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I'm not going to get on here and scream about how you shouldn't be a tattooer, even though that's a preset gut reaction nowadays and it's totally valid. After all, I'm a fairly new tattooer in the game and why should I be telling people what they should or shouldn't do. However, what I will bring up is something that continues to plague me at every turn, and it's something that I struggle with every day. Think and consider a few things most people don't before they just "decide they want to be a tattooer". Such as the effect you have on the craft and it's craftsmen/women. Specifically in your area. With every new tattooer the pieces of the "tattoo pie" get smaller and smaller. The pie being the personal benefits of tattooing. Not just financial, but all the benefits. The more tattooers, the smaller the pieces of the pie. Less money, more people doing desperate things to try to grind more loot out of tattooing, especially in the slower seasons, like tons of random discount days, undercutting the previously established shops prices to steal clients, etc. Think about what you're doing to the people who've already been there, who've already worked their asses off to establish a clientele, and a relationship with their neighborhood. Think about the taking you will be doing. That's not to say that you should not become a tattooer. What I'm trying to say is this: before you start on your journey to take from this craft and the people who held it on their shoulders through all it's iterations and think about how you're going to justify your actions and their consequences. How do you justify making everyone's pie smaller? How about by becoming lots more pie to those people. Get tattooed by righteous tattooers. A LOT. Blow loads of money on them. If your sitting here reading this thinking that " I can't do that because tattoos are too much money and I'm broke, which is why I want to be a tattooer in the first place dudes!" then you probably shouldn't be considering becoming a tattooer. On the other hand, if you are thinking "well, shit I'm broke, but if I get this second job and stop dropping a bunch of money on sneakers and beer then I could afford lots more tattoos, so now let's look and see who is good and figure out how I can throw bunches of money at them frequently", well then maybe you might be an asset to tattooing. I won't give anyone any advice beyond that. Tattooing is a career and if you become a tattooer that's a lifetime of taking. Maybe start evening the score early by giving back to it first. If there is any hesitation in your mind about that at all, don't even try. Save us all the next money sucking middle achiever. We already have enough of those. I'm not saying any of these things to be harsh. My mind is heavy with these thoughts all day long. I spend hours working my ass off, trying to make my clients as happy as possible but that's no where near enough. I spend all my money on tattooing. I buy tattoos, machines, pigments, supplies, flash, prints, paintings, books etc from righteous tattooers. I owe heavy debts to the guys that brought me up and I will never be able to repay it. Anytime I get a compliment from anyone on my tattoos I let them know who taught me. It's important to pay to your lineage no matter who it was. I spend time conversing with as many tattooers as I can that I admire just to hear what they have to say. I have a list of tattooers in every state and I frequently refer people to places to get the work they desire. Al that and I still feel like I owe tattooing everything. I expect I will always feel the need to justify my existence here among the people that I respect and admire by paying them heed in any way that I can. They do deserve it after all.

That's because your back is weirdly sensitive. Ever asked someone to rub your shin? Nope. But back rubs are awesome because your back has a million sensitive spots, all of which feel super fucking awesome when getting tattooed, especially the lower back. You already know that tattoos hurt, and you seem to be acutely aware that the back will hurt, too. You also know that you're already on this path (didn't you just get your hand tattooed?) and that the back is the ultimate canvas. you just need to figure out what you're getting and who's gonna do it, although something tells me that you have more than a few ideas in mind. While I did find the process to be painful (and expensive), I have no regrets at all about doing it. It was so exciting to see it come together, session by session. There's something about having a full back piece. It's something that I've always admired, but for years, I didn't think I'd be able to make the physical/financial/mental commitment to go through with it myself. Completing it was a big milestone for me, and I have a beautiful souvenir of the experience that I get to wear for life.

Alanna, this is really incredible! That you went from watching the TV shows, to seeking out a good tattooer, to LEARNING about the history and the trade, to actually being so invested to continue to get tattooed by great people and talking with such enthusiasm about Dietzel's desings -- amazing. I bet most people's initial reaction to that first sentence of your story was something like, "Here we go.." but you've just proved that nobody's own story is more legitimate than anyone else's. Truly, truly awesome.

My back is in progress and last session I realized that getting one's back tattooed is like getting your ribs done all over again. I foolishly thought going into it... "At least my ribs are done. Nothing could hurt that bad." If I'd given it an ounce more thought and considered the anatomy involved I might have realized that ribs wrap from front to back... fucking duh! I told Scott we will be finishing this thing in 30 minute increments. What a cry baby I've become in my old age.

KEV- best thing ive read toady! Ive been watching the tattoo shows on tv probably since i was seventeen and just was in awe of what was being done. i loved the finished piece and the bright colors or bold black on beautiful skin. fast forward to my current job where i started working with my now friend who has some beautiful pieces on her arms by some great Toronto artists. i had to stop myself from staring. i was mesmerized! i wanted a change in my life and i wanted to do something that seemed "dangerous" and i decided that getting a tattoo was the right thing to do. my co-worker told me about lizzie and i heard about LST from her. i have learned so much from this site and seen mind blowing stuff. i've recently fallen in love with Amund Dietzel's work and life. just last week Nick Collela was in Toronto at Speakeasy and i got my third piece from him. a sparrow and horseshoe design from the book about Amund by Jon Reiter. i love it! *smiling from ear to ear*

My spite tattoos are the tiniest but possibly the most gratifying.

I found the healing to be pretty easy. It's not like healing an elbow or ditch or some other joint, at least in my experience. And Gouge, I feel you on the first 5 or 10 minutes. It always takes me a while to get acclimated. I liken it to getting into a swimming pool: it's freezing at first, and it feels like you'll never acclimate, but within a few minutes, the water's fine and it actually gets worse if you get out and jump back in. Another reason why I don't like taking long breaks during tattoo sessions--then I have to get acclimated all over again! I remember getting birdies tattooed on my chest over 15 years ago and thinking, "Man, there is no WAY I could get a full back piece!" But then 10 minutes went by....

Well, I'll be damned! My only fear is that I'll get into it and puss out. In the first five or ten minutes I STILL sometimes get the "Oh shit, can I make it through this?" thought. Which I know is kind of ridiculous for the number of times I've been tattooed. But yeah, if I had a full back piece I think I'd be pretty pumped for the rest of my life.

I prefer sand paper and bleach personally

Somebody please draw an ass eagle. Between an ass eagle and Shaw Porter's Squid Pants rendering, we're well on our way to the first ever LST esoteric shenanigans flash sheet.

This definitely happens to me, and I've never really tripped about it. Like said earlier, tattoos are a pretty crazy thing to do to your body. Parts of my tattoos will itch and parts of my outline will get raised or whatever and I just kind of shrug it off with a "Wellp, that's what I get." I also have always had fairly sensitive skin.

Man, everybody already used my smart-ass answers but the Greg Irons quip was funnier than I could have come up with. But back to the original question. This is one of the newer approaches to tattooing that makes me slightly uncomfortable to be honest. Myself and a few tattooers I know and work with have noticed the trend of customers finding a sense of pride in how long they had to wait for their tattoo. As if that makes the tattoo more worthwhile. With some of the currently living/working tattooers mentioned in this thread, I personally know people (not even on the internet) that have tattoos from all of them. Filip, Horiyoshi III, Shige and Mike Rubendall. Yeah, they had to wait a little while for some of them but not as long as you'd think for others. Mike Roper is a different situation because he makes it deliberately difficult to get in touch with him, which answers the question posed above. But that wasn't really the question that was asked and it's rarely the question that gets asked. The question, or at least the implication, is "who has the longest waiting list' or "who has appointments booked furthest into the future". If I were to be snarky "who gives me the most bragging rights". For me the hardest people to get a tattoo from are the tattooers who are located furthest away from me. The ones where I have to get off my ass and do something about it. Time is easier to overcome than distance although patience is a different matter. It astonishes me that people call our shop from the outskirts of the city expecting us to change the way we work because they are catching a train to get here. On the other hand, we are humbled and honoured by the people who cross seas and continents to get tattooed regularly with us. But that's aside from the issue. Why is it a trend that makes me uncomfortable? Because I've heard people brag about how long they had to wait for 'x' artist and wear that information like a badge of honour. It feels almost as distasteful as bragging about who charges the most. Yeah, tattoos are for tough guys and tough buys like to brag and maybe that seems harmless, but it makes me uncomfortable and I have trouble clearly explaining why. Maybe it's because it's a phenomenon spurred on by the internet and the gossipy world of hearsay. Nobody calls and checks with the artists or shops they want to get tattooed at. Nobody travels down to the shop to ask the question. They just ask random strangers on the internet who have a lot of time on their hands and like to talk about something they know nothing about. Then the reality gets lost or twisted and in the end the real information is lost. I see this a lot with regards to the shop I work at. Forums are (or certainly used to be) bursting with 'facts' about how much we charge, how long we take, how far 'x' and 'y' are booked or how long their waiting lists are. Nobody calls the shop to ask and nobody suggests that the person calls to ask. I know that happens with a lot of things but it seems like this is starting to have a real-world effect, however small. People who wanted tattoos that we would love to do heard that we wouldn't tattoo them at our shop because we were so cool and busy and booked up for decades and rolling around in money 'n' bitches or something. We've heard of this a few times and it seems to be happening more. Yeah, we're busy, you may have to wait a little, maybe not. If someone has contact information, especially a phone number on their website it means that they want you to call. I'm not really going to touch on the tone of the "are they a fad or are they really worth it?" comment, except to say that if you have to ask, the answer is "no". Sorry to jump on this fun thread with a rant. I look forward to more witty quips.

Some new funny pictures:

My dad has tattoos, so even when I was young I always knew i wanted at least one. Then came skateboarding, and then hardcore.. yadda... yadda... yadda...

punk rock. that probably answers both questions.

Black Cat is where its at :) Premium Tattoo After Care Product Custom Label Healing Aftercare

by definition, industry means "the aggregate of work, scholarship, and ancillary activity in a particular field, often named after its principal subject" which in this context would be quite an accurate meaning. I can see why you would dislike the term "industry" (for most people it has connotations of corporate manufacturing which makes most of us cringe when thinking of tattooing) but to me it's no biggie like "gun" for instance

I never correct my clients - " what kinda guns, you use? " - I figure the less they know the better. I don't discuss any of it. I like " tatty " though, as in "just got a fresh tatty! "

hahahaha I love this shit. It makes me giggle like a little kid every time

When I was just getting into getting tattooed, I was getting worked on by Bud "Just Plain Bud" Pierson of Ancient Art in Orlando. This is... 1990 maybe. When I first went in I was pretty young, but we hit it off pretty well. I was worried that I wouldn't be taken seriously by the "collectors" or the "serious artists" due to my age and my lack of large tattoos. Bud was about as politically incorrect and offensive as they came, and he summed it up like this: "I'm just a guy who does tattoos and you're just a guy that gets them. That makes us as special as the guy who fixes the toilet and the guy who uses it." At the time I was all butthurt that he equated tattooing (something he had been doing for 20+ years, but my 16yo pride wanted to defend) with that, but as I got older, I totally got what he was saying. So yeah. God I miss Bud.

honestly, "collector" bothers me (sorry robin)! generally speaking people who refer to themselves as collectors are a bit smug and see themselves as above other clients. no offense robin, or anyone else who use this term, it's just been my experience and bothered me for years. the guy getting his girlfriend's name is just as important as a "collector" getting a custom "cool" tattoo. sometimes these "collectors" scoff at having to wait while i do a regular walk-in on someone they deem "uncool", and it eats me up. but i guess this is a whole other discussion!

A tattoo shop should only and always be referred to as "Ye Olde Tattzappery."

and thats why shes my wife......its hard to pick one. thats how you end up coverd head to toe. just trying to get the coolest one over and over, like a god damn goldfish.....i hate dudes who have hand and neck tattoos that dont even have full sleeves... just saying you dont get crazy tattoo status with out getting tattooed you just get douche bag awards.