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Some more on my back by Marius Meyer. It starts looking like a backpiece I think Next session is the 10th of May:

Yes, I co-sign 100%. This same line of thinking and appreciation of tat family lineage is how I got meet Thom, Higgs and Bubash, and was lucky enough to get tattoos from Thom and Dan. I'm hoping to get the time & money to get something from Nick as well this year. - - - Updated - - - Not precisely 'lineage' but more like crew/family pictures from a 20 year old magazine. Close enough to be post-worthy. I'm sure some of you have seen it but I'm fairly positive plenty of you haven't. Horiwaka family, no names were listed or mentioned. TC picture and GTC pictures are definitely my favorites, especially with Harrison throwing what looks like mystical esoteric gang signs. Kind of wandering off from the thread title so here's this, from a different 20 year old mag.. I posted it somewhere else a few months ago, so if you've seen it already then yeah whatever. Ed, Nick, Thom & Tux

@El Dolmago and I went to The Pearl today and each got ladyhead tattoos from Glennie. Mine is the cowgirl, and hers is the profile with butterfly wings. You can still see the blood oozing out! Fresh.

Not sure if you guys know but I got cocky with my Remis piece and never bothered healing it properly. It got really infected and smelt like rotting flesh. I just had it recently fixed by Remis so thought I would share and see if anyone else has any works that they had fucked up and had fixed, interested to see how they came out after the fix. I am very happy with the way my turned out. :) This was when freshly done! This was my healing skills lol Fixed 2 days ago :)

I'm quite partial to Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina, and the tattooers that work there.

A while ago I decided I want to start my left arm with a panther rose from Jeff Rassier. I hope to join your ranks someday.

I'm a magazine hoarder. I have kept practically every interesting mag ever since I was 14. The amount and weight of books is absurd. Even after donating boxes and boxes of books to the public library I still fill over 2 huge bookcases. My friends hate helping me move.

I don't think people realize the quality of tattoo artists that exist in just the Baltimore metro area alone! People like Eric Gregory.....Matt Rinks......Brady Duncan......Hunter Spanks....Dana Helmuth....Tom Beasley.....and the list goes on! I always tell people looking for great tattoos that they could stay within a 60 mile radius of Baltimore and get some of the best quality tattoos around! A lot of these guys aren't worried about being famous.....they just love to tattoo and care about doing great work! And the same goes for a lot of cities like Philly and Richmond as well as many others! I don't think people around here realize how blessed they really are to have some of these guys close by!

Speaking of Reed Street. Man, that shop. I like thinking about Brian Bruno, who was from Gloucester, but he worked with Jerry Riegger (who worked with Doc King), and then of course Reed Street, Tattoo City, and Absolute. @irezumi The pic of Charlie, et al, so amazing.

Another one I should have gotten to tattoo me at Read Street......Harrison! I think Scott tattooed a Walrus impaled by an umbrella one night I was there....lmao!

Is anyone interested in the lineage and family tree of tattooers as much as I am? Maybe I think about it because I like seeing the connection to myself. The person who is teaching me was taught by someone else, and that in turn bonds us on some metaphysical level. I think it could yield some fascinating discussion.

I'm surprised how many people are saying no back. Doesn't make sense to me. Maybe I'm biased ;)

I saw this on IG and I'm like, I know that leg... Glad to see how beautifully your tattoos are coming along

Latest session. 18 hours in now, the end is in sight! Thanks to Stewart Robson and FST.

Got this pantherose from Jeff Rassier at Black Heart yesterday. So stoked. If I lived here, I'd get a lot more tattoos a lot more quickly.

Thank you!! So, as I have mentioned before, Junii usually has some inspiration right before the tattoo and our plans change a bit - now it looks like we're going back to two snakes, no hannya (maybe). And the collab? Oh, just Junii, Shad, and EVERYONE IN DIAMOND CLUB, nbd. !!!!! At the beginning of the second day, I was looking at some frog paintings my hosts have around their home and vaguely thinking "what a cool tattoo that would be". Headed to the shop. As soon as I get there Junii says "what do you think about this?" and pulls out some frog stencils she made!! As my mind was wrapping itself around this fun bit of synchronicity, she explained that she wanted to put a meditating frog down at the bottom of my leg, and then add some dreamy clouds working their way up so it appears that everything we see is what the frog is sitting and meditating about - we have a beginning now!! She is going to add a few more frogs, one guy with beads, another one with a coin, maybe another guy. I am so satisfied with how this tattoo is coming along - not just with the quality of the work, but also the completely organic nature of how the tattoo itself is developing. It's really incredible to be part of this experience!! ...searching for more words...I'm just into it, is all. :p I'm booked again in July...we'll see what she comes up with next!!!!! I've attached some action shots and one of me being just clearly insanely happy to be where I am. (Thank you for indulging me). Yes @Lance, best birthday present to self ever. @Zillah the koi looks great!! You are a beast to sit for 7.5 hours - that shit is hard! Congrats and can't wait to see a healed pic.

Got my koi done today finally. We didn't go all the way around the back this time, the tattooist thought it would be better to wait until I extend it down to the forearm to do that. The colours don't look that great in the photo- irl they are far brighter. Need to take a daytime + healed photo at some point. 7.5 hours.

Boom!!

Almost fully healed now, leg skull/snake/flower by Scott Sylvia at Blackheart Tattoo.

Glennie does great lady heads! Honestly I'm thrilled - she did such a great job. Yay for spontaneous tattoo days!

In terms of the people staring, or judging us just for having tattoos, I know for me one thing I am learning is NOT to have a chip on my shoulder...like, expecting people to stare and judge. I had two situations recently that made me realize--I'm the one judging them by thinking they are judging me! I saw an old lady at Trader Joe's. She was looking at me real funny and I was wearing a short sleeve shirt. I assumed she didn't like my tattoos. To my surprise she came right up to me, reached out her hand to lightly touch my arm, smiled and said, "Oh my! I thought that was a real baby at first, hahaha!" I was holding my daughter's doll in my arm the way you would hold a real infant and I guess it just freaked the lady out at first and then she was laughing about it. I started laughing and said to myself, man you just judged that lady as being uptight about tattoos and she wasn't AT ALL! Then like a week after that, yet another old lady was shopping at Albertson's supermarket. She was taking up a lot of room in the aisle, her cart was in the middle and she was on one side, not leaving me much room to get by. I tried to squeeze through, she glanced up and had a grumpy expression on her face and I immediately jumped to, "She's disgusted by my tattoos." No sooner did I think that when her face softened into a big smile and she said, "Oh look at me taking up the whole aisle, like I'm the only one in the store!" I laughed and told her not to worry about it as she pulled her cart out of my way. I walked away thinking what is the matter with me? Why do I keep judging these old ladies? It must be because of my mom. She is the only one who has ever actually said anything to my face about her disdain for tattoos. I need to get over it. Older ladies looking conservative, wearing mom-jeans, whatever, looking your way, looking grouchy....they don't necessarily hate tattoos! Some are curious, some think they are cool. I definitely receive many more compliments than disses, and seem to run into friendly people wherever I go. I'm trying to embrace it, and not expect people to not like them any more. If they don't like them, whatever, that's their problem, but I shouldn't expect them to not like them.

Those are beautiful!

Yeah, those are pretty rad. Have a couple of sets of his older flash like the 10 page oversize set and the Seth/Matt split. - - - Updated - - - Just talked to him this morning; his road trip tales are pretty good. Bow-fishing like Rambo.

@irezumi I just got in touch with Dave for when he is at Classic Electric in Fredneck. Now I just need to figure out what I am going to get.

Matt & Brady are both super rad dudes, I have some really early work from Matt when he was on the road, hah POWERLINES like whoa; and a skull from Brady from when he was at Jinxproof. Matt Rinks shirt, early/mid 90s

That 60 mile radius...... :) I know we have strayed way off topic in a little @irezumi but this thread has some really cool info in it that I wish more people on this site would check out! You've added a lot of really good info....thank you for that!

o Wanted to share a fun tattoo I got to do.

Not to mention Frederick. Jeez.

@irezumi those are so good! A big regret is throwing out heaps of old tattoo magazines I'd bought up when I was like 16-18.. And totally looks like Rudy's doing some kind of hermetic something-or-other haahaa

Just popping in... Got another 7 hours on my owl coverup piece yesterday. Fresh and clean next morning Wrapped up Ended up using two 8x12 Tegaderm sheets to cover. For all the cost nazis out there, yes that means I spent a whole 8 dollars to heal my (to this point... in progress) 2500 dollar tattoo. Will leave on 3-4 days and then resume lotioning after I remove. Will post healed pics as well

Let me add this dynamic to the whole conversation I started...... Over the years....30 of them now....I have had to deal with the judgement of others....and have endured true discrimination at places I have worked....and "circles" I have traveled in! Even my kids paid the price a little because other parents didn't want their kids going to "their house....their parents are tattooed" LOL It was fine because I look back now and see how far I have come compared to most of those people and I am far better off than they are on just about every level as are my kids! ;) Here is my point though...... I made the conscious decision to alter my body at the time in a way I KNEW was not accepted by the society around me and as fucked up as this may sound.....I never blamed society for their ignorance or the discrimination! I took what they threw at me and turned their garbage into my gold! Yeah....I had to work twice as hard to get where I am in life....but it made me a much stronger person! My point being is.....people can cry about discrimination all they want.....BUT it's not like they were born deformed or a certain race....sex...genetic factor.....or some other thing beyond their control! WE have chosen this....knowing inside there are people who do not agree with us....and full on knowing that there could be some backlash for doing it! So me personally......I have never taken it too personally when people have placed discrimination upon me! Is it ever right? Hello No!!! But I personally do accept some responsibility only because I knew society wasn't going to agree with all of my decisions! Much like @TatsNCats......I just never gave a shit....LOL

Not sure whose they are - but they're awesome. Artist = Jeff Ensminger

Here's one of mine, redrawn from the Bowery book and tattooed by Sophie at Eight of Swords last year, a very nice birthday gift from the one and only @MrsGougeTheEyes

Also drove up to Napa to get this lady head/eagle from Chad Koeplinger on Thursday. Super good experience.

Here's the result of my recent trip to Austin... Instagram My hands are currently swollen to the size of boxing gloves, so I had to borrow the above picture from Thomas's instagram. Super happy with 'em.

Took a trip up to ol' Spider Murphy's on wednesday to talk to a man about a horse. No, wait, I talked to Theo Mindell about a massive devil head...appointment's not till July though. STOKED nonetheless.

A lot of my real estate has been filled up and so I've ended up going the unorthodox route of putting multiple smaller pieces on my thighs. So thought I would share a racy picture of me in my underwear...I mean of this bizarro mystical panther I had placed on my inner thigh by Shawn O'Connor (now in Nelson, BC at Timber Tattoo Co). One sit for 4 hours. I'm planning on getting another sit in at the end of summer to add some flames as well as fill in all the thigh gaps with spider webbing. - - - Updated - - - "Don't lick the frog"

It's not in the same league as some of the beauties in this thread but here's a little black and grey number I did last week.

About a year old - fresh on the left and healed on the right. Still learning about this and in retrospect would have done things a bit different - nevertheless a fair outcome!

So thanks for the butterfly Lady Head help! Thought you'd appreciate the result.

I'm a teacher. I imagine it varies school to school, admin to admin... I work in the inner city, L.A. Most of the parents in this community have several tattoos themselves. They don't mind. My principal doesn't know I have them though because I have chosen to wear long sleeves. My students see them because I pull up my sleeves from time to time inside the classroom. They do not mind at all ?. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Instagram

I just watched the Bourdain Parts Unknown: Tokyo episode and it blew my mind and really really really made me what to visit there some day. I've never been to Asia (besides like, a day in Turkey) and I can only imagine what that experience must be like. We have a vacation booked to Zion and Bryce and some other places in Utah for June with a couple friends of ours. This is my first camping trip/hiking trip/outdoor adventures, gotta be one with nature trip. Will probably be just as confused as if we were going to Tokyo.

my guess is Mike Roper.

Ladies and Gentleman, we've got (some) color :cool: Tonight we managed to do a 3.5 hour session of mostly greens and red. Unfortunatly we can't continue until the end of may... A six week break after 3 months of bi-weekly sessions... how am I going to survive that?! :p

I have never really gotten any dumb questions from non-tattooed folks. Oddly enough, the most annoying people to me are those with one or two tattoos. I seem to have a ton of people with 1-2 tiny hidden tattoos thst want to tell me how they "would totally get full sleeves if they could". Also, there are the people who insist on telling me the deep meaning behind their tiny, poorly-done tattoo. "Yeah, this tribal sun represents all the fun times in my life and reminds me to always keep my mind on the love that flows throughout the universe like the warm rays of the sun." Meh.

@Victor I don't see a "common sphere of activity" around tattoos. For the overwhelming majority of people who get tattoos or are planning on getting tattoos, their involvement in tattoos begins and ends with going into a shop and getting tattooed. And that is totally fine, I think there's nothing wrong with getting tattoos and not wanting to get covered or go to conventions or participate in forums like this one. When I think of a "scene" I think of people organized around a common interest, sure, but I also see a lot of boundaries and exclusion and trying to fit in, and that is going to push a lot of people away. If you want people to get better tattoos, being open and inclusive and actually listening to people is going to be far more useful. Now let's see some tattoo pictures.

I dig your Deku Scrub Ducky ^. Awesome thread! Here are three tattoos I have done. One is a Charmander from Poke'mon, one a helmet from the Dark Souls videogame for PS3 and one is a Papou fruit from Kingdom Hearts. I actually look forward to doing more tattoos like these.

is that what you're worried about? looking tough? while i don't know you, i do know that i'd be more inclined to talk to a person with a tattoo to remember their pet than someone with a tattoo design that appears to be more "masculine" by stereotype. you are who you are, and you love your dog (and that speaks highly of you in my book). tattoo's won't change that and won't make you any more or less tougher than your own personality dictates. and fuck what others think or say about you due to your tattoo. it was done by a stellar artist, and it's a very simple, but clean design. hell, i have a tribute to my deceased rabbit on my forearm and i'm an ex skin! i've got not shame in my love for Henry, as he was the feistiest rabbit i've ever met, and he matched every bit as much of my aggro tendencies during those days. if someone wanted to mock me, i'd deck in the face still to this day, and i know that Henry will be grunting, lunging, and nipping at their heels in spirit.