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Just got a nice surprise today in my inbox. Looks like sometime next year I might be getting tattooed by Thomas Hooper!

An in-person consultation will make that happen, and you will probably be more excited with the resulting design if you simply give the basic idea to your artist and let them run with it. Don't try to micro-manage how they draw it. We will be disappointed if you don't use one of the recommended artists we listed!

My first trip to Dallas was in 1998 and I worked right near Richard's shop. The owner of the shop said, "come on, I'll introduce you to Richard Stell". We walked over there and they were filming Walker Texas Ranger, Richard was tattooing. I got to meet Richard Stell, Mike Wilson AND Chuck Norris all within 5 minutes of each other. It was the coolest day ever for me. Richard wouldn't stop tattooing for them to film and told them to deal with it and film around him, it was rad. I told Richard that story recently from my perspective and he chuckled. I am very excited to see him on Ink Master.

this is by zach nelligan. straight up team logos are lame, but I’m totally down with a tattoo like this one. Zach also posted another baseball tattoo with the diamond and some other things incorporated. It was really awesome. I love baseball-grew up playing it-so at some point I know that I’d like to get a baseball related tattoo. edit-the one thing i don't like about this tattoo is the mustacheod gentleman. i really don't like the whole 1800s/1900s gentleman with mustache designs, but this is still an awesome sports tattoo. if i'd have gotten this, the dude just wouldn't have the mustache.

So many good snake tattoo posts here! Sick one from Dan Sinnes at The London Convention: ..and a sick one from Xam: A couple of nice snakes from Marius Meyer: and my very own girlhead and snake:

Freddy Corbin (oakland)

if you really want some killer Japanese, STATE OF GRACE is just an hour away in San Jose.

I forgot to mention Tim Lehi...

Go to black heart

amy best advice i can give is read threads here, soak it all in and get a good artist to fix that. If you know you want more work then just get tattooed again and look at and feel the difference. Not all tattoos are created equal and you have say in what tattoo you receive so don't buy any more lemons for fucks sakes

I had a great time talking with richard while he was tattooing my ribs, He could talk about so many different topics and the experiences that he shared were thought provoking to say the least

Seems like that may be a little excessive for opening a box or even cleaning a fish.

BHR snakes:

Seth Wood through the neck.

Snakes! Love 'em so much. Maybe too much. I have three, and I'm really trying to stop. One on my back by Jill Bonny, one on my elbow by Scott Sylvia and the aforementioned weirdo battle royale by Jeff Rassier:

You can purchase the prints for only $20. If you want an original it is quite a bit more. I know if you get the prints from State of Grace he will sign them for you. Horitomo does both tebori and machine.

Don't schedule around me, but I'd definitely try to make it to a meetup despite this non-committal answer. Sounds fun!

Cops? i thought it was only the robbers that had tattoos. How am i to distinguish now.

I carry a Mercator K55K. Gotta make sure you get the German one, there's Chinese knockoffs floating around. World Knives: Mercator German K55K Cat Folding Pocket Knife - K55K

Hi Tyler. Wow, we sound like an AA meeting.

If I were going to San Francisco I would get tattooed at Blackheart, but if you are looking for a small Japanese tattoo I would go to Diamond Club or over to State of Grace and see Horitomo.

He dodged a bullet there.

I personally like the cohesive body suit but I have always wanted to be tattooed by many so have done so. I told a work mate 8 years ago that I was only doing half sleeves and that was it. Now I have two spots left on my body for size able tattoos. I have planned the rest of my pink skin and am eyeing up a couple artists I would like to finish my body of work. I think when I am done I will start some laser on my left sleeve, I guess im just a sucker for pain.

I don't think there is much else to figure out.

I'm currently on four tattoos... with plans on getting one removed to be replaced with a piece of higher quality (young and ignorant tattoo decision making - "travel for a tattoo?! nah"). So far though I love the experience too much to even contemplate having it end. Everything from scouting out an artist to entering the shop, hearing the buzz and smelling the soap! My significant other doesn't like full coverage, she wants to see skin between the tattoos, so no sleeves and certainly no body suit in my future, but I do want to be significantly covered. I prefer big pieces to small ones though so am aiming to be very selective in who I choose to get work by... should keep me busy for several years yet! I'll be sad when I am "complete" I think. My biggest regret in getting tattoos is that the places I have them can't be tattooed by someone else!

This. I'm still pretty new to getting tattooed and I've already gone from thinking that everything about tattoos is the coolest thing in the world to thinking that tattoos are still the coolest thing in the world, it's just sort of unfortunate about the getting them and healing them part, and as I'm planning on starting some big work in the next year I expect that my opinions will change again, and that I will lament ever getting involved in this thing that involves me getting repeatedly stabbed with needles in my ass crack. That said, I really like what was said above about the experience of getting tattooed and getting to meet people who really excel at what they do and really getting something from that energy. I love the way that when I look at my tattoos that I can remember the experiences around them and getting them (for example, around a year ago I was in NYC on that freakishly really snowy day at the end of October and because the weather was so miserable and people were cancelling their tattoo appointments I managed to get a walk-in at Smith Street and got that classic wolf head with its tongue hanging out the side of its mouth from Eli Quinters and when I look at that tattoo I remember that day really sharply, though I probably would have otherwise forgotten about it) and I want to continue having those experiences as long as possible because they've been some of the best and most important experiences I've had in my life. Which isn't to say that getting a cohesive bodysuit wouldn't be this really amazing, transformative experience, because I'm sure that it absolutely is.

did that last week :D

As a point of clarification, tebori is hand tattooing. "Te" is Japanese for hand and "bori" (from "hori") is carve or engrave.

i didn't even think about it when i started getting tattoos but now i'm trying to get as much as possible as fast as possible done...i hate getting tattoos since i have more or less only painful spots left...so get it done, never bother again! starting to fill my head next week...should be awsome! :p

Little filler I picked up at Blue Arms tattoo here in Oslo a month or so back. Tattoo by Christoffer Wøien, design by Bert Krak.

josh Arment The Aloha Monkey Tattoo & Piercing @kore Flatmo mason williams http://www.mason-tattoo.com/

Well, supposedly "The midwest region consists of 12 states in the north-central and north-eastern United States: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin." so speaking only of people i've seen their work on folks, rich t at bicknee in coalton-ohio, durb morrison at red tree in columbus-ohio, jay blevins at high street in columbus-ohio, rev chad wells at wells and co. in dayton-ohio, dana brunson at designs by dana in cincinnati-ohio, andy blair at flying tiger in cincinnati-ohio, kori flatmo at plurabella in cincinnati-ohio and john massie who works at five star tattoo in louisville-ky but also works at one of the designs by dana shops so i'll include him in the midwest list.

i've tried a bunch of different methods but re-wrapping only happens on my legs so i don't have to care about fibres from the cloth getting stuck in the tattoo...thats what i would call a bacterial death trap! but i think different methods for different people. no ones immune system is the same so no tattoo will heal the same. i guess you have to find what suits you the best. for me(except legs as mentioned), wrap....come home, change it for the night...off in the morning..wash, bepanthen...the usual. works everytime. i also drink alot of orange juice or similar since vitamin c helps your body heal faster. read somewhere that smoking weed will help the process with it's anti inflammatory effects but haven't tried that. a friend claims it to be amazing...but he thinks everything is amazing after smoking a fatty so...

Sounds pretty much like the aftercare instructions that were handed out 40 years ago at CTC! I'm not sure when the move to taking off the bandages after 3-4 hours happened, but when I started getting tattooed, 38 years ago, it was ALWAYS leave the bandage on at least overnight. I'll see, I think I may even have on eof the old instruction sheets around-if I can find it, I'll post it.

chris emailed me back. im on his waitlist, getting tattooed in december. WOOOOOO

Not exactly an EDC (we're not allowed to carry knives in the uk). This is my knife of choice for kebabing intruders. A Cold Steel Trilite with a 6" blade.

ACME TATTOO I started one recently, need to upload more pics, but trying to just keep it about recent tattoos the guys are doing.

That's so awesome, @G.Uristti! Question for you tattooers with kids: when you color in their coloring books with crayons, do you fill in using lots of tiny circles? Semi-serious question. :)

I'm gonna be a rebel and tell you to get a panther head with a knife through it. That'll be your best bet. ever.

here's my Ass Cobra from Chris O'Donnell :D

might as well have another crack, Tattoo around the clouds and Kraken is fresh/swollen in this pic. Tristan bentley, Ocean ink Sydney Australia

This is a creepy one from the Grime on my leg, snake lady with double titays and gimpy arms...sweeet!!

It's on Todd Noble. He saw my Grime tattoo and said "that's sweet, but mine's better" and pulled off his shirt.

Stewart put together this video of Frith Street at work. Every now and then he does them, a fun way to document what goes on at the shop i think.

i wouldn't sell it, but for showing-off's sake...i have an original rollo sheet from 1986 that i bought from him about ten years ago, and an acetate he cut, which was a gift from josh arment. i took it for granted that we lived in the same city, and never got tattooed by him, wish i'd done it.

hogg, if you care to share the story, I'm sure most everyone would enjoy dude.