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Outline done on my rib panel. From Horiyoshi iii book 100 demons. Tattooed by @Stewart Robson at Frith Street today. I'm really over the moon with it.

Jelle Nelemans did this on top of my shoulder last Wednesday.

This is my Koifish, it's not finished yet, I got at Have Fun Be Lucky in Baltimore, Maryland by Hunter Spanks. Any opinions/ideas about it!

Got this Friday at Kings Ave. from Victor Kensinger. In memory of my grandparents.

He just had to go below your waistline so that everything you wear will be painful for the next three days, didn't he? Enjoy that. ;) You've amassed quite the collection, my man. You have excellent taste.

Yeah! @gougetheeyes

I'm going to start an OV thread because I'm way too lazy to mention things in specific threads. Sooo. Today I posted a digitized version of a huge interview that Jonathan Shaw did with Col. William Todd in ITA 1/1 in 1992. Mr. Shaw gave me permission to digitize all the interviews that he did for ITA- takes forever (OCR for the win) but TOTALLY worth it. Here's the first one: Jonathan Shaw Interviews: Col. William L. Todd « Occult Vibrations SO MUCH good stuff in this interview.

I just had my wife take an updated picture of my back, here's a before picture... and how it looks now, this is 2 months after 3 sessions on the black and one session on the grey (and a week in the Maui sun :D ) The tattooer doing the cover up said 2 more sessions and at least 4 months heal time should be enough to start the cover up. I'm getting another treatment in 2 weeks...

Got this one towards the top of my shoulder.

I love that! Stewart seems to always kill it. That 100 daemons book is great.

Calf done by Marco Hernandez while he was over at Electric Tattoo. Based on a design from an old tattoo international. SO FUCKING AMPED.

latest from Danny Reed

Had a great day with matt bivetto today

Barnett - your Dad's tattoo was done by Bert Vallar at 404 Argyle street, Glasgow, Scotland. Bert was the son of Prince Vallar who tattooed in Glasgow from 1911 until his death in 1949. Bert served his apprenticeship under his father and also ran the shop until around 1964. He was world famous - long before the internet, TV or and print exposure - and was revered for his fine line single-needle and freehand style. I have a picture of the exact same tattoo that was also done by Bert around the same time. Prince Vallar was a society tattooist who modeled himself on the great tattooists of the early 1900's such as George Burchett, Sutherland MacDonald and Prof. Tom Riley. For further reading on Prince Vallar or Scottish Tattooing please visit www.princevallar.co.uk

@eisen777 That is a killer tattoo! Congrats! @jade1955 Wow! I can't wait to see that finished! Nice Job @Stewart Robson @distortion2 Go to a quality tattooer that you want work from, and have them draw it up. It's generally a faux pas to ask tattooers to draw you something on the internet. (let's see how many mentions I can make in one post)

a frog on a mushroom playing the banjo. It says you like fuckin' bluegrass, you don't mind amphibians, and you definitely get high.

I thought I'd start this thread along the same sort of vein as tattooer's deserving some recognition ,except more like shedding some light on the classics.So i'll kick this off with one of my all time favorites,N.Y.C's finest -Tony Polito

Nothing bad! Hes a funny dude and its usually a wacky time

Oh, I was only joking. :) I don't know why but I just figured people who had a bunch of tattoos would gamble more?

Ive got a couple from Spanks proud to call him a friend Sassy++++++

I've been tattooed by Hunter myself. Always a fun time, whether he is feeling sassy or not!

Hey Kev , Giving your diet more consideration a hard training person like yourself needs a more substantial breakfast . I know it kinda sounds old-fashioned but you need to at least have your eggs in the morning (most guys I know would also have a bowl of oats also ) . Supplements can never replace food , one of the very best pros said " If I only have 20 dollars in my wallet and its a choice between supplements or steak , steak wins " . More than one sponsored athlete sold his endorsed products for food also I think you need more carbs pre-training . Back to the issue of breakfast I have an awesome Paleo pancake concoction that I also rotate with my cooked breakfast , say the word and i'll pass it on .

good breakup tune. my kind of day.

Everyone has that, come on try to be a bit more original...........

I am waiting for Marco to get back to Olympia so I can go down and get something from him.

Liz that rules! And sitting time varies wildly for me the older I get. Keep us updated on the color!

Something I've noticed from working with Robert is you can't photograph a Robert Ryan tattoo. It just doesn't work. I'll see tattoos he does at the shop, (like Shawn's for instance or Greg's front torso piece), and in person they'll put you on your ass. but i'll see a photo of it he puts up on instagram on my way home and i'm taken aback by how little of the power can be contained in the picture. His tattoos really have to be seen in person to be appreciated. and like T.D. says "Any Imperfections only add to it's beauty"

need a relative size comparisson on this one . . .

holy shit, i almost choked on my coffee. too funny

I've just seen on a social networking site that the next Episode of Gypsy Gentleman will be coming soon :D

So... they're still casting "human canvases" for season two. I just saw a solicitation asking for people willing to get "hand, face, head" tattoos, as well as women willing to get pubic area tattoos. I weep.

Cris Cleen

-Part 3- Sorry about the lack of updates, but I am hardly ever at my hotelroom except for when I'm sleeping. I gotta run and meet up with my two norwegian buddies, Olav & Marius, at the Kellogs diner now. We're getting some breakfast, pancake style, but I'll try to write a paragraph or two later. Here are some pictures though. I think most of them are self explanotory.

@jade1955 i normaly take them out of the holder but that is because i'm kind of a retard when it comes to motor-skills (is that an english word?:P) and at the pub i frequent you have to give your left show as a guarantee if you drink the beer out of a glass like that since theyre apparently expensive and they dont have many of them. I like my shoe so i don't want to break a glass. The beer is delicious thou, just had a few. I love my pub. It has no bar seats, instead it has swings hanging from the ceiling. Genius.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUPDla44jfQ&ob=av3n this one just makes me happy my favorite band to get tattooed to is Gorgoroth though haha

This for the day:

The world needs more people like YOU... That do your footwork, and headwork, then make a good decision, and follow thru with it... The WORLD needs more Tattoo Admiration from "Professional Collectors"... People that have impeccable taste in tattoos, and tattoo art in general, that love it soo much to leave it the fuck alone, and just get tattooed, because they respect it enough to let it be...

I'm going to hop on my soap box for a second and give everyone a little rant: Who cares? Really? When I first got into this I looked at it like a business mostly... Capitlaism, blah, blah, blah.... Fuck that noise now. Over 12 years now, I look at it like this, as my husband always said even when I first came into his shop... "You never really see rats jumping on a sinking ship... Why in the Fuck would any smart and skilled person want to do this for a living? It's not easy, it's not cool, and it's not a life easily lived, why?" BUT, in this case, yeah... It's much too cool, to not WANT to do it... You can blame TV, you can say it's more accepted, but it's not really... If there are still small towns in the middle of nowhere, and you needed to stop and get some help, they would look at you sideways, say sorry, can't help ya, move along stranger... Deal with that bullshit for a good few years, you might change your mind about how accepted it is... But while all us are busy bitching about it online, the real heros, and pros are busy, working... Tattooing and painting and putting their stuff out there. Putting the real work in. So in an effort to save time, and typing do us all a favor, just get tattooed, don't get attracted to it, between the hours, the people, the drugs, the bullshit, it's not something you can just do, it's something that does you. OK, end rant. Tattooing and this life inevitably chose me, like it does with anyone that partakes it, NOT FOR THE MONEY, but purely out of LOVE for the craft, that love is the drive that keeps us rolling around doing what we do....That's my take. PS... all the new kids and folks hopping on this site need to go back into the older parts of the forum, and read everything there that they might be thinking about, cause all this stuff has already been brought up before, while I am happy the site is gaining members, I am tired of re-reading old stuff, that's not really relevant to life, and tattooing right now. Ok, end of second ps rant.

'in some respect the commodification of this practices (tattoo) and their claims to be 'art' require as to treat them as no different then any other form of personal consumption in the West. In the words of one clear-sighted enthusiast, 'The guy with 10,000$ worth of tattoos is no different then the guy in an Italian designer suit wearing a Rolex.' Ed Hardy 1. For each exclusive commodity there is a niche for illegal copies 2. for every standardised and regulated industry there are people committed to operate outside of this industry, often in opposition to it.( think street art- most of it is a nuisance and it IS illegal, mostly quite bad too. But there's no stopping them, it's about personal freedom) 3. Goods that are common cannot be exclusive but having no cash for Nike's trainers never stopped anybody from running. They'll buy Chineese exports. And I could go on and on with reasons WHY. The bottom line is the answer is as simple and as complicated as the modern capitalist society.

It doesn't bother me a bit. 1 It just makes my tattoos look that much better. 2 If you have to justify a tattoo by telling how little you paid then it's probably a shitty tattoo. 3"You'll appreciate the quality long after you've forgotten what you paid."

I've said it before, and i'll say it again - you can't go wrong with a "Wu-Tang Buffalo with laser beam eyes". Here's one that was prepared earlier (I have no idea who did this originally, I came across it awhile ago in all its awesomeness)

how about a sun with a banner that says rejoice???

On display at the Amsterdam Tattoo Museum.

this is hilarious just saw it in Raoul van Noorden's album

just stumbled upon this, pretty amazing

That was very cool. Great music too. I have to say I laughed my ass off at the end where Tony makes reference to a conversation with a client: Client, "I want a tiger! But I don't want it to look mean." Tony,"...Then don't get a tiger!" Ha ha! Also,"Well if you really look, it's not a mean tiger.". I'm really loving these episodes.

Just got this. The artist asked if i was cool with something less classic looking...i said yeah.

That bear tattoo just makes me think, "Ms Rad by name, Ms Rad by nature", haha. Here's a new one from me! This was done just yesterday, so my arm is pretty swollen. It's by Thomas Morgan, who is just finishing a guest spot in Inkslingers in Newcastle. I think he told me he'll be in Paris next, so if you live near there, I'd recommend getting some work from him! Oh yeah, and I kind of thought this was obvious (I'm sure it will be to you guys), but since a couple of friends have asked me- the gypsy head isn't from yesterday- Ian Parkin did that, and it looks FAR better when my arm isn't at a funny angle :P Anyway, here you go, sorry for the bad picture. I never did put that picture of my tattoo from Charlie on here, did I? If anyone wants to see it, I'll gladly put that up too :)