Ben Crane

@bencranewrites.com

1052 Followers 409 Following

He/him. Writer and editor of prose and comics. SCATTERED FUTURES. COSMIC CADETS, A MAN OF LIES, SYSTEMIC. Profile pic by @andyalvesart.bsky.social

A Shepherd-mix dog lies on her back in a pile of ivy, looking up at the camera.
A 6 panel comic, "FACTOIDS with Ben" 1) The "-OID" ending usually means something resembling a thing without being it. 2) Like this die, which is a "cuboid." Its rounded corners and edges mean it isn't a true cube. 3) Or the Earth, which isn't a true sphere, but a "spheroid." 4) And the monsters slowly replacing all my friends and loved ones while I sleep are "humanoids." 5) So "factoid" should mean a thing that resembles a fact, but isn't one. 6) Meaning the very first factoid was our thinking the word meant a small, unimportant fact!
5 illustrations in a grid. Characters from Disco Elysium, Homestuck, and Dimension20, along with a xenomorph and a Soviet-style Tiamat propaganda poster.
A flyer for QCon. Free tickets and info at qconprism.org
The cover of SCATTERED FUTURES. Two astronauts float above a planet, their hands nearly touching.
A dog sits by a closed door, starting at it.
The cover of Scattered Futures, showing 2 astronauts floating over a planet, their hands nearly touching.
A comic book panel of a woman and two men in a space station. The dialogue has been edited so that one of the men is saying "Hi Canna. How are you?" and she responds with "I'm fine. I'm going to back Scattered Futures on Kickstarter."
The cover image for Cosmic Cadets: Contact! featuring 5 kids exploring an alien jungle.
Two enamel pins of good luck icons, a lemon pig and a cluster of gluckspilz.
A panel from a comic book. A woman sits in sci-fi wagon talking with a scarred man. She looks excited. He does not. The dialogue has been changed to say "There're only 3 days left in the Scattered Futures campaign. Have you backed it yet? I hear the book's full of hope."
A graphic with a pull quote for Scattered Futures
A comic page illustrated by Mertyn, showing a sci-fi western farmer riding a robotic covered wagon toward a town past some corporate propaganda.
A graphic with a pull quote for Scattered Futures
A picture of the Cosmic Cadets graphic novels with an enamel pin of an alien.
A comic page from the story "Legitimate Salvage" in Scattered Futures.
A comic book cover showing two astronauts floating in space above a planet. Their hands are nearly touching.
A close up on a propaganda sign. It reads "Feed the worlds, Feed your soul. AgrioCO"
A comic page. An orbital ring station hangs over an agricultural planet as down on the surface a farmer rides a walking wagon robot toward a distant town. He spits as he passes a large propaganda sign for AgriCO.
A graphic with the cover of Scattered Futures and text that reads: What folks are saying about... Scattered Futures "Ben has created three quiet stories about deeply moving, empathetic moments. This isn't just science-fiction. Scattered Futures is on another level. I want to see more of this in the world." --Jimmy Gaspero (Penny and the Yeti, Cryptid Creator Corner)
The title page of the comic book COSMIC CADETS: ACCUSED. The illustrator, Andy Alves, has signed the book Alves Alves.
A beautiful graphic showing COSMIC CADETS: ACCUSED and SYSTEMIC with human arms hoisting trophies as fireworks explode in the background. Across the top reads the text "YOU can make this happen!"
A screenshot of the Scattered Futures Kickstarter page, showing the campaign at $2000 pledged from 110 backers with 18 days remaining.
A closeup of a comic panel. Smoke drifts from the top of an active volcano and a shuttle flies through the sky above it.
A comic page. In the first 2 panels, excavators dig at the surface of an inhospitable badlands. In the final, largest panel, a shuttle approaches a space station and requests permission to dock. A volcano belches smoke on the planet below. The caption identifies this as a terraforming station.
A screenshot of a kickstarter page showing 99 backers of Scattered Futures.
A winking fox logo
The SCATTERED FUTURES comic book cover featuring two astronauts floating in space above a planet, their hands nearly touching.
A closeup on a mustachioed man grimacing as he clenches is his hand into a fist.
A comics page showing a small ship approaching the wreck of a much larger one as two people bicker.
A graphic with a blurb for SCATTERED FUTURES: “Each story in SCATTERED FUTURES hits for its own reasons. When read all together, they each speak to the power and importance of family… Set in space! In a world full of division around every turn, more comics like SCATTERED FUTURES need to exist.” --Chris Stall, The Long Box Punk CHK Comics
A screenshot of the Kickstarter page for Scattered Futures showing it at $1001 pledged of a $1000 goal.
A screenshot of the SCATTERED FUTURES Kickstarter campaign page showing it at $996 pledged of its $1000 goal.
A comic book page drawn in a whimsical retrofuturist style with old newsprint inspired colors. The first two panels show heavy machinery digging on a barren planet. The third shows a shuttle approaching a station above that planet getting permission to dock.
The Kicktraq page for Scattered Futures showing it trending toward $14,607, an extremely accurate and infallible prediction.
A screenshot of the Kickstarter prelaunch for Scattered Futures, with "99 followers" crudely circled in red.
A graphic with the cover of the SCATTERED FUTURES comic book and the text: What folks are saying about... SCATTERED FUTURES "Each story in Scattered Futures hits for its own reasons. When read altogether, they each speak to the power and importance of family... Set in space! In a world full of division around every turn, more comics like Scattered Futures need to exist." --Chris Stall, The Long Box Punk CHK Comics
A screenshot of the Scattered Futures Kickstarter prelaunch page, showing 97 followers on the campaign.
Two video game boxes. The Nintendo Switch update of Final Fantasy Tactics and the original PS1 version of the game.
The cover of the graphic novel Cosmic Cadets: Contact! It shows 5 kids (4 human and 1 alien) exploring the jungle of an alien planet.
A comic book cover for Scattered Futures. Two astronauts float in space above a glowing planet. Their tethers drift off the side of the page and their hands very nearly touch in the middle.
An illustration of two astronauts floating above a planet. Their tethers drift off to either side of the piece, and their hands are very nearly touching in the center. The planet's surface is a swirl of clouds, water, and land. The atmosphere glows in a radiant blue, and more planets and stars fill the black of space above the planet.
A comic page. Excavators dig at the surface of an inhospitable planet. In orbit above the surface, a space ship docks with a ring station. The art is done in a chunky retro-futuristic style with a color palette inspired by old 4-color newsprint comics.
A comic book page. Across three panels, a spaceship with a logo of a smiling fox flies toward a wrecked cargo vessel. As it does, it's pilot and a crewman argue about the crewman missing the pilot's wife's party, and whether now is really the appropriate time for such an argument.
A panel from a comic. A man in a space-suit bends over with his face just outside of the frame as his helmet floats beside him. A sound effect of BREUUUGHHH trails beside him.
A panel from a comic book. Close in on the boot of a space suit as its wearer steps beyond the edge of their platform and into open space. They are saying "STEPPING OUT."
Two screenshots of a pdf export page in Affinity Publisher V2. On the left, "Allow JPEG compression" is checked, with an estimated file size of 9.91MB. On the right, "Allow JPEG compression" has been turned off, and the estimated file size is only 5.88MB.
The cover for Cosmic Cadets: Accused! Five children (four human, one alien) huddle in the foreground, hiding behind a sea-green column as an angry axolotl-inspired alien yells from a balcony in the background.
Two dogs sit in fallen leaves against a sun-washed fence, both looking off-camera in the same direction.
An image of the cover of Cosmic Cadets: Accused! next to a box of text reading "If you're looking for a fun adventure with wonderful characters, packed action, and explosive colors, Cosmic Cadets is the book you want to pick up! It's a comic full of fun and charm" -Jose Pimienta, Author of Twin Cities.
A drawing of a blue frog alien in a purple outfit with poofy sleeves, a cravat, and a foppish cap. He is midway through his amphibious transformation, so he still has his tadpole's tail. He is marching toward the viewer with a self-serious, arrogant expression.