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Here is the latest on my backpiece from @stewartrobson Did 5 hours on Saturday and 4 hours on Sunday. Actually tapped out on Sunday, it was a long week of good eating and drinking and it caught up to me. It's 47 hours of total work so far and it will hopefully be completed in October. Pic is from Stewart's IG. Photo by stewartrobson • Instagram

Quick update of more work from Rubendall on my collaboration backpiece. His attention to detail is fantastic and looking at his water makes me sea sick! More to come before I take a break over the summer. Hope to see Henning soon to continue the upper portion of the backpiece. Enjoy the pics folks. FYI, there's some work that's still healing and of course new work. Will have fully healed pics in a couple of months.

My two-headed raven ! inner bicep Zafera Kambouris. Ashland, MA

I was bored one Sunday and thought I would make a map of decent artists around the world, with their details and small thumbnail of the style they do. I thought it might also help new people to find an artists near them :) I am adding to it all the time and trying to incorporate all styles, so if you don't find someone on the list and they should be, I can add them :) or if anyone feels that someone shouldn't be! I know alot of the people on here are into old school tattoos, which are basically the ones I know least about. Anyhows, here is the link :) Enjoy! The ForbesTAT List! - Google Maps

After reading that post a few times I think I understand it and to answer your question You need to get a huge ass crawling panther or a ROA.

I'm in Central Texas until the end of May... I'm seriously considering setting something up with Tony myself. I know, I know... I said I was "taking a break"!!! But, if I put it off until close to the end of this contract that's still "a break" right?

So I was back in Chicago in January and we went to visit my wife's 92 year old grandfather. I always wear long sleeves around him, out of my mother in laws wishes, and it was Chicago in January so it was kind of chilly anyway. I was sitting their with my son and grandpa, and he looked at me and said "What? You're not going to show me your tattoos?" I was taken off guard and couldn't come up with a quick comeback before he said "You want to see mine" I said sure, but he said he didn't feel like taking off his pants. I know he was kidding about having a tattoo, but had to let me know he knew.

Got a one way train ticket to Cologne, Germany for this friday morning. From there I will start my backpacking/hitchhiking adventure through Europe. I'm currently looking for a couchsurf location for the first day. These past 2-2,5ish months of preparation went by so insanely fast, can't believe that in 2 days I will be living out of a backpack. It's absolutely terrifying, but I couldn't be more excited for something. Next time I'll post something on LST, it will be from the road. Life of a drifter in Europe for updates on my travels @ThaliaCamille how is the carpe diem life going for you so far? Have you been able to find other work yet?

Funny thing @CultExciter I've totally back pedaled and going for just a classic Bert Grimm style roa.....fuck it why mess with the classics most original ideas either aren't or suck. Looking forward to getting it. But I'm still not a Christian.

Got this out of the Revisited flash book, done by Lee Brooker, Classic Tattoo, Red Deer, Alberta

Matt Arriola , Liberty Tattoo

...you get stressed thinking about what you will do when you have no empty space for new tattoos even though you still currently have plenty of space.

i did this last month with $2000 i saved up over the last year. there goes the beginning of a back piece... or finishing my arms. - - - Updated - - - when you're spending your night before your chem midterm catching up on LST interviews instead of listening to class lectures.

As a non-believer with a ROA backpiece, my stock explanation is "I just like the picture". I've already had to say this on several occasions. (I really do just like the picture.)

This really caught me off guard. I saw the Mario post and wasn't too shocked, as he has moved around a little bit before landing there, but my jaw dropped when I saw Nick's post. I love Beatdown, Frank William, Jelena and everyone else's tattoos there, but to me Chicago Tattoo Company is Nick Colella. On the other hand can't wait to see what he has planned, and hopefully I have some space left next time I head back. I have a few guesses to what is going to happen, but don't want to put stuff out there that is just specualtion.

I quit my job and moved to the other side of town. Big, scary changes, but I figure before my health gets any worse I may as well "seize the day" and start doing stuff I wanna do. So far, it sure beats answering phones (lessened income aside :P )!

I took a pic of a Japanese Version of the "ROA" it was a backpiece on one of the guys that works at Goodtime Charlies, in Anaheim, I can't remember who it was on, or who did it.. But it was badass... I saw this at the True Tattoo Grand Reopening while hiding out in the office avoiding the crowd.

must stab myself in the back of a pattern regarding my personal sweetheart.What kind I want to stab me at the back of a structure of my own boyfriend.What sort of impact will be better?Won't look quite unusual?associated with effect will improve?Does not look really odd?

actually, it was the recent Lady Heads (and the lack of black women in it) that reminded me about this piece. Erica Flannes:

based of the bolded words you should get: pattern = mandala sweatheart = heart or rose stab = dagger boyfriend = japanese penis monster (aka a poorly drawn koi fish)

Why not just get a lady head with an extra set of eyes, I can't stare at those, it confuses my brain

I've always wanted an ROA with the book on enlightenment instead of a cross. It's just a powerful image. Luckily we can get whatever the heck we want. No gods. No masters. Or both. Whatever you like.

Frank Williams is well on his way to being a first-class tattooer, for sure. As to what they have planned, I'll ride with @David Flores on this and wait to see, but I think I can safely say that Nick has a HUGE collection of tattoo history, including what is probably the largest stash of Cliff Raven's work extant, so I know that wherever they land, the shop will be exciting, historical, and au courant. Their styles compliment each other, and Mario and Nick are both Masters of the trade, and artists to be reckoned with. Hang on, kids, this promises to be exciting! Just as a kinda closer, my oldest has booked what I believe is Nick's last opening at CTC. The ink-pig!

when...you start to think maybe your arm is cooler than you are... ;)

@Dan S, that kid Frank Williams tattoos blow my mind!

I'm pretty happy with Nick's tattooing, so I will stick with him, as long as he doesn't move to frkn Paris or something! I would never rule-out having work done by the other tattooers at CTC, they are all first-rate.

^Agreed! Well, since I'm an idiot, and this is the correct thread... I'll ask a more specific question. It seems every one so far is referring to "imagery", but what are your thoughts on biblical text or passages? As an atheist, I view the bible as literature rather than a guideline for life (even though it has its share of positive models). Therefore, there is a lot of great writing. I wish I knew all the people that actually wrote the bible--sucks the prophets, god, etc. stole their credit... :)

To get to this question nearly a year later.. Probably shock value. Ad not anything to do with St. Peter, who is said to have been crucified upside down. They're all over the Vatican. Kinda like all the burning church tattoos that were hot (heh) a couple years ago that seemed to be spawned by Uncle Allan. I doubt anyone was making a statement much more complex than taking a negative view of organized religion.. Also, this thread was fun to go back through! Thanks @Iwar for bumpin' it back up..

Just saw this! That's on Stan Corona of GTC. I believe it was done by Horiken (not Yokohama Horiken of State of Grace, but Horiken of Tokyo, IIRC). As far as I know, he tattoos entirely by hand, including the outline.

@jacobyoung I think I saw Matt working on that off and on... a friend of mine was getting a rose on his hand by Albrigo, so I spent some time hovering that general vicinity. Also, I got this at the same convention, from Ron Henry Wells. Photo from his Instagram...

Lol sorry for the late reply, kinda forgot about thread :) he didn't use any white except at the end. Was all done shading inwards and using skin (negative space?)

When you stop having "late to work/school" stress dreams and begin to have "late for a tattoo appointment" dreams. I overslept, and then couldn't find my pants or the power bars I like to bring, and for some reason I was in San Francisco when I was supposed to be in New York...

love the rock of ages image, but i'm an atheist. can't wait to get that shit tattooed on me.

I saw this on his IG and now I know. It's you!

Just incredible!

AMAZING! Love the details and colors!

Frank is great hes one of those next level guys

no you don't. you will get a big ass cat somewhere(of course!).

It would be great to see a picture of your arm in general, and healed, as i said before this tattoos are amazing.

Finally got an updated photo together - this is after two treatments: My business partner has been extremely busy with 5 month old twins so our schedules never seem to sync up, I'm hoping to get a 3rd treatment this weekend.

It's your skin...but if it was me, and I was worried enough to ask a forum about advice, I would go see a doctor no matter what another tattooer told you. Talk to the artist that did the work...asking another tattooer will not help anything.

I thought I'd post a few pics before and after my first treatment, the results so far have been quite better than what I expected although I suppose the fading will not be as significant as the treatments progress but so far it's looking pretty good. This is the original tattoo, you can notice at the bottom the patch test which I had a week before taking this pic: This is two days after the first treatment: This is one week after the first treatment: Sorry about the difference in the lighting, I hope you can still get an idea of how much has faded.

I'm bummed this is sideways, but am too lazy to fix it. If you have me on instagram you saw this last week, but figured I would post it here. Tobias lives.

...aaaaand @Pugilist is quite possibly going to a conference next year in Oklahoma. Guess I need to figure out what I want from Richard Stell.

Here is the picture I chose for this part that we didn't use. Was just the woman without her face as I didn't like her face lol

Your thigh piece has been imortalized on Dimitri's interview here: http://inkfreakz.com/hnews/tattoo-artist-dmitriy-samohin?utm_source=Inkfreakz&utm_campaign=e528e21c4d-Dmitriy_Samohin7_23_2012&utm_medium=email

The first commandent says: You shall have no other gods before Me. It doesn't deny the existence of other gods; just that you can't put them before YHWH. So I'm sure the creation stories had a little from Brahma, a little from Tiamat, etc. Anyhoo.. got off topic for a bit. I'm an atheist. I'm covered with religious work; Tibetan Buddhism, Satanism, Hindu, Christian, Hebrew, Christian Mysticism.... you name it. I don't really think there's a conflict with religious imagery on a nonreligious person. Sure, having Hindu gods on my neck has led to a lot of conversations about respect and culture (the best being a Hindu friend defending me to her daughter- "if you love Lord Krsna more than he does, why is he not on YOUR neck!". Gotta love my Pushpa Dashwani!) and the Baphomet on my hand has led to more than a few fun situations but by and large... It's no different than having Peter Pan tattooed on you. Which I do. Hah.