Travis Smith: “Some of my best ideas were just there”
I make no bones about the fact that I’m a huge Travis Smith fan. His CD artwork is Art with a capital “A” and it graces the covers of many of my all-time favorite CDs. So I was thrilled when Travis said Yes to my interview inquiry e-mail. I called Travis this past week and was surprised to discover that he was gracious with his time, friendly, and somewhat self deprecating. What follows is our conversation, virtually word for word…
TS: How you doin’, Bill?
BM: Hey! How are you?
TS: Oh, not too bad, not too bad.
TS: Little tired.
BM: Little tired? Well, did you have a hectic day today?
TS: Yeah, I’ve been basically moving stuff all week, and cleaning up the yard, and moving, you know, breaking stuff up and throwing it in the trash and everything. And I haven’t had much sleep, so–
BM: Oh really?
TS: –it’s catching up with me.
BM: Wow. Well, I appreciate your time then, doubly today.
TS: Oh, no problem.
BM: Well, as you know, I’m a big fan of your art.
TS: Well, thank you very much.
BM: And as a matter of fact, you know, interestingly enough, the ProgPower forum just posted a question, a thread posed this week, “What’s your favorite artwork of 2006?” And wouldn’t you know, your name pops up quite often. [laughs]
TS: Oh really?
BM: Yeah.
TS: I’ll have to look at that.
BM: One of the top albums of 2006 that people are citing right now is Novembre, the Materia cover, which is phenomenal.
TS: Oh really?
BM: Yeah. They say that’s one of their favorite album covers of 2006.
TS: Wow!
BM: Yeah.
TS: That’s a big compliment.
BM: Well, it’s a great cover. I mean, I’m looking at it right now. That’s phenomenal.
TS: Oh, I see the thread right there.
BM: [laughs] See?
TS: [laughs]
BM: Yeah, you routinely come in like top–another one’s like Mattias Noren, another big artist from Europe. But, yeah, so this interview’s gonna be timely for those folks. They’re gonna love it.
TS: Nice. There’s a nice looking cover on a banner at the top of that page. Manticora?
BM: Oh yeah, yeah.
TS: It’s kinda small, but wow. It looks kinda neat.
BM: [laughs] Your cover art that I’m most familiar with right now is Mercenary’s, the one they just released, The Hours That Remain. When I was taking to Mikkel, he said it was a very quick, easy process, working with you on this one. How did this one differ from the other Mercenary cover you did, Everblack? What made this one so much easier?
TS: Actually, I don’t know. It was a lot easier. It’s hard to pinpoint any particular reason, it just seemed that I connected with them a little faster this time. And plus, you know, since I was working with them on Everblack, I was just talking to them and, you know, still getting a feel for you know, how they were and what they were looking for. And you know, I’ve talked to Jakob [Molbjerg, guitars] numerous times since then, and you know, you kind of, even though we’ve mostly talked over e-mail, you, you know, I felt like I kinda got a better feel for him, his personality, and when he asks you to do something, you kind of know his vision a little bit better.
BM: Yeah.
TS: It’s, in some ways, for the new one, I still ran into the same problem as Everblack, where I wasn’t exactly sure how to pin down their idea right away. But I just, you know, it just kind of fell into place a little faster this time. There was actually less time, I had a lot more time to do Everblack. And I think, for Everblack I think that I had a thing I was working on, and it was a moon picture, and that was something I was just kind of playing with. And they said something about a moon, and I showed them that, and they liked it, but it wasn’t right. And so we spent a lot of time. I said, “Hey, I’ve got this thing I’m working on, maybe it’ll fit.” And then, so we tried a couple different faces in the moon, and that one was more a matter of, they kind of liked it, but it was a matter of getting it right. And this time, there was a little less time and I, you know, I still, I read the lyrics, and you know, there was just so many visuals in their lyrics, it was kind of hard to pinpoint down one single thing to run with. And usually when I do that, when I can’t do that, I try to run with everything.
BM: [laughs]
TS: You know what I mean?
BM: Yeah.
TS: To try to do, and try to do multiple images. And unfortunately, the timeframe this time around wouldn’t allow for that. So I kinda tried to switch to a different frame of mind and just kind of do something that fit with the title, without really, without saying one particular thing, where it would just encompass the general scope of the whole thing. And so, what happened with that, basically, is I got a couple ideas in mind, and did some rough versions, and they, I think I did four or five rough versions, you know, rough drafts of ideas. And I think they weren’t diggin’ one or two of them, but they liked the ones that ended up in there. And that’s pretty much it.
BM: It’s a cool cover. I really like it.
TS: Well, thank you.
BM: You also worked with another band at ProgPower this year, Zero Hour. You did a couple of theirs. Their Towers of Avarice cover is considered one of the classics of all time.
TS: Yeah, that, I’m really proud of that one. And I didn’t get to work with them this time, actually. [On Specs of Pictures Burnt Beyond.] But you know, I was working on that one, and it’s another case of there was some miscommunication and the deadline came up to fast when they asked me, and so I said I’d give it a shot. And they had these ideas, and you know, let me see, I’m trying to recollect here. They gave me some ideas about the title, and then there was a couple other ideas we had for some different songs inside. And it was kinda hard for me, there was a couple of things I had to do special to nail down the idea for the title of the album, so in the meantime I was working on some of the secondary ideas. And the deadline just came up too fast and I couldn’t do everything. Actually, the funny thing is, the thing they put on the cover for the new one, it’s similar to an idea I had.
BM: Oh really?
TS: Yeah. I had a personal picture, when I was, it’s kind of a leftover from the Katatonia Black Sessions. ‘Cause I was doing, there’s a couple pictures from that of a guy with a trench coat, with some photos raining down on him.
BM: [laughs]
TS: And there’s one in that, and when I was working on that idea, one of my drafts that I threw out was the same guy, but he was in a crumbly street.
BM: Oh wow. Yeah.
TS: You know, which was kind of funny. And I actually did have that idea again, and that didn’t seem–I think if I knew they were looking for something like that, I would have ran with it. But it didn’t, that kind of thing didn’t seem as epic for Zero Hour, you know, when you compare it to something like Towers. ‘Cause I was still, you know, whenever I work with Zero Hour, I have that mindset of like, you know, the epic scope like Towers is, or you know, so I wasn’t even thinking along those same lines. And then, you know, I was kinda struggling with that. And then the label had another guy try out some things, and then he did that one, and it’s really cool. But when I saw it, I went, “Oh man, I shoulda tried something like that.”
BM: [laughs]
TS: So, but no, it turned out real well. And looking at the final result, I think they made a good choice, you know?
BM: Oh yeah. It’s pretty good. So you must be pretty familiar with ProgPower USA then, aren’t you?
TS: Oh yeah, I’m familiar with it, yeah. I’ve never seen it.
BM: The way everyone loves your art, I’d think if you came to a ProgPower and set up a table or something that you could probably sell your art and make a fortune. [laughs]
TS: You think?
BM: Yeah. Yeah.
TS: I never even thought about that.
BM: You should connect with Glenn Harveston sometime. He’s the brilliant guy who puts these ProgPower USA festivals together. Maybe he’d consider that. But yeah, that thought just occurred to me. I’m thinking, wow, with all these people liking your art, this is the perfect place for you to be.
TS: Yeah, that’s really flattering. Thank you very much.
BM: [laughs] Well, my taste in art tends to run to sort of the ethereal, Dali, sort of strange, I don’t know how to describe it. But whenever I see your art on a CD cover, I almost want to buy it without even knowing what the band is, ‘cause I figure whatever’s on the inside’s gotta be cool.
TS: [laughs]
BM: Do you get people that, do you have a following like that now, where people just see your cover and think, “Yep, I gotta have that.”
TS: I don’t know, actually. I don’t know what they’re thinking when they buy it. I’ve had a couple people e-mail me with complements like that, and once in a while they’ll say something like that. I think it’s really cool. I mean, it means a lot to me to hear things like that. Actually, some days, hearing things like that actually helps me through the day sometimes, ‘cause I’m stuck on an idea and I think I’m in a rut, and I’m like, “What am I doing?” And I can’t, you know, and I’ll hear something like that. You know, it’s not often, ‘cause I don’t really talk to a lot of people all the time, but occasionally I do hear things like that, and it’s really nice to hear. I mean, it means a lot, and it’s very flattering.
BM: Well, where do your ideas for the CD art images come from? Do the bands send you their music as a demo, or the lyrics, or they just talk through ideas? How do you get from initial contact to final piece?
TS: It varies. Pretty much every project is different in that respect. Sometimes, you know, I don’t even know where to start with something like that. Let me see, I’m not very good on the phone, so I’m trying to think over my words. They, a lot of ideas are just, either I already have them, or you know, I’ve had an idea before and I’ve sketched it down, but it’s incomplete. You know, maybe I just kind of leave it there in case it comes up in the future, just a basic thought. And sometimes somebody will say something and I’ll think back on that and say, “Hey, I have this basic idea, maybe I can work it into this and make it fit, ‘cause it makes me see that.” I mean, the way I see it kinda fits with the way I’m seeing what they’re telling me. Other times, they’ll tell me what the album’s about or what the feeling is or what they’re saying. And I’ll have a completely new idea. And other times, there’s other times where they’ll already have the idea. They’ll say, “We want this, this is exactly what we want. Do this in your style or how you see it.” Or even a little more, off that, they might say, “Well, we kind of know what we want, we have this general theme, but we wanna see what you can do with it. This is what we want this to say, but how you say it is up to you.” But in all the cases, you know, I’ll try something, I’ll put the idea down, and it might not be right at first, so I’ll go back and forth with the band. And we might fix this or fix that and make this better, or you know, things like that. So, but a lot of the ideas, you know, sometimes I’ll get a really good idea, and it’ll fit a CD. There’s been a couple albums that I’ve done that are completely my idea, and at first, they weren’t related to the album. But you know, when I started working on the album, I pulled out that old idea and tailored it to that particular project and it fit real well. But you know, sometimes, once in a while, I’ll get really lucky and a good idea will come from nowhere, you know, sometimes before I need it, sometimes not soon enough. But you know, it just really depends.
BM: Well, you mentioned your style. You know, that’s an interesting phrase, because I was going to ask you about that. Everybody seems to be able to recognize your artwork when they see it. You know, like with Roger Dean or Derek Riggs, or some of these guys that are distinctive. What is it about your style, how would you describe your style? What is it about a piece of CD artwork that says, “Travis Smith”? What do you put into it that says that to somebody? Or even yourself?
TS: I’m not exactly sure. People have asked me that before, and I’m not really sure. I’m not sure what the proper answer would be or the correct answer.
BM: [laughs]
TS: Because, you know, my style is influenced by things I see, just like I’m sure anybody’s is, you know, with whatever they’re doing. And so, some things I do I don’t think are all that distinctive, and some things I do, I think they are. But it’s just, I don’t know, I think when I get an idea, I put it down the way I see it and the way I think that it would look the best. I mean, sometimes I’ll get a little abstract with it, or sketchy, or sometimes I’ll try to do something really focused and simple, you know, more photographic than sloppy, or whatever. It’s just kind of, you know, that’s one of those things I was talking about, where when I’m talking to a band, and we’re talking about the idea, I might see it one way, like “Oh, this needs to be a little abstract, heavily textured or a little bit, you know, a little off kilter, a little bit odd.” And they might agree, or they might not agree. And sometimes they don’t agree, so then I’ll try it the totally opposite way.
BM: Yeah. Well–
TS: I mean, that new Katatonia [The Great Cold Distance], I think is real different for me. I mean, I’ve seen things like that before, I don’t think it’s, as far as the solid red and the solid black, I’ve seen things like that before. But as far as Katatonia goes, I think it’s a little bit different. You know, the band and I were talking back and forth on that, and said we wanted to try something different. And that’s the first thing that popped into my head, just something like that, real stark and real, you know. Not even so much contrast, ‘cause the colors almost eat each other up.
BM: Almost like a Mondrian sort of approach, just primary colors?
TS: Yeah. More or less. And then, inside we just did some little abstract things. But that was the mood that seemed to fit that moment, so.
BM: Well, you know, I’ve read some interviews with you online, and one of them said you’re self-taught and all of your designs come from Photoshop, Illustrator, Quark Xpress, things like that. You also said that some of your designs start with photographic, your own photographic images.
TS: Yeah.
BM: What kind of camera do you have, Travis, that’s taking these kinds of photographs? [laughs] Is it, like, hooked into The Twilight Zone or something?
TS: [laughs] No, it’s just a regular camera. When I say things like that, I mean, sometimes I take a photograph of something that might become something completely different. I mean, right now I’m doing a cover–well, I mean, for example, Towers of Avarice. The basic shapes of the towers, I basically painted the shapes of the towers. And all the things that are in the towers, like to make the texture of them and the elements, they’re just like random photographs, like a metal texture. I made some portholes that I photographed things off a wheel, and just some random pipes, and then like a landscape. Yeah, I went down to the beach where there’s this really tall hotel, and you know, went up to the roof and took a picture of the city, and used that as the landscape for the little textures in the bottom. And then the sky is a mixture of watercolor and actual photographic clouds. So, sometimes I’ll use a straight photo and just treat it and texture it and to give it the right look, and sometimes I’ll just photograph a bunch of different things and cut them up and build something completely different out of that.
BM: Wow.
TS: You know, sometimes I might make a person, you know, there might be a person on the cover, but he could be, they could be made out of different parts of different people that I photographed. You know? So?
BM: [laughs] What kind of camera do you use?
TS: Right now I’m using a Sony digital, like an eight megapixel. Like an F828.
BM: Yeah. That’s pretty high-end. That’s a good camera.
TS: Yeah, it’s not bad. I got it, bought it from a friend of mine who I work with sometimes. And I still like the film thing, I still use my film one as well, but so far, the things that I stick to the digital a lot, because with this one, I finally have one that when I take the photo, the file is, you know, high enough quality that you can use. ‘Cause when I was buying my first camera, the digital cameras, they were taking, you know, very tiny pictures.
BM: [laughs] Yeah.
TS: And you couldn’t print with that, ‘cause it was just too pixelated. So by the time it came ‘round, I got offered this digital camera, the quality was there and the convenience, it’s just very convenient.
BM: Yeah.
TS: I mean, you take a couple of shots and you plug it into the computer, and if I want that old film look, then I just kind of take the digital pictures and put some grain over it.
BM: [laughs] Isn’t that ironic? [laughs]
TS: Yeah. Well, I like that. That’s always been kind of one of the things I like. I really like that old, organic look of film. It looked, I don’t know. When you look at an old photo, or you look at a photo like that, it just had a certain feeling that certain projects just need. If it’s too clean, it just won’t work.
BM: Yep.
TS: And, so actually a while ago, when I got the digital camera, I took, with my film camera, I shot on slide film, I took a bunch of photos of nothing, it was just white. So I scanned that in and got the grain from the film, and I used that. You know, maybe I shot a wall that has different lights on it, so the edges are a little dark, and sometimes I lay those over the digital and it gives it a little more, you know, organic, or yeah, organic look.
BM: You know, some of these interviews, I read a couple just today, interviews with you. One in ‘99 that you did and somebody asked you if you still have a day job, and you said yes. But then the very next year, in a 2000 interview, you said no, now your full time work is making CD cover art.
TS: Yeah, yeah.
BM: In one year’s time, you jumped from yes to no.
TS: I think I quit my job in ‘99. I think that’s when I quit, ‘cause I got signed on to a comic book.
BM: Oh really?
TS: And so, basically, I just wanted to take a risk and try it out. And so the comic book was basically my day job at that point, but I didn’t have a day job anymore. But the comic book was consistent, that was my job, and the CD covers were still side work, you know. ‘Cause I’d get up in the morning, and I’d have to finish one or two pages today, you know, no question. So that was, that became my day job without having the day job that you clock into, you know?
BM: [laughs]
TS: Everything like that. So I actually quit my job for that. And that lasted about two years.
BM: What comic book was that?
TS: It was called Violent Messiahs. It was on Image.
BM: Yeah, oh yeah. Well, looking back on this thing now, you’re full time CD art covers for at least six years now. Has it been the sort of ride that you thought it would be? Or is it better or worse? How would you describe where you are right now?
TS: It’s, the ride has been a little bit better than I thought it would be. Like I said, when the comic book stopped, I got really scared, but I’m like, “Well, I don’t think I can support myself on CD covers.” You know, as far as having a mortgage and a family and stuff like that. And in a lot of ways, I was right, but in a lot of ways it was also not as bad as I feared it to be. But, I think at the point where you look at it right now, I thought I would be a little bit farther along as far as security in the whole thing. You know, I’m still, you know, it’s still, right now, “Am I going to have enough jobs for next month.” Or, a bunch of little jobs will come and I’ll take them all in just so I’m, you know, I know they’re there. But at the same time, now I have twice as much work to do in the same amount of time, you know?
BM: [laughs]
TS: So that makes it really tough as well. So it still has a lot of ups and downs. And I thought that maybe at this point it would be a little smoother.
BM: Is it, do you like second-guess yourself a lot, or do you worry about your abilities? Or is it–
TS: Oh, all the time.
BM: Really?
TS: Yeah.
BM: Why is that? I look at your stuff and I think, “Man, I would kill to be able to do that.” [laughs]
TS: [laughs] I don’t know. Because, it’s like the thing I was saying earlier, sometimes the ideas are not there.
BM: Yeah.
TS: Or they’re not working the way I thought they were, or, I mean, just anything like that. If I get these, or I might get to the point where, let’s say I committed to three jobs. You know, that have to be done in a month, month and a half, two months, whatever. So the time is pretty much filled. Well, then maybe a couple weeks after that, while I’m still working on those, somebody will come along that I’ve worked with before and want to work with me on something that I just don’t want to turn down. And so it’s like, well, I wanna do this, but I don’t have the ideas and I don’t really have all the time to do everything I want. So I have to try to figure out how to make that all fit. And when you’re, well, at least for me, when I’m working under conditions like that, it’s really hard to like, just kind of sit back and let the ideas flow. And sometimes, and like something I said earlier, sometimes the ideas just don’t come. You know, it’s like writers’ block.
BM: What do you do to get them to come then?
TS: I don’t know. That’s what I’m saying. Like some of my best ideas, you know, that I’ve had, like I don’t know, they were just there, and I just wrote them down. I didn’t even have to think. Some of the ones I’m most proud of, they just came there. And it wasn’t like I thought too hard. Sometimes, I’ve been lucky on a few projects, where I give it some thought, and work a couple problems out with it, and it’ll just click. I’ve done that a lot of times. And everything just fell into place and it was a really good feeling. But most of the time, you know, the ideas were just there. And sometimes, when I need to have something fast and I need to have it right, you know, it’s just not there. That was one of the problems with the new Zero Hour. There was something about it that just wasn’t clicking.
BM: Yeah.
TS: So I was like, “Ok, I’ll put this one back and I’ll work on some of the other ideas they were talking about.” So I was getting them going, and I was still stuck on that cover that they needed first. So that was…
BM: [laughs] Yeah.
TS: So it’s, I mean, and not to use that one as just one specific, it’s just like, that’s just an example of all the kinds of things that can happen. And when you have so many things like that going on, then it just makes it really tough. And if I can’t come up with something on time, well, no I actually rambled, and I’m trying to get back to your question. When things like that happen, that’s when I start doubting. Like, “Oh, you know, when the next thing comes up, am I gonna be able to you know, do it the way it needs to be done?” You know, so…
BM: Well, you know, my day job, what I do is Advertising and Marketing. And I’ve had that same feeling though, every time I’m faced with a new project, and I’ve got to write all the copy for it, I feel that way too. Like, “Heck, I don’t know if I can do this again. Where does it come from?” But you know, it always does.
TS: Yeah.
BM: It just seems to. But I worry about it beforehand. You know?
TS: Yeah, like I said I’ve been real lucky sometimes, where I’ll be struggling with something for a week, just like on one image and I’ll just be struggling. And then out of the blue, like in a second, everything will just click and fall into place. And it’s just, the problem is, that doesn’t always happen, and so you get, it’s not something I want to count on. You know, I don’t want to take it for granted, so to speak.
BM: Well, you mentioned the covers you’re most proud of. What would be a few of those? What’s a couple of good examples?
TS: Let me see. A lot of the Katatonia ones, and a couple of Opeth’s for sure, and the Devin Townsend Terria one.
BM: Oh, that’s a great one, yeah.
TS: Yeah, that’s really up there. I’ve done a lot that I’m really, the King Diamond one I’m really proud of that one. And you know, those couple Zero Hours, I really liked how those came out, you know. And like, those are perfect examples of things that just fell into place.
BM: Well, the Opeth covers you’ve done, judging by your output, I would say you’ve done more of those than any other band, including Iced Earth. You’re almost like a fifth Beatle with the Opeth guys. [laughs] What is it about Opeth’s music or their covers that really makes you come back again and again and want to work with them?
TS: Well, I think the main thing, the main reasons I keep working with them, is they keep, so far, they’ve asked me every time.
BM: [laughs]
TS: And they’re, on top of that, they’re one of my favorite people to work with. So you know, I’ll work with them as long as they ask me to. And they’re also one of my favorite bands. And they’re just real inspiring. The last Opeth album was a very good example of–
BM: Ghost Reveries?
TS: Yeah, that was one that it took me a little while to connect, and then I had a couple ideas that just weren’t right, and you know, during the whole process where I was coming up with the ideas, I started developing the look of what would eventually become the artwork. But the actual concepts weren’t there. You know, they weren’t right for Mike [Mikael Åkerfeldt, guitars]. I was kind of struggling with that, the deadline was creeping up, and then, I think it was just like one day, I think on a Sunday, I just had this rush of ideas for it out of the blue.
BM: That’s great, yeah.
TS: And I spent like two days just, you know, drafting up the ideas. And I sent them to Mike, and there were a couple he threw out, but there were two in there that he was like, “This is a keeper, and this might just be the cover.”
BM: Wow.
TS: So you know, we talked back and forth and I got a feel about what he liked and what he didn’t. And I just kind of ran with that, and everything kind of fell into place like real easily.
BM: Well, you’ve had probably, what, 200 covers by now in your career.
TS: Yeah, it’s something like that.
BM: What, is there one or two that you can think of that were like the hardest ones for you to do? Like when you think of them now, it’s like, “Oh god, I remember that process, it was a pain in the ass.” I mean, are there a couple covers that gave you the most trouble?
TS: Not that I can think of right off the bat. I had a little bit of a hard time coming up with the right ideas for the last Sadus thing. You know, not to imply that it was unpleasant or anything, but that was one that I wasn’t clicking with right away. I was interpreting things like totally wrong. And, you know, I was trying to think of a bunch of different, really unique ways to say one thing, ‘cause I wanted to really attack that thing with artwork. And a lot of the ideas were wrong, and they weren’t right for some of the guys in the he band. And so like, “I like this element, so why don’t we take that, and why don’t we try this.” And so that became a thing where at first, it was see what I can do, but later on it was, “well, your ideas aren’t exactly right, but they’re giving us some thoughts, so let’s combine these things.” But at first it was kind of tough.
BM: Well, the album–
TS: And I can’t think of anything right off hand. I’m sure if I thought about it a little longer, I could think of a bunch that were real difficult.
BM: How about the positive side of that? Was there one or two where they just instant, flowed immediately, it was just done?
TS: Yeah. Opeth is usually like that, and Katatonia is usually like that.
BM: Cool.
TS: The Terria one, the Devin Townsend was definitely like that. Those things just came out. And there was actually, yeah, there was a little bit of, another one that was a little bit tough was the Devin Townsend Accelerated Evolution. I was having a really hard time pinning that one down. And you know, finally Devin was like, “This has to be right, you know, and it’s not clicking yet.” And so it was getting kind of strained a bit at the end. And after he had this talk with me that kind of lit a fire under my ass–
BM: [laughs]
TS: And then, the next day, I came up with what became the cover, the rough. I was like, “Well you’re looking for something kind of like this.” ‘Cause like at first he wanted something really clean and sterile, and the things weren’t sterile enough, I guess.
BM: [laughs]
TS: And I just went to the other extreme and made things really sterile, and he’s like, “This is perfect.”
BM: [laughs]
TS: So, and even the hard ones, even the ones that are difficult, that’s kind of the way they turn out. You, it’s just like there’s a few weeks of struggle, and they might just click. And there’s a couple times, you know, it hasn’t clicked or whatever. But as far as the ones that are just real easy, like I said the Opeth, and again, Devin Townsend. The last, the new Strapping Young Lad, that was real, that fell into place immediately.
BM: Wow. Tell me about this cover that people are saying is one of their favorites of 2006, the Novembre, the Materia cover. What are the elements I’m looking at in that? Did you take a picture of that kid looking at something, and then you superimposed some background to that? What is this picture made up of?
TS: Yeah, that started out a little bit different than it ended up. That one started out a little bit tough, that’s a good example. I worked with them before, and with this one they came at me a little bit late in the game. Another one of those things, “Hey, we kinda need something fast. This other thing we tried isn’t working out, and the time is, you know, we’re getting short on time, do you want to try something?” And I love working with them as well. I love that band. And so I’m like, “Sure.” And they had a couple general ideas, and I was trying to figure out a way to take their ideas and make it work, but also very quickly. And sometimes that’s a bad combination.
BM: [laughs] Yeah.
TS: So anyway, a couple of those ideas ended up inside the booklet. And there was some people that, you know, there was a couple people that had differing ideas on it. Some people really loved it and thought it fit, and there were a couple people that thought it didn’t. So nobody could, there was a couple disagreements that we sort of tried something else. And he said, “Well, the time is kind of short, what other ideas do you have?” And that was the one that ended up on the cover was like a really old personal idea. There was just something I was playing with, ‘cause you know, I did take the photo, and I really liked that photo. So I was always trying to do this with it, or maybe put something in the distance that made it a little bit ominous.
BM: Yep.
TS: And that was one of those things that even for myself, I could never really make it work, so I just kind of left it alone. And during this whole time, that factory element, that industrial factory overshadow kind of element that’s in there, that came from the original ideas that you might see inside. So I took that, and I remembered that old photo, perfect example of the first question.
BM: Is that photo one you took, is that somebody you know in the photo?
TS: Yeah, that’s my son.
BM: Is it really? [laughs] That’s great.
TS: Yeah. So I think that was when he was three, and he was on the beach and he was looking out. And I was just sitting there and I snapped him. And I just love that photo. It’s just one of those where you can take 20 photos of something, but there’s that one that just really stands out. That’s why I’ve always tried to do something with it. So I was looking through some of my old ideas in my sketchbooks, and you know, my old archives, and I found that one, and I tried the factory element in it, and I said to myself, “Well, here’s an old personal idea I have, maybe this will work for something too.” That was actually one I submitted when they were, “What kind of ideas do you already have?” You know, that I’ve done that maybe will work. And I think that was one of the ones that I sent, but I wasn’t real happy with how it looked at the time, so I did like seven or eight different versions of it with different colorings and textures and things like that. And they said, “Well this one right here really fits, you know, everybody is really happy with this for the cover.” So they just kind of went with that.
BM: Wow, that’s great. Does, you mention your family a couple of times. Are they pretty supportive? Do they enjoy your career, and they like your CD covers? What kind of support do you get from your family?
TS: It varies, you know.
BM: [laughs]
TS: [laughs] You know, my kids are like still really young, but my daughter’s old enough to be curious about it, so she’ll ask what I’m doing. And you know, she’s actually been on a couple of them too.
BM: Oh really?
TS: And you know, so it’s, yeah. It can get trying, like I said, this kind of thing can get trying, so, you know.
BM: Oh yeah.
TS: So sometimes there’s support, and sometimes there isn’t. [laughs]
BM: [laughs] Yeah, that’s probably pretty typical. You know what I found interesting? Your web site, talk about minimalist. You’ve got 32 covers on there. Did you handpick those as your best of the best? Or what does that represent on there?
TS: Are you looking at the current one?
BM: Yeah.
TS: Well, I’m putting that back together right now.
BM: Ok.
TS: And I’m doing it a little bit at a time. What happened is, I don’t know, it’s been a while since anything’s been done with it, and it’s never left my mind, but you know, I did a couple of new updates, like last year. And then the webmaster, you know, was busy with some other stuff, was out of town a lot, and I think she you know, was ill for a little bit. So I was like, ok, you know, we had the old one up and I just didn’t really like the look of it. But when she did it, I kind of like didn’t, she was going to try this, and experiment with that, so I’m like, “Hey, do whatever you want, as long as people can go up there and look at the pictures.” So I think, we took that old one down, ‘cause I wanted to try like a really simple, grayish, just like you said, real minimal, where it’s nothing but, you know, the necessary text and some artwork. And some things. So we totally erased the old site, and while we were thinking about that, you know, she got caught up in a lot of different things, and couldn’t do it fast enough. So we’re getting back on track with that. So we got the basic format down now, and since we erased the whole thing, I’ve just been going through my old files and picking out the ones I want ot put up. And those ones that are up there now are just some of the most recent things.
BM: I see, yeah.
TS: You know, they’re not brand new, but I figured, while I’m still getting the other sections back up, I’ll start out with the most recent things that weren’t added to the site before, and then build it up kind of backwards. And you know, newest to oldest. And so I’ve gotten those there, and I’ve been uploading files for like a week now, going through the older stuff, you know, as it’s not online yet, but the sections are being built. So I’m going through the old stuff, and I’m picking like my favorite. Since most of the new stuff’s there, I added some more new stuff that’s newer, that hasn’t been put there, and while I’m going through the older stuff, I’m kind of doing like a favorites. You know, I’ve got the Katatonia section, and then the Opeth section. And you know, the King Diamond stuff, and that kind of thing. So I’m building it a little bit at a time, and then when there’s enough there, we’re going to put it up all at once.
BM: Do you have, you sound like a fairly young guy. Do you remember the album covers of the ’70s and how cool they were, and elaborate? You know, fold-out, pop-up, booklet type stuff?
TS: Well, the thing is, you know, when they were brand new in the ’70s, I was too young to appreciate them, as far as what you’re talking about, the real elaborate works. Or you know, with the elaborate packaging or the artwork itself. But, you know, since I’ve started doing this, I’ve definitely looked at a lot of things like that. And I have gained an incredible appreciation for things like that. I mean, something, you know, even when I was a little kid and I was buying KISS albums and ACDC and stuff, even then, I liked the Back in Black cover, because it was black, or I liked the Dirty Deeds cover because, I didn’t even know what it meant, you know.
BM: [laughs]
TS: But I still kind of liked it. So I’ve always liked them, but as far as like an appreciation, I mean, when you’re eight or nine, you don’t look at the Tommy gatefold. You know, “Ooh, that looks kind of neat”, but you don’t have a, at least not for me, a real appreciation for everything that was involved.
BM: How old are you?
TS: 36.
BM: Yeah, see, you’re a fairly young guy. But see, what I was getting at with my question is, for me the album covers of the ’70s were everything. I loved them. And then when CD’s came in, it was gone. It was just instantly gone. But now your covers to me, make the artwork just as exciting as it used to be in the ’70s. So that’s–
TS: Well, that’s saying something. I really appreciate hearing that. Well, I kind of, that’s one thing that I kind of feel the same way. ‘Cause like you said, now I have kind of a retrospective appreciation, I mean, looking at Pink Floyd The Wall on CD, yeah, I had that on vinyl when I was a kid, and that was just amazing. You know, even like I said, but with perspective, now I appreciate it much more. But then, it was just like, “Oh cool.”
BM: [laughs] Yeah.
TS: But I mean, even now, I appreciate something like that on vinyl, you know, exactly what you’re saying, it’s much better in the vinyl format. Sometimes, when I’m doing a booklet or something, I’ll try to put, you know, if there’s time and the ideas are flowing, I really like to do multiple photos. And keep each one a little bit simple. That’s something I learned later on. A lot of my early stuff, it was you know, “How much can I throw in here to tell the story?” Where later I learned it’s not what you throw in, it’s what you leave out. You know, it’s what’ll tell the story exactly like it need to be said? You can use the other parts inside to continue it. But I feel the same was as you do, I have an appreciation for that. And with the CD, you have less to work with as far as the way it’s presented.
BM: Yeah.
TS: So I kind of, instead of a big canvas, I try to take all the pieces of the canvas and try to do something with it as one continuous thing. You know?
BM: And it works. Now, for me, I look forward to the art with CDs just as much as the music. So now, it’s come full circle, and it’s a total package now. I really appreciate that about what you’re doing.
TS: Well, thank you. Yeah, that’s one thing I try to do, and I think a lot of that, no small part is, one of the CDs I remember standing out in my mind about the same time I really started doing this for real, was that Megadeth Euthanasia one.
BM: Oh yeah.
TS: And you know, Hugh Syme’s always been one of my favorites. And I looked at that, and I realized you know, he’s got like a, there’s a different picture for every page, or every lyric has it’s own story. I really liked the way he did that, so that’s kind of something either consciously or subconsciously that I kept in my mind. Sometimes I do really like the minimalist approach, though. Because like, you know, when CD’s first came out, like if you even look at the back of the original Abigail CD or Master of Puppets, it’s just like a flat color with the song titles.
BM: Yeah.
TS: And sometimes I actually like that. You know, I’ll do that myself sometimes now, ‘cause it just, sometimes it fits. Or like, Fates Warning Parallels.
BM: Oh, that’s great, yeah.
TS: I mean, that is one of the most minimalist layouts I’ve ever seen, but at the same time, I think it’s so elegant. I mean, I love the whole thing. Just the way he kept the textures going with the really classy photos.
BM: That’s great.
TS: And the nice lyrics, you know, all laid out. I really love that clean approach a lot, as well. ‘Cause sometimes it doesn’t feel right, trying to cram a whole bunch of artwork in, you know?
BM: Yeah.
TS: Sometimes, it’s just like, if you have a really nice cover and a back cover, that sometimes if you put too much in, it might overshadow it. So it just depends.
BM: Another artist you said you like is Dave McKean, and I can definitely see some of his style in yours, with some of the covers. He’s got a quirky way of approaching things where he uses a lot of photographs too, it appears.
TS: Yeah. Yeah, he’s one of my favorites for sure. He, it’s kinda weird with him, you know a lot of people have talked to me about that before. And they’re like, you know, “He’s obviously an influence on you. Are you trying to copy him or whatever?”
BM: No, I wouldn’t say that at all.
TS: One thing I told him, it’s like, I don’t know if I could copy him.
BM: [laughs]
TS: He’s like, he’s just too, you couldn’t try to copy that guy.
BM: No. [laughs]
TS: And have it work.
BM: Yeah, I know it.
TS: So there’s a couple things, a couple reasons that I do like his stuff so much. First of all, a lot of his stuff, when I first discovered him — I think it was on some CDs and a couple of Sandman covers — and a lot of his things look like the drawings that I used to do, like for Psychotic Waltz flyers and things like that, when I would just draw. And that’s one thing I like about the computer, is because, and photography, is ‘cause it can take some of the things I drew on paper, and you can — ‘cause I’m not really a good painter. I couldn’t paint something like that at all. I mean, it would just look terrible. I mean, I can’t channel it from my–if I have a pencil or a pen, I can do a really nice drawing. But you don’t want to put a weird pen, like ball-point pen drawing on a CD cover. So when I discovered the computer, I actually found out that I can actually, with the computer, I can channel within my mind, and have it come out. And it actually goes to my hand and comes out the way I want it to. That’s why I’m so, that’s why I click so much with the digital thing. And so there was that, but at the same time, that was about the same time I discovered Dave McKean. And that was a little bit before I actually knew what Photoshop was. And his stuff just looked so surreal and so foreign to me. I’m like, “Well, this is a photograph, but I don’t understand how he did this, because I know some photographers.” Keep in mind, I had never heard of Photoshop at this time. I didn’t even know this kind of thing was possible. And you know, I have a couple of photographer friends, and I’m like, “How are they doing this, because this part looks like a painting, you know.” I think one of the covers was Testament Low, and it’s obviously a photograph. There’s the leaves on the ground, and that’s a man, he’s with light, and he’s blurred. And I was asking my photographer friends, you know, “How is this possible?” And they were saying, “Well, we have methods to do things like that, but you can’t pull that kind of thing.” And they’re like, and they were older as well, so they weren’t familiar with Photoshop either. And so they couldn’t answer my question. So I was just like, ok, I’ll just appreciate it for what it is. And I kinda, you know, stopped thinking about it. And then, it was about a month later where I discovered Photoshop. And so I kinda learned, I played around and finally figured out what you could do with it. And I tried this one tool, and the result was, you know, I was, like I said, I had some textures going, and I has some elements here, and I was just experimenting with the tools. And I tried this one thing, and totally on accident, and the result was exactly what I was looking at with Dave McKean’s stuff. It was like the fade out, and the light, but the way this part’s clear, you know, like on that guy’s torso, this part is clear, but this part’s blurry. And then there’s these cracks in his chest. You know, I had this texture, right, that I dropped over the image. And I experimented with this tool, and it made the exact same effect. And so then, I’m like, ok, this is how he does that. And at that point, I had such an appreciation for him, that when that kind of effect came up, that’s what looked right to me. It was like, “Oh, that’s how you’re supposed to do this.”
BM: [laughs]
TS: And so at first, I’ve actually thrown away a couple of ideas in the past, because they were too much like McKean. And that’s not to say that the quality was there, but it was just like, well this looks like you were trying to get that, but you failed, you know? And so, over time I kind of learned how to take what I learned and develop it into, you know, not my own thing, just something, into something that wasn’t, you know, something a little more individual, I guess.
BM: Yeah.
TS: Where, just because it looks like that, doesn’t mean it’s right. Try to find, try to do something with it for yourself and see what you can do. I mean, now you know how to use this, so see what you can do. Don’t try to do the same thing. And then I kind of went with it from there, and that’s what I’ve been doing ever since, basically. But he, yeah, on that note, he was definitely a big influence, for those reasons.
BM: Well let me ask you one more question, and then I’ll let you get back to things there. And I do appreciate this a whole lot.
TS: Oh no. It’s no problem.
BM: Tell me something. This may be a hard question to answer, and I’m not sure you can, but what is it about you, your own personality, that produces these types of art images? Because, in other words, what did you put into you to get these out? Did you, were you raised on books or comic books or horror movies, or what went in to get this out?
TS: That’s, well, I can answer that. I mean, I can, but I don’t know if I can answer it very simply. It’s a combination of all that. You know, I spent most of, a lot of my time early on reading books and listening to metal and watching movies, you know, and other people were out getting in fights and stuff, and I was sitting in my room reading comics and playing video games and stuff like that.
BM: [laughs]
TS: So it, I don’t have really, you know, compared to some people I don’t have the life experience, but I’ve always liked to draw. And I’ve always come up with, you know, reading books or movies or whatever, you kind of get these ideas about things, and you know, so you kind of come up with your own little twisted kid ideas. I was always drawing pictures like that. And as you grow older, you know, you kind of keep the same kinds of things, you know, the superficial fantasies, whether they’re scary or beautiful, they’re things that are appealing to you. And then as you grow up, they’re things that affect you more. And it’s just sometimes they combine. And maybe a lot of my ideas are just things I’d like to see, or what if they looked like this, or what if this good thing was doomed to go bad at some point, or what if there’s a feeling of no hope, but over here’s the hope, you don’t see it from here yet. So how do, I don’t know, I just try to think of all these scenarios, and then, and a way to realize them in one or two images, you know? And I just kind of take a little bit of thoughts from here and there, you know. Like I said, brutal fantasy things or horror things, or you know, emotional things, or a little symbol. And I just kind of try to tie them all together. That’s a really hard question to explain, actually. That’s kinda–
BM: No, that’s a great explanation. And a couple things you said, the emotion part I get quite well. ‘Cause a lot of these things resonate with me a lot. There’s a lot of emotion, a lot of passion in this artwork. But you know, another thing I see in it though, is almost a bleakness. I mean, if you had to look at all of them combined, maybe that’s the genre of metal. Maybe that’s what I’m seeing here visually, but you don’t seem like a bleak kind of guy, but the kind of stuff you produce is often very scary or spooky or you know, twisted in some way. So how, that’s not coming from your personality, is it?
TS: Not necessarily. Sometimes you have those moods where things like feel really bleak. You’re having a bad week, you know, how are you gonna get through the week, or there’s a problem. You know, not necessarily, it’s not necessarily indicative of anything real specific, but you just kind of have that mood sometimes. Sometimes there’s a bleakness because, I don’t know, maybe the picture has like a character. And it’s just supposed to be like nothing there, because for a couple reasons. It might take the focus off them. I might have this one point, I just want this one part to tell the story, and adding too much might take away from that, so I’ll leave it simple. Or, sometimes it’s there to maybe convey a feeling of emptiness or loneliness or you know, and with that might come independence. Like when there’s no one you can depend on, you have to find it in yourself. You have to find strength in yourself. Or maybe that’s the way this person, maybe the image you see on the cover is not exactly the way things are, but maybe this, the protagonist, that may be how they’re seeing the world. You know, there might be nothing there, or there might be ugliness, or there might be some ugliness with one little niceness. You know, one little positive thing. Or it might be the reverse, you know.
BM: Is there…? Go ahead.
TS: So you’re right, with the metal thing, there is a lot of that. I mean, it’s almost built in, because I’ve, and I think, I don’t know. That’s one of the things that makes it more appealing to me, because it’s, I think that gives it a little more feeling. And there’s always the story with it. And there’s something I can, whether I can relate to it or not, it’s something that always makes me feel something or connect. And you know, that’s really inspiring for me, for whatever reason. I don’t have a definite answer as far as that goes. But I do know that some of the times, you know, with a certain band or a certain lyric, I know exactly what they’re taking about, and I know the feeling that they have.
BM: Yeah, that’s it. Yeah, that’s a good way to put that.
TS: And a lot of times, even if it’s not supposed to be literally bleak, the bleakness gives it that intention. Or it gives that mood.
BM: Is there one of your covers that you most resonate with? Perhaps even colors. Because I’m looking at your home page right now, and I’m seeing the Triggering Myth cover [The Remedy of Abstraction], for some reason I love that. I think there’s certain colors you use, maybe these deep blues like that ship tossed about on the ocean there, that I resonate with. Something about those colors. Is there some stuff that you do that really just pleases you inside? Like you look at it and you just think, “Oh geeze, that’s me. That’s me inside.” You know what I’m trying to say?
TS: I know what you’re trying to say. I can’t think of one, there are a few that do that. I can’t think of one that does that completely. About the colors, some of those covers, ok, you mentioned two. So like, the Triggering Myth, they didn’t suggest the blue. But the way that is, is there’s a little spot of ugliness happening in the picture, and the rest was not, the rest is supposed to be the outside where it’s not so ugly. And I thought, there’s one of the lines where, in that album, where “after my house is burned down, I can see the moon.”
BM: [laughs] Yeah.
TS: Its, I thought it was brilliant. It’s a way of, when things are very wrong, it’s a way to look at them positively. It’s almost the way to see the bight, the silver lining in the cloud.
BM: Oh yeah, yeah.
TS: And I thought that was just a brilliant line. And that’s where that cover came from, because sometimes I feel like that myself. But I didn’t want, when I did that one, it was supposed to look a little bit stylized, and you can tell what’s going on, but the outside was supposed to be a little bit more serene. And so that’s where that came from. And blue just seemed to be a natural choice for that one. It wasn’t anything personal or, it just seemed to fit. And for the cold colors with the ship sinking, that was, you know, the band suggested like a dark blueish gray. You know? And so I went with that, and that one just kind of became what it was on its own. You know, that’s the way I started with that one, so that’s the way it finished. Other times I’ll try a couple different color tones. Lately, I’ve been kinda, a lot of my covers lately have been one color over a bunch of colors. And I’m trying to work on some things now that have a little bit more color in them. But when I do something like that that has a dominant color, I’ll do it a couple different ways. It’s like, I might see this photo for me, it looks better to me as a golden orange or a red or something. But that color doesn’t seem to fit the idea of the image, so I might try a yellow version, and then go over and do a grayish version or do a couple, change the tones a little bit. And then I might send more than one of those to the band and see which one they like better. Like for the new Katatonia, Anders [Nystrom, guitar] told me, “We want to do something red.” And that was the first thing he said.
BM: [laughs]
TS: And he’s like, “And I mean, a lot of red. We just want something, you know, every Katatonia album had a color. Like this is the blue album, this is the silver album. This time we wanna do red.” And that was the first thing he told me.
BM: Really?
TS: And at first, that was the only thing he told me, “We just want to do something red.” And I’ve always been real good with working with them. I’ve been able to take their thought, I mean they’re, like I said, they’re one of my favorite bands to work with. And this is one of those reasons, i just, I’m real connected with them for some reason. I mean, they’ll tell me something, and I can just run with it. And it’s always right. And even if it isn’t right, it’s almost right, and it just takes a little bit of work. And they’re just real easy to work with when something is wrong. Like, “Well, this is the only thing I see different.” And the communication is just always there. And it’s just always a great experience. And, but like I said, the Katatonia thing, that wasn’t my pick. They just said, “We want to do something red.” And I’m like, “Well, what should we do?” “We don’t know, but we don’t want it to look like the last one.”
BM: [laughs]
TS: “The last couple have looked, you know, they’ve looked similar in the way they’ve looked, and we want to do something red and stark and different and simple.” And so I kind of threw some things down on that one. You know, that’s a good example. And for the Morphis, that’s on my site, and that’s kind of a gold tone. I started, I did a couple different things for that one. I did some that were a real dark blueish gray with some orange highlights in it, like a nighttime sky. And I did some that were a real washed out kind of bluish aqua for a water feel. And I did a couple of those gold ideas, and they were real happy with that, ‘cause it looked, for them it looked a little bit old and primitive. You know, they said it looked really primitive, the gold, the scratchy gold gave it a really old and primitive look, which was exactly what they were going for. So I kind of ran with that as well. So there’s sometimes the colors are suggested by the band, either at the beginning or along the way. Or sometimes, I’ll do a couple different things that I’m feeling, and sometimes it’s feel, and sometimes it’s just arbitrary as far as what I feel makes the image look better. And I can’t always decide. I’ll be like, “I’m not sure which one I like better.” And they’ll be like, “Well I like this one.” And that, you know, narrows it down.
BM: [laughs] Well, that’s great. I appreciate your time, Travis. I really do.
TS: Oh, well I really appreciate it too. I mean, I hope it was good, because like I said, sometimes I have trouble finding everything I want to say without taking too long.
BM: No. It was perfect. It was one of my favorite interviews.
TS: Maybe you can fix that. [laughs]
BM: [laughs] It was great. I really appreciate it. And I’m looking forward to your next–what are you working on next? What do you got on the burner for you, what’s the next album?
TS: Well, right now I’m doing, I’m working with a band called Moon Sorrow on their thing. And I’m working, might be trying out some ideas for the new November’s Doom. And another Winds album, which should turn out really cool. That one and the November’s Doom, if they go with this, are going to look real nice. I’ve got a couple things, Redemption. That’s almost done.
BM: Cool.
TS: And I might be trying out some ideas for Tarja from Nightwish for her solo thing. And, which I’m real excited about.
BM: Well, yeah. I thought she dropped out of sight. I was wondering what she was going to do. So now she’s coming back to the scene, and you’re helping her do it, huh?
TS: Yeah. She’s, I just started talking to her manager a couple days ago, so I’m still seeing how that goes. I don’t think it’s set in stone yet, but that’s one of the things I’m trying some ideas for. Hopefully that’s not tooting my own horn before it happens, or counting your chickens, as they say.
BM: [laughs]
TS: Yeah, so it’s a few things like that.
BM: Very cool. Well, thank you so much, Travis. I appreciate your time. You have a good rest of the day there.
TS: Thank you very much. You do the same.
BM: Thank you. Bye bye.
TS: Bye.
Travis Smith’s official web site is www.seempieces.com. You can also see a nice display of his CD covers on the Rate Your Music web site (www.rateyourmusic.com). Just search for “Travis Smith.”
Travis told me that he sells signed artwork. Any cover that he’s done. Just ask. His price is extremely reasonable, too. (And, believe me, I’ll be turning in my order soon.) To contact Travis — for signed artwork or to commission him to work on your band’s album art — use the contact form on his official site.
