The Hyena

Thanks dudes. Ursula, are you going to be at Montreal this year?

I finished this about a month ago. Just got prints made through Shirts and Destroy. Ron Henry Wells | Webstore

Those are RAD

Co signed. Good dude, good tattooer, works fucking hard and appreciates good clients.

Thanks for the kind words, james. I completely co sign the Lina Stigsson tattoos and paintings. I fucking love her work. Kills me. I gotta say here, though. Not come off like an ass kisser at all, but I have always been partial to how Scott Sylvia does lady heads. So absolutely tattoo looking and completely un-pretentious, but still pretty and charming. I'm a big sucker for charm in a tattoo, especially when it's perfectly fitted with looking bad ass or tough. And that's a very hard thing to do. It's one of those things that only comes with years of experience, analysis, trial and error, study, and love for your craft. His painting in the Bella book kills most of the other fancier ones in there for me because of how sincere it comes across. Truly mature tattooing.

The one in San Diego was closed already because of the out cry from the show I believe. I was just there last week, and that was the story I got.

I was thinking those two, and this little bell that Chad did on some dude's cheekbone. Super cool.

No face. Well, most likely. I've seen a few that don't look assy.

I made this post in another tattoo forum. It applies here. "Im not saying facebook posts are going to make any difference to TLC. Im saying our voices are important for the regular public to hear also. Just because you may not have heard of the show doesn't mean all the "middle america, sit on the TV all day" kind of people haven't. I want regular non tattoo people to understand how we feel about this and why. I would like to counter the immediate response to thinking that a tattoo school is a good idea. I want the people who might watch this show and decide they want to go to a tattoo school. The kids who get turned away from apprenticeships and see this as a backdoor into the craft. I want them to hear why that's a bad idea. From the people who they would be looking at for employment. I am under no illusions that a bunch of posts on the net are going to change a networks mind necessarily. More that I want as many people as possible to understand that this isn't the norm in tattooing, nor the way to go for anyone." I feel we need counter measures.

OK here's the thing Bubbleberry. You aren't a tattooer. Not that your opinion isn't valid, but try to understand things from this perspective: Among craftsmen, information is the true currency. It's why master woodworkers, calligraphers, metal smiths, violin makers etc. guarded their secrets. It's keeps the things that you do special. When everyone knows everything, what is special? Thats why the Stradivarius violin is what it is and not just some normal violin. When I was in my apprenticeship my teachers told me things. Very valuable things that helped me in my journey. Things I still think about today. One had been tattooing 14 years and the other 9. They had accumulated a lot of experience. They made mistakes, figured some things out, talked and worked with other tattooers, and had a chance to see a lot of things they did age and make adjustments to compensate. When they taught me stuff, they put their faith in me that I wouldn't just treat the things they passed on as just stuff to talk about or things to say when you want other dudes to know that you know what you're talking about. It was truly valuable and needed to be seen and treated as such. I had very good friends working at other shops in town on their own similar beginning adventures in tattooing, and I never told them any of the shit my bosses told me even if I thought it would help. Which was hard, but here's the thing. It wasn't my secrets to tell. As much as I would like to help someone out that I think might benefit from a hint or two, it's not my information to tell. I couldn't betray that. It's what keeps it valuable and helps keep that bond between student and teacher sacred. I truly believe that. That's maybe why so many of us are up in arms about the tattoo school thing. Because we may have gone through the student/teacher apprenticeships, and value that. I'm proud of my lineage. They aren't huge name dudes or anything, but I think that are some of the best tattooers I know. My stuff has a look to it that you can trace back to the people I worked with and learned from and that's important. It keeps things rich. It's the best way to cultivate and nurture tattooing as a whole. My stuff may not be the best stuff out there, but it's mine, and what's mine is a combination of the people who taught me, and I'm proud of that. Think about your wife. She's going through her very own apprenticeship. What about the accumulated knowledge that her teacher is passing on to her. Should she not hold that in truly high regard? Shouldn't she keep his secrets and put them to good use? She is now part of his lineage. That's not something to take lightly. That information is valuable and she should treat is as such. That's not to say that you can't ever mention it. Trading bits of information between craftsmen is another way to honor the value of the knowledge, AND that gives me the privilege of being able to go back to my teachers and tell them what i've learned as a part of the way you can pay them back for giving you so much in the first place. As craftsmen we meet up at conventions, guest spots, shop visits on vacations, writing to each other, and we can sometimes trade portions of information to each other and we can in turn use these in our own ways and it helps keep tattooing robust and alive. It helps us form bonds between each other. However even in those situations I try to hold back certain aspects of the info, as do the people on the other side. It keeps the level of mystery, not in a mystical sense, but in the sense that we now have to figure out the key to unlock this particular piece of knowledge, and sometimes we find our own key and use for it. Tattooing is different than most things in that it's still a largely master/apprentice craft. True a lot of tattooers came in through different means but most of them respect the apprenticeship as the proper way, and although more tattooers than not shouldn't actually be giving apprenticeships since they aren't really cut out for it, and we have too many to begin with already, it's still the proper way. That is part of the tradition that, at least I hold in very high regard. Ursula, if you're paying for info, that you've in turn used to help you create something unique, then yes you should see it in that light. Hold it back. People ask and ask, but that shows you just how valuable and special your stuff is. Let them find their own secrets. Now if you are meeting up with other people and can trade parts of things for more info, then good on you. I could write more on this subject but I think I need food right now. I'm sure smarter people than me can expound in a better way.

Yup. The fact that he called is good.

Point is, everyone wants to take things from tattooing. People keep taking.

Ha! Will do.

Finally got A Bob Wicks girl head from Eli three weeks ago. Will post a healed soon.

I ran into a small inkwell that was a "scholarly skull" last week from the late 1700's in an antique shop. Pipe, book, and mortarboard. Shit looked just like a piece of flash, was the size of a baseball, but it cost 900 bucks.

Being professional has fucking nothing to do with looking like you work at Starbucks. Just be clean and presentable. And work your ass off for the client. If you want to impose some tradition on your elf about the way you carry yourself at work, that's cool. Just don't expect everyone to do it, or even try to make them. You could all be wearing suits and still tattoo like shit.

Myles fucking Rules. And, thanks Petri.

I'm not going to get on here and scream about how you shouldn't be a tattooer, even though that's a preset gut reaction nowadays and it's totally valid. After all, I'm a fairly new tattooer in the game and why should I be telling people what they should or shouldn't do. However, what I will bring up is something that continues to plague me at every turn, and it's something that I struggle with every day. Think and consider a few things most people don't before they just "decide they want to be a tattooer". Such as the effect you have on the craft and it's craftsmen/women. Specifically in your area. With every new tattooer the pieces of the "tattoo pie" get smaller and smaller. The pie being the personal benefits of tattooing. Not just financial, but all the benefits. The more tattooers, the smaller the pieces of the pie. Less money, more people doing desperate things to try to grind more loot out of tattooing, especially in the slower seasons, like tons of random discount days, undercutting the previously established shops prices to steal clients, etc. Think about what you're doing to the people who've already been there, who've already worked their asses off to establish a clientele, and a relationship with their neighborhood. Think about the taking you will be doing. That's not to say that you should not become a tattooer. What I'm trying to say is this: before you start on your journey to take from this craft and the people who held it on their shoulders through all it's iterations and think about how you're going to justify your actions and their consequences. How do you justify making everyone's pie smaller? How about by becoming lots more pie to those people. Get tattooed by righteous tattooers. A LOT. Blow loads of money on them. If your sitting here reading this thinking that " I can't do that because tattoos are too much money and I'm broke, which is why I want to be a tattooer in the first place dudes!" then you probably shouldn't be considering becoming a tattooer. On the other hand, if you are thinking "well, shit I'm broke, but if I get this second job and stop dropping a bunch of money on sneakers and beer then I could afford lots more tattoos, so now let's look and see who is good and figure out how I can throw bunches of money at them frequently", well then maybe you might be an asset to tattooing. I won't give anyone any advice beyond that. Tattooing is a career and if you become a tattooer that's a lifetime of taking. Maybe start evening the score early by giving back to it first. If there is any hesitation in your mind about that at all, don't even try. Save us all the next money sucking middle achiever. We already have enough of those. I'm not saying any of these things to be harsh. My mind is heavy with these thoughts all day long. I spend hours working my ass off, trying to make my clients as happy as possible but that's no where near enough. I spend all my money on tattooing. I buy tattoos, machines, pigments, supplies, flash, prints, paintings, books etc from righteous tattooers. I owe heavy debts to the guys that brought me up and I will never be able to repay it. Anytime I get a compliment from anyone on my tattoos I let them know who taught me. It's important to pay to your lineage no matter who it was. I spend time conversing with as many tattooers as I can that I admire just to hear what they have to say. I have a list of tattooers in every state and I frequently refer people to places to get the work they desire. Al that and I still feel like I owe tattooing everything. I expect I will always feel the need to justify my existence here among the people that I respect and admire by paying them heed in any way that I can. They do deserve it after all.

Man, that dude with the scum hat just looks like he sucks.

From the few conversations I've had with the dudes at Smith St. it's more revolved around(though not limited to) random people and their random photoblogs and such. People who take a picture and just post it with all these other random things that have zero to do with the tattoo, the tattooer or really anything. It's a band t-shirt to them. "These are all the things I think are cool, and I want you, the viewer to see me in this image." Which by itself is pretty harmless, but when you think of the scale of how often this happens and what it leads to, well then, yes, that's where the sore spot is. Someone posts a pic, then it gets re-blogged six hundred times, eventually it loses the credit as to who did it, if it even had one in the first place and then ends up on some fashion blog, and then on some t-shirt in a random Etsy account. That's not free advertisement, that's a few hundred selfish people not thinking about what they are doing because the internet is essentially the wild west. I know people want to show appreciation for others works, and I do too. But there are tactful ways to go about it. How about if someone really wants to bring attention to another artist, ask permission. We text and email all the time. It shouldn't be such a hard thing to do, but for some reason people react horrendously when they have to all of a sudden think and act respectfully when it comes to the interwebz. Like it's a form of slavery or something. Just ask permisson and maybe don't post their whole portfolio. Or even a picture. After all it isn't about you it's about the person you're trying to bring some attention to. Maybe just post one pic, small enough to see and a LINK TO THAT PERSONS WEBSITE. Not hard at all. But people are harping on the tone of their argument and justifying their actions with sayings like "Come on, get over yourself. This is 2011. It's the internet." First off, I don't know what any of that means, but it just sounds like lip service to me. Sounds like he/she meant to say "Come on, it's been so easy for me to define myself on the internet with pictures and now you're telling me I shouldn't maybe just rifle through peoples stuff as if it were my own and post away without a care in the world? BULLSHIT." From what I gathered, it isn't necessarily directed towards tattoo oriented forums and the like because those tend to operate with a keen set of morals as to posting of pictures. I mean, this site itself has a thread about giving props to under the radar artists, and many threads on who does what stuff well. That's not really what those dudes are talking about. It's more like the people who use someone's 50 hour work week as some sort of bragging rights as to what they like. It's weird that people even do that to begin with, never mind being surprised that the person who did work hard to make these images in the first place might not want it treated like a sticker on your Trapper Keeper. It's not even a bad thing that someone wants all the credit for their work. How could it be? If a plumber fixes your pipes, he would expect all the money and thanks for that job. And deservedly so. It would be shitty if it went instead to neighbor who pulled the plumber's business card down from a cork board at a laundromat on the other side of town, OR the laundromat that had the cork board. PLaces like this are beneficial to tattooing. What they are bringing attention to are the leeches who are playing it out everyone's hard work with no credit given, without thought to how this could effect us or our craft. Sorry for the long response, and sorry if it was a bit convoluted.

I am so pro strong silhouette. I've been working on fighting the urge to put bursts and nonsensical background behind everything just to preserve the silhouette. Sometimes it;s difficult, but I find that If I think the image needs some background 9 times out of 10 it's because the drawing is weak anyway. So I redraw. If I do add an element into the background or something, I try to make it add to and preserve the silhouette, not take it away. I fail miserably at it all the time, but I work on it constantly.

I tend to draw the small shit huge, and the big stuff all small. I'm a fucking idiot.

I tried to be the guy who can draw shit a week in advance, but I just can't. When I do that, I still end up re-drawing it right before the appointment because there's shit I want to improve. Like Julio, I think about it a lot starting when the appointment is made. A lot of time, I'm actually tattooing it in my head. When I do sit down to draw, I usually rough the idea out at night, then finalize it in the morning that way I have the night and the early morning to contemplate what I roughed out. I may change things at the last minute, or after seeing it with a fresh pair of eyes, but it's usually pretty close to what the final ends up being. It all depends on the subject though. Outside the comfort zone takes more reference time, not necessarily more drawing time, although it may do that too. When people ask me for stuff I do often, that usually ends up with the most actuall drawing time, because I'm trying to not make it look like the last one I did.

I personally know someone who, years ago when he turned eighteen got "Queensryche" tattooed across his shoulders. But dude left out the U. QEENSRYCHE He had the guy put the little carrot and a U above it. I still shake my head at the whole shit.

Looks inspiring.