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Done by Eric Inksmith. He's a great guy.

got this guy yesterday from Lowercase J @ Tattoo Marks in State College, PA

sunday appointment with mr. scott sylvia (my birthday) great present to myself

Hi! First, I want to say that I really appreciate this forum. I've been intensively lurking here for a few weeks now and I love how sincere and respectful (most of) the posts/posters are. It seems to be a rare thing in forums like these for people to be genuinely helpful, nice, and laid back :) So, Thanks to all of you who are here and contributing in such helpful ways. I have this disorder which is causing the motor nerves in my legs to die off. This, of course, means that the muscles in my legs are working less and less and less... and it hurts. For the past 2 or 3 years, as it's been getting noticeably worse, I've been HATING my legs. They let me down. They are betraying me by failing and by robbing me of my ability to do the things I used to love to do and the things I dreamed of someday doing. A few months ago I started dreaming about getting more tattoos. (I have two now. Old. Not the best quality maybe but I love them anyway :)) I am planning now to start tattooing my legs. Sort of a "value-added" idea I guess. Over time they're becoming less functional, but maybe more beautiful? Definitely MINE. And... total bonus... instead of feeling self conscious about people watching the way I walk I can choose to believe that they're admiring my tattoos! So. That's it. That's why I'm here. I am excited to start.

most definitely! i got tattooed by timmy a month or two ago so i figured it was time to get something from J. he did this cool spider & web on my girlfriends elbow as well last night.

Long time lurker. First time posting and introducing myself. My name is Tron. I just recently moved away from NYC where I worked with my friends/tattoo family at Thicker Than Water in the East Village. I just moved to Portland, OR and am currently looking for a new shop to call home out here as well as some new people to befriend and paint/hang with. I've been tattooing for a little over 2 years now and always trying to push on and move forward and learn as much as I can. I don't do much but paint all the time. I'm into punk, bicycles, motorcycles, weird shit, funny shit, hopeless romantic shit, science, nature, the occult, coffee, and Morrissey. I'm technologically retarded and have no clue how to post pics of my stuff so... My website is here: LOSINGSHAPE In the words of Boy George: I'll Tumblr for you - Losing Shape Follow me on Instagram and Twitter: @LosingShape

C'mon @else I bet you know what you like and what you don't like if you think about it. Start poking around on here and checking out tattooers' books and you'll begin to form opinions. Whether it's, "Oh man, this panther is awesome -- ooh, maybe I'll get Jon Q Tattooer to do a sweet panther head on me!" or if it's "Panthers are dumb, I want a scientific diagram of a cat," your ideas will start to take shape. Look at what each tattooer you want to visit puts out, what they do well or what they like doing. Or even ask 'em if there's something they're dying to do.. You'll get it, don't stress out.

Finally got in to get my first "since LST" tattoo, by Ryan Gagne at Classic Tattoo in Red Deer, Alberta Canada, awesome artist, awesome shop.

4th hit on my back. 7 hours on veil and leaves. Once healed veil will be an opaque grey to distinguish from the black and grey background, everything under the veil will be boosted once healed aswell,Thanks.

Chest eagle from valerie vargas sat 15th, I'm looking forward to that, not...

Wassap guys, im new here to this site. Finally a quality tattoo forum. Ive been getting tattooed for around 4 years, my first was a cross by Dan Santoro. Ive been getting tattooed by various artists in the NY area, most of my tattoos have been from Kyle Sajban out of Red Rocket Tattoo and my left arm sleeve is currently in progress by Rodrigo Melo of North Star Tattoo. Awesome tattoos in this thread. I have 2 sleeves as of now, I dont have any good pics of my right arm sleeve unfortunately, just old pictures. Heres some pics of my chest and my left bicep, which I had a session on yesterday. Two koi fishes on my left arm with some peonies and cherry blossoms.

Well I would say that they are going to want an idea of somekind. While I also keep things pretty open ended, that is a ton of space to just say I don't care at all. I would say get a theme or slight idea in your head for them to work with, otherwise I can almost guarantee that you not like it. What artist are you going to? If they have a very defined style it is usually a bit easier to bring up some of their work that you liked. Also a warning, if you say do what ever you like you might or might not like what you get.

Just finalized plans for an out of town getaway with the mister to celebrate finishing my PhD which will, of course, including a celebratory "Phd, fuck yeah!" tattoo. Cannot wait!

Haha I do have interests outside of tattooing. But mostly I'm an awkward stoner hermit that enjoys sitting at home painting listening to records. - - - Updated - - - Hey Pat!! Nice to see ya on here! The move went well, stressful and annoying but I guess that's how moving goes. We're still out here getting settled and sort of living out of boxes since we don't have much furniture yet. But yes! I did bring the new bike out here with me, it's sitting in the garage until I can make some $ to get my motorcycle license and take one of those classes. Hope all is well in NYC. I miss the drinks at the Richardson, but Portland has got some strong whiskey drinks and bartenders with a heavy hand. Haha! - - - Updated - - - Thanks for the warm welcome everyone!

Phase one of "project squidpants" is complete! :-) "Raven Steals the Sun" - done in ~4 hours tonight by Levi Hatch at Think Ink Tattoos in Norman Oklahoma. Completely and totally in love with it - it wasn't exactly what we had talked about and it took me a minute to come around to his vision after he showed me the drawing. Now, the more I look at it the more I love it.

Check out Nick Caruso@ Bound For Glory Tattoo: 644 Forest Avenue Staten Island, New York, 10310 | 347 . 695 . 7255 in SI.

Thank! And to the other poster too. I wish I had better pictures of all my tattoos, my Japanese is looking good. If I could though I would do things differently, I woudve gotten the lady facing the other way. I told the artist to do it that way, and while it still looks good I wish it were facing forward. Same thing for the compass, though it doesnt bother me nearly as much as the gypsy. Heres a pic of the chest panel for my Japanese. This was about 2 months ago, all the background from the elbow up is done now.

Forgot to post this in last month's contest... Got it done mid-fiancee visit, so I was too busy with sushi joints and Klingon Monopoly to be online. Also, in what may have been a small miracle, we got the stencil (which was two pieces) perfect on the first try. Josh Cruse JP Cruse Professional Tattooing Wichita, KS

Note to the moderators, this is my leg, tattoo removal being done on me, not a client / stranger / randoms. Back in 1997 I started what I hoped would be an epic leg sleeve - and ended up falling out of love with it about a year or two later. I also added to the back, by a different artist, a totally random piece to what you see here and what's on the side. By 1999 I had zero intention of actually finishing it and started focusing more on work, a career and things like that. Since then I've had several other tattoos that I actually like, but have always dealt with what's that? whenever I wear shorts. Thus, I started having them removed a while ago. Since this piece was mostly grey wash, and put in rather lightly, I've had some really great results after a single treatment. Thursday night I sat through a 2nd treatment on this piece and had 1st treatments on the right side of my leg and a piece on the back. Healing is going well already and hopefully by the second week of January I can get another treatment.

So I was poking around on Instagram and saw that Henry Lewis was posting a bunch of funny pics of people as Futurama characters, low and behold I found the app for Iphone and started making some of my own. I did my close friends, family, guys at the shop, then the thought occurred me to make some of my favorite tattooers into Futurama characters. So I will start with the attached guys from Chicago Tattoo Company. I know that some of them aren't the best, but it is an app so there are only so many choices, but thought it would be fun to see how many of these we could do. I would advise that any one of these I make is for pure fun, and I would never create something that I wouldn't be willing to show the person in question in person. Let the games begin.

You've only been Tattooing 2 years? BRAVO SIR!!!!!

You have an idea of the type of tattooing you like, no? I would say, do whatever you want, within this style, and within this theme... You could keep it mythological, like your first leg tattoo towards the squidpants you could have literary references if you wanted to change the theme. But sitting down and saying, "put whatever on me, whatever you want" maybe isnt the best idea. You should have some input into what is going to be on your body forever

"I'm not here to make friends"

the extras are great too- Zeke's shoes, Eddie and the Pineapple juice haha

If you end up in Houston, check out Nate Beavers. Nate Beavers :

Nick Caruso is a solid tattooer and a great guy. You could do far worse.

@else levi did a bang up job for you, I talked with him some in SF and he seemed like a cool guy. Actually Josh, fern and levi all seem really cool which makes it all that much better since I think they do the best work in the metro area I am happy for you

@else how did I miss this?! So stoked for you!

Hi all. So, so freaking glad I found you guys. I'm a downtown, 45-year-old who got my first tattoo earlier this week. It was a reward for staying clean (oh, the joys of crack cocaine: took my marriage, every cent I had ever saved, my home and for a long time, my health) for three years, and I've been planning it about that long. I think it would be fair to say that I'm hooked. I'm starting to plan my next tat as a reward after I lose some of the weight my medication (see health problems, above) put on me. After thinking my life was over a few years ago and clawing myself back out of the black hole I was in, my simple new tattoo ("courage" on my forearm) makes me happy every single time I look at it. Anyway, glad to be here.

they are called acetates. you powder them with carbon ,blow it off leaving carbon in the scrathes,grease up the skin and stick it. state of the art until the 70's. - - - Updated - - - holier than thou.they want you to know that thier better than you.

Update: It totally worked! I was a little worried that I would get a leg tattoo and still hate my legs... But I've spent pretty much every waking moment since I got my raven-girl staring at my leg (and pictures of my leg) with absolute adoration. I <3 my leg!! Yay!! Also - I figured out the probable reason *why* I've been persistently dreaming about leg tattoos. My motor nerves are dying but my sensory nerves are fine. However, because of the motor damage my sensory nerves are freaking out pretty much all the time and I have a constant pins and needles/sunburn feeling from my ankles to my knees. It's much worse at night (like a toothache I imagine, worse when there's nothing else to think about). Anyway, as soon as he started I realized that the sensation was just a notch stronger than what I've been feeling all the time anyway. And - I learned to trust my tattooer. I had gone in initially telling him "I don't really care, do whatever you want". And then we had talked about a few things and kind of nailed down an idea or two. When I came in to get the tattoo the drawing he showed me wasn't what we had talked about at all and my initial thought was to cancel altogether. But then I thought on it for a minute and recalled that I had told him that he pretty much had free reign to do what he wanted so I went with it even though it wasn't what I had expected it to be. And it is AWESOME! Better than I ever imagined and I couldn't be more pleased with the thing. And now I want more ;)

I currently have a few similar scabs on a medium sized leg piece I got about a week ago and I'm hoping for the best...

Welcome! You do nice work.

@LosingShape, I follow you on the interwebs and have met you once when I came into TTW. Welcome! I dig your stuff.

I saw him a month or so ago. Good show, but I have to say I prefer The Smiths to his solo stuff.

I've watched a couple of episodes of this now and what can I say? It's my new funny show to watch when I need a good laugh! But, come on, that Sarah, or whatever her name is...she should seek some professional help. I bet a psychiatrist and some medication would calm her down a bunch.

I don't know, honestly for that style I think the guy is pretty solid overall. Obviously the talent pool in and around NY is huge but there doesn't seem to be a lot of artists doing black and grey realism, if that's the style wanted. I'm sure there's some better choices but I don't think he'll get a bad tattoo by the Victor guy.

Ah, the circle of life!

Most of it looks really nice. I can see some stuff that looks pretty poor though. Some minor things that throw a few pieces way off.

Tattooed guys talking about how they don't like tattooed women give me the douche chills.

Well might as well since I finally have a worthy tattoo... Scott Sylvia, Guest Spot @ Kings Avenue Tattoo, NYC

Tattoo Age has been so great overall, but these deVita episodes are really something truly rare and special. We're so lucky that they even exist and that we get to see them.

Three words: Japanese squid pants. And welcome!

He's well-known in these parts, but I haven't seen much mention of Dave Cummings from PSC Tattoo, Montreal on LST: - - - Updated - - - Another local guy who I feel deserves some recognition (again, pretty well-known locally) is Pol from Pol Tattoo, Montreal.

I made another reaper, I wanted to share it 'cause I'm stoked on it. This is 6.5x6" embroidery and paint on linen. More people need to start posting in this thread again!

I'm with you on that one 100%. Another one I don't get at all is Noon. I know this thread is about artists that deserve recognition but what the hell are these supposed to be other than a very bad idea.

Deno from circus tattoo madrid/Spain does some sick stuff.. Deno CIrcus tattoo (DENO CIRCUS TATTOO MADRID!) on Myspace

i have a feeling i am really behind the ball on this one, but i'm still schooling myself on european tattooers and i just discovered Stizzo, an italian artist. it looks as though he owns and works out of his own shop called Best of Times, in milan. i'm sure anyone who works the milan convention is probably familiar with him. i really enjoy his use of black, it's beautiful and it really gets me. you can check his stuff out on facebook under Stizzo Tattoo. seeing that he has over 4,000 friends on facebook, i assume his work is no secret. but i had never heard his name or seen his work in books, magazines or on the web before. here some samples...

well Isaac Fainkujen is awsome! i have haad some contact with him before and hoping to get tattooed when he comes to denmark this summer. i have to promote swedish artist Peter Lagergren. Let's get tatt'n