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I had my first session with Steve Moore yesterday and we finished up the outline for my Monkey King. I have about 48 hours of tattooing under my belt so far and this outline session was only 3 hours, but the most uncomfortable and painful 3 hours yet! I've read a lot on full backs and apparently they can be quite sharp, but I had a hard time in quite a few spots. For example, often I can keep my breathing and just flow through the pain, but this session had me clenching my jaw, face and just suffering. Steven started chatting with me and it really helped distract me. Steve Moore is absolutely a professional. He researched tons for this piece. He looked at photographs of monkeys, martial artists, and other reference pictures. He mentioned that he debated about how to put the orientation of the Monkey King's foot and used a martial artist's monkey style to duplicate it. I think it looks amazing and the details on it just blew me away. I love how Steve put our collaboration ideas together. Anyways, here's the drawing After three hours of outlining Got my next session in February. Dreading it a bit, but also very excited haha

I just booked 2 back to back appointments Feb 27th in Fresno with Oliver Peck for my wife & myself,to get some of his American trad.

Just had a weekend in Oslo with the missus topped off with the first session on my chest by Tony at Blue Arms.. Super stoked with it Pic stolen from his Insta. Cheers to @hogg for Percy Waters reference

In two weeks, I'm heading down to San Francisco / Oakland to get tattooed by Scott Sylvia and by Freddy Corbin again. I'm pretty pumped about it to say the least.

Had a cool session with Eddy Deutsche and received this Goldfish, powered by a Kappa pilot. My input was: weird, eastern influence, and I threw out a bunch of classic imagery.

Already in the works... August 5, 6, 7 at Crowne Plaza Hotel Reading Sick poster by Chris Conn up. Tim Lehi, Valerie Vargas, Stewart Robson, Dan Smith, Shaun Topper, Greg Whitehead, Teide, Andreas Coenen and more. Wild ass already.

Artist is https://www.instagram.com/woodzart/ Thank you!

Damn, @Jackrabbitt666! I saw that on his IG and thought, "Cool...I wonder if that was inspired by the Percy Waters design?" I'm so happy that I was able to help a bit. Great start to a killer tattoo!

That tattoo is so fucking cool. Thanks for telling us what you wanted too, because when I see tattoos like that I always wonder what the client asked for.

"There was a gap. It fit."

The first time I travelled to Asia was in 2008. I was very privileged to have my Sifu (Master, RIP) take me along with his family to Foshan, China to learn about the roots of Wing Chun kung fu and experience Chinese culture. Then we would spend time in Hong Kong to train Ving Tsun with his Master (my Sigung, grandfather teacher). We had some free time and went to explore the street markets one evening. We had been in the area the day before and I noticed the big blue “TATTOO” sign on the busy street. My curiousity had me drawn to it and I wanted to see what it was all about. I would say I was still inexperienced at this time, 5 years after my first piece (maybe 50hrs in?) however tattoo culture was becoming something I had become very fascinated by. If you wanted to see pictures of tattoos you would muster some courage, suffer through the intimidation of ~actually going into~ a tattoo shop; you could see what your punker friends had scratched on each other; you would sneak a peak at the BME website (the internet! Oh my!). I went off on my own at night time to find this mysterious tattoo shop. I had split off on my own, away from my group. My time was limited to explore. I found the building underneath the big blue sign, went up several flights of a dark dingy stairwell. And there it was “JIMMY HO TATTOO”. Just an apartment door framed with classic tattoo flash pasted to the wall. So I rang the buzzer… I thought maybe it would be cool to get a tattoo in China…but I was also very hesitant. Did I have enough time? My group didn't know where I took off too and I had to meet back pretty soon. I was uncertain about the safety of the needles and ink. Healthwise it seemed risky. China isn't exactly the cleanest place in the world. How was I going to heal a new tattoo being in the hot sun all day and then training (contact) the evening? Afterall, my focus in Hong Kong was Ving Tsun. ...I remember being so nervous when I rang the buzzer. Shaky. There was no answer. So I waited for a bit, my curiousity had brought me this far. But what the hell was I doing here? Sketchy. And then a head suddenly appeared through a gap in the flash covered window. This older gentleman opened the door, poked his head into the stairwell to see who else was around and waved me in. I was pretty mesmerized. Here I am a younger, naïve kid, swept up in the energy of Hong Kong at night. Here I was in a sketchy, dimly lit building in an old man’s apartment studio. Old timey flash, certificates, photos, a lot of tattoo history covering every square inch of the 300 sqft apartment. What in the hell was I doing here? “Tattoo?” He said. That was about the only English he knew and would speak to me. He motioned at my long sleeve shirt, I didn’t have any of my tattoos showing. So I took off my shirt and showed him the work I had amassed at that point. Both my arms fully covered. Some leg tattoos. A big dragon on my ribs. He gave an approving half smile and motioned for me to sit down. I think this man knew that I wasn’t there to get a tattoo from him that night. However he made my curiosity feel welcomed in his studio. Looking around the studio it felt like a risky place to get tattooed and I felt I wasn't experienced enough to think otherwise. Not very sanitary by North American standards (but probably cleaner than some of those tattoo conventions haha). The bench pillow was covered in ink and blood stains. I couldn’t see an autoclave. The ink bottles in the corner looked a little crusty. The older tattooer gentleman didn’t have any visible tattoos and there was a serious language barrier. He gave me some his photo albums to flip through. It wasn’t a portfolio. It was more like family photo albums. Very old pictures of some American-classic tattoo designs he had made on people - eagles, panthers, daggers, hearts. There were pictures of him with groups of shirtless Chinese men, dragon and tiger backpieces and sleeves on display. Photos of this older Chinese gentleman with who I would assume to be elder American and European tattooers (I would be to naïve to have named at that time in my tattoo journey…I’m pretty sure there was a pic of him with Hardy, I think Pinky too? I really can’t remember). The whole experience was very surreal, I was nervous and awe-struck. I was going to have an amazing story about meeting Jimmy Ho, but would anybody really believe me? Or care? Afterwards, I did a bit of research (in which there was and still is limited info online). It turns out Jimmy Ho was the son of the late James Ho, who opened up Rose Tattoo, one of the first tattoo shop in Hong Kong back in the 1940s. My mind was blown that I had just had an exchange with a man from tattoo royalty. The next day I was exploring and ended up checking out another tattoo studio “Star Crossed Tattoo”. It was run by two friendly UK ex-pats Ross and Julia. I spent the afternoon talking with them about HK life, punk rock, tattoos, watched Julia tattoo and confirmed a few things. Yes, I had just met Jimmy Ho. He was tattoo royalty in Hong Kong. Hygiene standards were very questionable in Hong Kong/China at that time. Very risky, healthwise. The HK tattoo scene wasn’t regulated by the health board. Later on in the trip I would venture back to the area of Jimmy Ho’s tattoo shop. I didn’t take any pictures inside his shop, I was too distracted by the reality of the interaction - a human exchange about tattoos that happened in spite of a language and cultural barrier - and I didn’t want to be disrespectful towards a man that had let a stranger into his studio apartment. But I wanted to get a picture of the big blue TATTOO sign from the street during daylight. At that time I realized that I must have been a batshit crazy kid (even if I did know some kung fu!) to take a back alley into this area at night time, as there were a bunch of strip clubs, bath houses, massage parlours and gambling going on in the area with Triad looking Chinese (dragon/tiger halfsleeves) working the doors on the block. Not a place a young white tourist would want to find himself alone at night time. No guts, no glory I guess haha. I didn’t get a tattoo on the trip. And I have no regrets about that. But what Jimmy Ho did give me was an incredible memory and experience. Another story to go along with all the pictures I wear on my body. Thank you for reading :) PS If anybody has any further info about Jimmy Ho, James Ho, Hong Kong tattoo history please do share, love to learn more about it. - - - Updated - - - I did find this https://www.facebook.com/jimmy.ho.7127/media_set?set=a.292623604111543.71717.100000917175393&type=3

@tc3500 awesome!!!

SO Many Fantastic pieces being posted!! Here is my latest (and second, lol) tattoo. It was done by Christian Buckingham at Revolt in Las Vegas last week. It's on the right side of my chest and took about 4hr. The idea was basically a war style triceratops and I asked for it to be tough looking.....the rest was left up to the artist and I couldn't be more stoked with the results! This picture is a quick cell phone pic from the day the piece was completed, maybe will upload another of the healed result in several weeks.

Definitely going full colour. Steve Moore excels at colour so I'm taking full advantage.

@GlaryMilberg That rules! I saw that on Instagram and I think it was my favorite from Eddie's recent Skull and Sword postings. Very cool.

I received my dragon tattoo December 2014 and have not been happier with any tattoo that I have received. Yes the sanitation of the instruments were a bit iffy but I went there for one reason and nothing held me back. Will I go back? Yes. I'm hoping he is still tattooing when I get back. Tattoo royalty at its finest

tell that to Rosa Parks.

Love this. Such a clever design. - - - Updated - - - I really need to book an appointment with her. Her colour palette is so distinctive. Everything she does is so crisp.

Just had a new tattoo added to my right leg by Tammy Kim at The Okey Doke in Toronto. She is amazing.

So I was hanging out at my local shop going through Piotrs new book full of old woodblock prints and I saw in the corner of a Kuniyoshi diptych depicting Taira no Tomomori these little fish samurai dudes, I told him you don't see enough fighting fish, usually just rats and frogs carrying swords, and he sketched/painted this guy up for me. Piotr Kopytek Blue Heron Tattoo Frisco, CO

Snakes and flowers make great butt tattoos.

two of my favorites are on my inner biceps - by Rob Ryan and Steve Boltz - not a bad combo

In progress with Shige, finishing with Shakamuni to complete my triad ....

Currently on my nyc tat-cation. First up was Eli Quinters. Next is Hillary Fisher White. When I first got to jfk airport, I was charging my phone at an outgoing terminal and the loudspeaker guy at the desk was listing people that needed to come see him and named Richard Stell. Didn't see him though.

Personally, I just say that none of my tattoos have a deep meaning...it's the truth

You could always try the halt-the-conversation-with TMI approach if it gets really uncomfortable. "This Hot Stuff represents my struggle with irritable bowel syndrome." This was a super fun way of dealing with annoying questions about whether I was pregnant when I gained weight a few years ago.

I got this from Tony Nilsson at Blue Arms Tattoo in Oslo today. It's based off an old Percy Waters drawing that Tony had wanted to do for a while, and I had no specific requests so we just went for it. I'll admit that I did cheat a bit, after the outline we did use a numbing spray or something like that, which basically made me not feel a thing until we started doing the colors. Happy we did, since then we got to finish it so I don't have to wait until the next time I'm home.

I don't get asked these questions. I recommend you start giving off unfriendlier vibes.

I just say they dont mean anything. If i really had a deep meaning for a tattoo i probably wouldnt share that with just anyone anyway, but they are really just pictures on skin in the end.

started this end of '13 with rich hardy in krakow,poland. then i travelled to london, paris and london again to finish it few weeks ago. so relieved that i finally don't have to get through that pain again. although the shading during the last 3 sessions was so easy in comparison to the lines. anyways i can only repeat that rich is the nicest guy. everyone should get tattooed by him if he is around. merry christmas everyone!

Get them both.

So I finally got my chest piece. So happy with how it came out. By Valerie Vargas of course.