sleepy mel

my role as a female tattooer has been in my thoughts a lot recently.
i work hard to be the best i can as a decent human being and as a good tattooer. i feel like my work defines a large part of myself. if i work hard and good comes from it then i feel rewarded. i'm aware of being a woman, at work, walking down the street, etc,,, being taken seriously is very important to me.
sometimes i will get younger girls tell me i am a role model to them and i just dont know what to say to that! i hope that it's because they can see the hard work put in and they can see that it does pay off regardless of gender. that you don't need your tits hanging out to get you noticed! if anything i certainly dont think that type of behaviour helps the plight of the 'female' tattooer. i've lost count of the times i've heard people say 'good, for a girl' while growing up and it definitely had an effect on me at an early age.

My Dad got this same design in Fayetteville, N.C. in 1953 (obviously not from Sailor Jerry, but the same design anyway).
It's the only tattoo he ever got, and at 75 years old you can imagine that tattoo looks like total shit, and it does.
I'm almost 46 now, but I can remember seeing seeing this tattoo since I was three years old. It got me hooked on anything and everything to do with tattoos ever since then.
Pop's is on his left arm, about the size of a softball. I don't have any room on either arm for it so I'm gonna get it on my left leg on Saturday.

Opinions?

I don't know it depends on what people are trading? My kid is pretty cute so I think I could get a lot for him.

I'm not a tattoo artist but it seems like there's no credibility that way. If you're passionate about painting you'd own paintings. If you're passionate about tattooing you'd have tattoos. Obviously it's nothing but a business venture to you then if you're nothing but blank skin and you're encroaching on good people's livelihoods and careers.
I mean hell, at least get the standard warped tour visible tattoos and fake it ;)

Always a great vibe at Frith Street Tattoos, London.


From Frith Streets blog.

no offense but tattoo magazine makes me sad to look at. often times it seems to be mediocre work plastered on half naked girls and if its not that its ads for some shitty supply company or some h2ocean bs. sex sells blah blah blah. all show and no substance. my uncle buys me those things and i always end up putting them right in the trash. i wouldn't want my picture in one of those things. sorry...

I had several hand poked tattoos on my hands, but as a teenager in a young offenders institution I suppose I had a good excuse. The tattoos were done by my best mate Phil. Phil sterilised the needle before each session with a lighted match which was good but probably cancelled out , on the hygiene front, by the location which was one of the traps in the shitter. Phil had an unusual technique for ensuring a straight line by dragging the tip of the needle and then poking the Indian ink into the shallow cut. From what I can remember it was very, very painful.
Within a very short time of being released I started to realise that these tattoos were not a very good idea so I got them removed. None of that fancy laser surgery in those days, just local anaesthetic and a scalpel. One of the surgeons asked me if I wanted to watch and he pulled over an overhead mirror. It took many years for the scars to fade.
Here’s some after pictures.

Personally that scratchy, graphic stuff gets too much attention as it is. I like it less than colour realism.
I don't think it belongs in tattooing, a way for an artist to express themselves on somebody else's body. I know the people ask for it and pay for it, but part of a tattooer's job it to stop people getting ugly shit they will want covered when they grow up and see real tattoos done properly. Actually, I apply that to anything that doesn't look like a tattoo. "how clever, it doesn't look like a tattoo"
I know this makes me sound like a dick, but I've seen it time and time again. I've even made some of the same mistakes myself, getting bold graphic crap that I thought made me special and clever. It didn't. It just ruined the space for a proper tattoo.
I think what Hooper does is capture the same urge to be bold and different but he executes it with an amazing eye for design and respect for the body, not to mention his work is filtered through his knowledge of tattooing as a whole.
Horses for courses I guess....

Teaching your kids to be open minded and to make carefully considered decisions is a trait that everyone should be taught. If a tattoo helps deliver this message then why not.

I wish my flat smelt of rich mahogany , normally it smells of bleach and cats.

Those are all really interesting posts. S33ktruth its true what you say my 12 year old daughter just collected 11 merit certificates at the end of term.

I wish my flat smelt of rich mahogany , normally it smells of bleach and cats.

I wish my flat smelt of rich mahogany , normally it smells of bleach and cats.

Ms Rad I completely agree with you I love the heavily tattooed look on men and women and would love to reach that point myself one day, however at the mo due to funds, children etc im not at the point where hand tattoos would be appropriate for me , good luck with new job by the way.

Well I have many leather bound books and my apartment smells of rich mahogany. Just kidding guys good work.

Hello im Mel and im quite new here , I have a great intrest in tattoos particuarly traditional ones and I am also a parent of three children. I was wondering how any other parents with tattoos feel , has anyone ever felt people judge them because of their artwork or do people just show a friendly intrest? For my own part I hope having tattooed parents will make my children open to all sorts of differences in people . Sorry for long post I love this forum because no one in my circle shares my intrest.

I came to this forum to find other people into getting tattooed with knowledge to share. I found that and as a bonus some of the top tattooers in the world speaking freely about tattoos and other various topics.
Before my son was born I spent six days in the week behind the counter of the shop and the other day getting tattooed at another shop in town, now i work only Friday and Saturday. So the rest of the week I interact with soccer moms at Target and the park. It's nice to have a place to come and chat during my downtime and getting a perspective outside the shop you have grown comfortable in. I would hate for it all to go away.

OOH NO YOU DID NOT!!! You might as well have just called this: "Andy Perez, the thread"
Heere We Gooooo!

I don't think that the idea of a tattooer only section is elitist Mario, although I would hate to see the tattooers on here disappear into that section of the forum. One of the pleasures I get is reading rather than posting (most of my posting activity is in the non tattoo section) and there's a good reason for that. Unfortunately some people join forums to seek attention and act the "Big I am". As someone once said "opinions are like arseholes, everybody has one". Unfortunately some people have trouble grasping the concept that unless a contribution to a discussion has some point or merit it's best to keep your arsehole to yourself.

I havnt been a member long, but as a non tattooer it upsets me that some of the artists are posting less because of us. I and most from what I can tell are grateful to be on this site with awesome artists and have no intention on doing anything other than getting good tattoos from good artists. I dont want to market anything or make money. I want to learn more so I am in position to get some great work and share it with the place that is getting me on the right path.

Come on LSTers show your pussy/pussies
Jasmine. 1990-2004
/

I read the link to the Daily Mail in the comments section people were sadly saying very unkind things such as she must be a terrible mother. I can say honestly that my partner and I are both tattooed and I know other members of this fprum are parents and im sure we all do a great job as Jacqui does, it is such a shame people judge in this way.

Just a little fluff piece but sweet all the same. nice to see nice stories involving heavily tattooed people for a change rather than the usualy freakshow shit.
Jacqui Moore celebrates divorce with full body tattoo by new lover | Metro.co.uk

As the saying goes "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing"
Yeah, we really need a step-by-step guide to 'Teach yourself to tattoo - in 9 easy steps!'
While there may be a few crumbs of sound advice in the 9 point program, the fact it's laid out like a 'how to' stinks, sorry.
Nobody is self taught.
I never had an apprenticeship. I could say that I'm self taught, but that would be egotistical and more importantly, incorrect.
I learned and continue to learn from the people I have worked with, the people I currently work with, the tattooers who were gracious enough to allow me to watch them and be present while they worked and the people I've been tattooed by. I could have worked for the rest of my life and never figured out some of the simplest things that were shown to me or that I have seen.
Aw, fuck it. Yeah, ok, I learned by tattooing pigs and grapefruit, taking evening classes in human anatomy and drawing still-life compositions with graphite sticks and writing essays on pop art. I watched every Bob Ross VHS tape. I took classes in CPR, blood borne pathogens, midwifery and chiropody. I took apart my shitty tattoo machines and put them back so that they would be even shittier. But most of all I took advice from every non-tattooer who thought they knew how to learn tattooing.
(only some of the above paragraph is false, but all of it is sarcastic)

Hello, my name is John, people call me JB, I'm from Roanoke VA. I'm 34 years old and have been getting tattooed for 15 years... I'm an IT admin at a small private school. I'm also HFA (high functioning autistic) so I walk about with a blank face and dont really socialize outside of the tattoo world, where strangely I've become comfortable, probably because I've felt accepted. I bike alot on an old modded Trek 700 and am really into ancient astronaut theory and esoteric history. Aside from that, I have a wife (who has superior tattoos), 5 cats, and watch alot of bollywood and play too many video games.
bonus pic: