Bristol International Comic and Small Press Expo - Part 2

Regular visitors to Escape from Tomorrow will know just how much I enjoy books from publisher Top Cow - Witchblade, The Darkness, Velocity, Magdalena ... the list goes: complex characters in thought provoking stories complemented by some of the finest art you'll find anywhere in comic books.

Imagine my delight, therefore, when I saw that both Matt Timson and David Hine were scheduled to appear at this years BICSPE.

As I was based at the Mercure Holland House Hotel conference centre I tracked down Matt Timson first. I'd met Matt last year at the Exeter Comic Expo where, aside from getting a few books signed, I was able to purchase an extremely limited edition A3 Darkness print.

Matt very kindly agreed to sign a couple more books and to do a sketch for me - I asked for Batman after seeing a really nice Batman sketch he'd posted a little while ago on Twitter.

I popped back an hour or so later and couldn't have been happier with what I saw - Matt was putting the finishing touches to this stunning illustration.

Matt had a brought along a selection of prints of some of his work and, continuing the theme started at Exeter last year, I purchased a glossy, full colour print of his cover from Top Cow's free comic book day offering The Darkness II: Confession that I'll shortly be framing and displaying at home.

I genuinely couldn't have been happier with both the sketch and the print - thank you Matt.

Over at the Ramada City Hotel David Hine was sharing a table with Shaky Kane where, amongst other projects, they were promoting their Bulletproof Coffin collection. David was kind enough to sign copies of Top Cow's The Darkness: Four Horsemen for me and then, after signing some of my Batman books, very graciously agreed to my unusual request for him to record a promo 'bumper' for a forthcoming episode of The Batman Universe Comic Podcast.

Two very nice, and super talented, guys who it really was my pleasure to meet once again.