Bram Stoker's Dracula

People often ask me if I "paint on the computer" and many assume I do it all digitally. I love the look on people's faces when I tell them I draw everything and all the textures are either like the photo I took below or hand made and painted then scanned for later use.

I do own a cintiq, just never really used it yet since I still prefer to do things by hand.

Maybe one day.

( And huzzah, just got the blogger app so seeing how an update goes while on the bus. It'll make posting WIPs much easier! )

I'm off for Wizard World Chicago tomorrow, I'll be there for the entire thing. ( And then hanging around Chicago for a bit and maybe doing one other signing, with the amazingly talented Menton3, though details are to come )

I'll be at my booth at the con almost the entire time, find me at booth 3215 with my red banner "T' logo thing.

I'll be doing commissions! Email me at bentemplesmith@gmail.com to get on the list or see me as early as you can at the con. Am likely to fill up. All info for commissions is here.



I WILL HAVE SOME COPIES OF SQUIDGIRLS WITH ME. Yes, indeed, a couple boxes worth should make it to the con by Friday or so. They're $50, come signed and with an original sketch page and fancy, personalized experience with me, idiot supreme. The power of Squid compels you, etc etc.

Also, I'll have a bunch of cheap prints. First come, first served.

I expect 3 very common questions/statements while at the con. Let me answer them for everyone in advance... though apparently nobody checks my various websites aaaanyway... :-P ( Maybe I'll just direct fans to my website here eh? )

1) What happened with FELL?

WORKING ON IT. ( Same with CHOKER )

2) What did you think of the 30 Days of Night movie?

IT WAS GOOD. YAY! I'm all about comics though, not many people get the chance to have a movie made of their work, so who am I to ever diss it? It was lovely. David Slade did a fantastic job.

3) I didn't know you were going to be here!

YES, the most common of statements made to me. I have a website, the con itself has a website, lets all make glorious comic music with each other, yes?  I'll be there. With bells on. At least pants. ( I keep saying this now. Maybe one day I'll actually go pantsless and shock you all? )

Being back in the US has been a good time. I nearly didn't come back due to family & personal stuff but bugger it, there's a lot of life yet to live. Seattle and it's surrounds continue to be beautiful, now it's on to Chicago and let's win this thing. ( Just don't shoot me on the way out through the kitchens please ) Oh, and then finally NYC where I hope to loiter for possibly a good few years and mix it with some amazing artists who continue to enthuse me about comics. If you happen to have an amazing NY apartment for rent, let me know. I may also at some point be looking for an intern in said city. But beware, the interview process will be long, awkward and involve knifey spoony.

A special shout out to Julie and Damien Shanahan. ( As well as Gerick, Killian and Emma ) Finer human beings I have not met in my short insignificant life. My pseudo family this side of the Pacific. I'll be back to Seattle next year.

I write a basic plot outline, then write pure dialogue, all by hand, then layout the entire book, then draw it, then finally after all that, I actually type up the dialogue and cut it up so someone else can actually letter the thing, because they can't peer directly into my head.

Ask me anything

Umm... You think mullets count? I do not.

Ask me anything. Typing actual english words helps though.

Yes, absolutely.

You see it in "fine art" especially with the recent spate of them ripping off commercial artists and calling their "reproductions" "found art" or some such. Meaning in art is a lovely thing but honestly, it's really about how pretty and aesthetically pleasing something is at the end of the day. I miss the days of actual technical proficiency that'd go along with the long winded "explanations" for their art too. I appreciate most art, as I appreciate the beauty, even in the ugly side of life... but I really wish decent figurative art would make a come back.

Banksy, now, there's an artist who at least for awhile had real meaning and social commentary to his work.

In my opinion, the worst offenders of "pretentious" artists are some musicians, who rate their own work far too highly and go on and on in such serious ways...when the intelligent people in the room know they're simply derivative of many a musician before them, or even worse, are a creation and simply a front for corporate blandness sold as "edgy" and "new" when it's been written by committee and the singer mimes the words and looks pretty. People who don't even write their own music are not musicians, they're taking part in some shallow commercial karaoke business. Yeah, musicians, when you've written a piece that captures the mood of the times and affects a generation or becomes their voice, then you can take yourself uber seriously. Odds are though, those talented folks are just humble and like to write and acknowledge that it's luck of the draw as to what sticks. You're not all David Bowie. You're not all Nick Drake. ( Nick Drake impersonators are the funniest to me. )

To me, art, all art should first and foremost be a creative outlet that makes the creator happy. Sod anything else. Sod all the extra layers of meaning you want to add to try and make yourself "serious". Just have fun, make something beautiful and
hopefully many others will also agree. And by beautiful, I don't mean happy. By al lmeans, share your sadness with the world too. Don't fluff yourself up as if it's some deep thing. It's not. Unless you watched your heroin junkie parents parents die in a burning car wreck and were then raised by an abusive step uncle named Jeff, living with the demons he got while off fighting in some war that damaged his brain and the depleted uranium shriveled his testes and made him a eunuch...then you're probably just a middle class effete bastard play acting at such things. Don't take yourself so seriously. Because I won't. It's either pretty to look at/listen to or it isn't. "Meaning" ( pretention ) is too often used to cover up for lack of quality. I crack up when I hear musicians get interviewed and droll on and on about the importance of a certain piece or blah blah blah. Especially when they've got a 100 million in the bank. Yes, you have it so tough, please share your troubles with us. Same for you, Damian Hirst.


End angry old man rant. I tend not to like pretentious holier than thou types. Or as we call them, wankers.

Ask me anything. Typing actual english words helps though.

Bram Stoker's Dracula

People often ask me if I "paint on the computer" and many assume I do it all digitally. I love the look on people's faces when I tell them I draw everything and all the textures are either like the photo I took below or hand made and painted then scanned for later use.

I do own a cintiq, just never really used it yet since I still prefer to do things by hand.

Maybe one day.

( And huzzah, just got the blogger app so seeing how an update goes while on the bus. It'll make posting WIPs much easier! )

I'm off for Wizard World Chicago tomorrow, I'll be there for the entire thing. ( And then hanging around Chicago for a bit and maybe doing one other signing, with the amazingly talented Menton3, though details are to come )

I'll be at my booth at the con almost the entire time, find me at booth 3215 with my red banner "T' logo thing.

I'll be doing commissions! Email me at bentemplesmith@gmail.com to get on the list or see me as early as you can at the con. Am likely to fill up. All info for commissions is here.



I WILL HAVE SOME COPIES OF SQUIDGIRLS WITH ME. Yes, indeed, a couple boxes worth should make it to the con by Friday or so. They're $50, come signed and with an original sketch page and fancy, personalized experience with me, idiot supreme. The power of Squid compels you, etc etc.

Also, I'll have a bunch of cheap prints. First come, first served.

I expect 3 very common questions/statements while at the con. Let me answer them for everyone in advance... though apparently nobody checks my various websites aaaanyway... :-P ( Maybe I'll just direct fans to my website here eh? )

1) What happened with FELL?

WORKING ON IT. ( Same with CHOKER )

2) What did you think of the 30 Days of Night movie?

IT WAS GOOD. YAY! I'm all about comics though, not many people get the chance to have a movie made of their work, so who am I to ever diss it? It was lovely. David Slade did a fantastic job.

3) I didn't know you were going to be here!

YES, the most common of statements made to me. I have a website, the con itself has a website, lets all make glorious comic music with each other, yes?  I'll be there. With bells on. At least pants. ( I keep saying this now. Maybe one day I'll actually go pantsless and shock you all? )

Being back in the US has been a good time. I nearly didn't come back due to family & personal stuff but bugger it, there's a lot of life yet to live. Seattle and it's surrounds continue to be beautiful, now it's on to Chicago and let's win this thing. ( Just don't shoot me on the way out through the kitchens please ) Oh, and then finally NYC where I hope to loiter for possibly a good few years and mix it with some amazing artists who continue to enthuse me about comics. If you happen to have an amazing NY apartment for rent, let me know. I may also at some point be looking for an intern in said city. But beware, the interview process will be long, awkward and involve knifey spoony.

A special shout out to Julie and Damien Shanahan. ( As well as Gerick, Killian and Emma ) Finer human beings I have not met in my short insignificant life. My pseudo family this side of the Pacific. I'll be back to Seattle next year.

I write a basic plot outline, then write pure dialogue, all by hand, then layout the entire book, then draw it, then finally after all that, I actually type up the dialogue and cut it up so someone else can actually letter the thing, because they can't peer directly into my head.

Ask me anything

Umm... You think mullets count? I do not.

Ask me anything. Typing actual english words helps though.

Yes, absolutely.

You see it in "fine art" especially with the recent spate of them ripping off commercial artists and calling their "reproductions" "found art" or some such. Meaning in art is a lovely thing but honestly, it's really about how pretty and aesthetically pleasing something is at the end of the day. I miss the days of actual technical proficiency that'd go along with the long winded "explanations" for their art too. I appreciate most art, as I appreciate the beauty, even in the ugly side of life... but I really wish decent figurative art would make a come back.

Banksy, now, there's an artist who at least for awhile had real meaning and social commentary to his work.

In my opinion, the worst offenders of "pretentious" artists are some musicians, who rate their own work far too highly and go on and on in such serious ways...when the intelligent people in the room know they're simply derivative of many a musician before them, or even worse, are a creation and simply a front for corporate blandness sold as "edgy" and "new" when it's been written by committee and the singer mimes the words and looks pretty. People who don't even write their own music are not musicians, they're taking part in some shallow commercial karaoke business. Yeah, musicians, when you've written a piece that captures the mood of the times and affects a generation or becomes their voice, then you can take yourself uber seriously. Odds are though, those talented folks are just humble and like to write and acknowledge that it's luck of the draw as to what sticks. You're not all David Bowie. You're not all Nick Drake. ( Nick Drake impersonators are the funniest to me. )

To me, art, all art should first and foremost be a creative outlet that makes the creator happy. Sod anything else. Sod all the extra layers of meaning you want to add to try and make yourself "serious". Just have fun, make something beautiful and
hopefully many others will also agree. And by beautiful, I don't mean happy. By al lmeans, share your sadness with the world too. Don't fluff yourself up as if it's some deep thing. It's not. Unless you watched your heroin junkie parents parents die in a burning car wreck and were then raised by an abusive step uncle named Jeff, living with the demons he got while off fighting in some war that damaged his brain and the depleted uranium shriveled his testes and made him a eunuch...then you're probably just a middle class effete bastard play acting at such things. Don't take yourself so seriously. Because I won't. It's either pretty to look at/listen to or it isn't. "Meaning" ( pretention ) is too often used to cover up for lack of quality. I crack up when I hear musicians get interviewed and droll on and on about the importance of a certain piece or blah blah blah. Especially when they've got a 100 million in the bank. Yes, you have it so tough, please share your troubles with us. Same for you, Damian Hirst.


End angry old man rant. I tend not to like pretentious holier than thou types. Or as we call them, wankers.

Ask me anything. Typing actual english words helps though.