
03:11energy. We use it to make our food taste better. You know, just a little bit of sugar. We don't really
03:17think that sugar could be something that could hurt us. But that's the reason for this movie. We decided
03:25to take some time to talk to some people who've seen the bittersweet side of sugar. Even now, even
03:32though I look at the animation and I'm like, it's a little bit janky and it's a little bit old, but it
03:37still warms people's hearts and it's still informative at the same time. Ever since then, everybody that has
03:44watched it understands how serious diabetes is and how you can manage it, you know. But for me,
03:50it really worked that that my mother could look at it and say, oh, sorry, I was a difficult patient.
03:55Now I understand why I need to take care of myself. As South Africans, like our literacy level in terms
04:02of our health, very low. A literacy level in general can be really low. So something like animation where
04:07it's pictures, it's characters that look like you, they have the same skin, they have the same hair,
04:11they have the same condition and also is in your language, you know, not just in English.
04:17That can be really, really useful for actually combating some of the issues that could be really
04:23preventable, like type 2 diabetes with our film. That's something that is preventable.
04:29But it's not all medical related stuff. You have to meet Rory Sung.
04:34She is the main character from our TV show concept called Rory Sung and the Girls.
04:39She's based off of me and my friends in school. I went to an all-girls school. We had a band.
04:45It's like modern African girlhood, you know, and self-esteem and self-expression,
04:51friendship, believing in yourself. We're trying to always give out positive messaging with our stories.
04:57So even though Rory Sung is not a medical project, she is a positive project.
05:02And what's it like to run a business with your mother?
05:05I always tell people that because I have someone who it's like in-built in them that they want the best for me,
05:15I've got like a built-in cheerleader and a built-in mentor. Because my mom has been cheering for me my whole life,
05:21you know. We started this animation journey when I was 11 is where I was like, I want to do animation,
05:28even though I had no idea how it was going to come together. So she's been taking me seriously,
05:33a whole doctor has been taking me seriously with this animation thing from the very beginning.
05:38You know, when you have a child and you see them grow and, you know, they go through the milestones,
05:44all of the things that I learned in medical school. But for me, this was a time to see her in a
05:49different light where she's growing in business and she's coming into her own and creating what she
05:54likes. And so I really enjoy working with her. With the production team of about 14 people in various
06:01corners of the globe, Cablo Studios is proving that creativity and innovation can change industries
06:07and maybe even lives. Who says art and science don't go hand in hand?