Cork

@DevilMan good thing you got that done before the artist moved away!! It looks so good. I'm very happy for you and thanks for sharing all of the progress.

Did you know Horimitsu did John Mayer's arm? Sorry I'm not going back through 16 pages to see if that was mentioned, haha.

Shit buddy. My condolences.

I just booked my first appointment of 2014 (which is hard to believe): I'm getting an uchide no kozuchi (as referenced here) from Horisuzu at Dark Horse in LA on August 2nd. I'm also going to the Perseverance exhibition that day. I can't wait!

Can I just be you?

My next appointment with Dana isn't until August 11th!

Thanks for the welcome. I can't promise I wont hold it against you being a kiwi. Only time will tell.

All my new work has been done by Kian Forreal at Authentink in Surry Hills (Sydney)

I spent alot of time researching my new artist and his work was the one that really worked for me. Was on his wait list for just over 18 months but has been well worth it.

He is a great artist and a great guy to boot.

I am now in for about 33 hours on my backpiece, loving and despising the process at the same time.

Not sure what is next after the back, but I doubt it will stop there. :)

Jason.

Welcome!

So which of those backs is yours? I've been following his Instagram for a while now.

Finished up my left side. Background is down to a big wave in the middle of

My butt and a few windbars on my right armpit.

Yeah, you say that, but you must be forgetting you said you were going down to the thighs!

Finally finished Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan. Took the bastard 24 years to finish it, even after he died in 2006 (to which Brandon Sanderson finished). Forget Song of Ice and Fire. After The Wheel of Time I vowed to never start reading a series that isn't already finished. 24 years! I started this series in 1998.

Although I'm bitter about the whole thing, the last couple books that Sanderson wrote were phenomenal. Overall the series was decent. I'd recommend it if you have a couple years to kill. Or the audio books... a paltry 19 days worth of audio. I would describe it as incredibly detailed fantasy adventure, or is that what they referred to as "epic" fantasy? I don't know much about specialized genres. Overly detailed in some aspects. In some of the books you could skip entire paragraphs and not miss anything important except understanding how the drapes were hanging in someone's bed chambers in a castle. The detail can become tedious, but the weaving in and out of different story lines is good. And this series was written before some of the other popular magic/fantasy type literature, and you can see influences in those other books pulled from this one.

I wish I weren't going bald so I could rock that hairstyle. Instead I'll just settle for the fatter, ulgier, tattooed Jason Statham style.

@TravisGarcia YEEEESSSSS

I've been seeing a lot of tree wraps.

Went to the beach this weekend and finally got the opportunity to unveil Kongo Yasha Myo. As I was lying there reading my book, no one touched me. As I walked down the beach with my wife, no one asked me questions. Playing in the waves, no one stared at me. What am I doing wrong? Give me attention!!!!!!

It's funny how sensitive people are with touching. One of the girls at the shop has a sweet forearm snake, or maybe it was a tiger.. this was last year sometime and the details are hazy, so she held out her arm to me and I touched her forearm to sort of rotate it so I could read it all at my own pace. After I realized what I did I recoiled in disgust with myself and apologized. She didn't seem to care, but I can't tell for sure. Now I think she secretly hates me and may have already posted in this thread about me.

I don't know what I can add that hasn't been said already, but this the damn internet, and everyone has to listen to my 2c if they want to or not.

Backs take time. Artist/client travelling, money, holidays, vacation, etc.... Just set a pace that you can tolerate and then stick with it, that's my recommendation. While getting my back done, I see more and more other guys who just haven't been able to make progress on theirs. I've asked Dana how many backs he has in progress, he doesn't even have hard number with all the guys who are still in progress over the course of a decade. People drop in and might only get work once every 2 years. He told me about a guy he worked on recently who he hadn't seen in almost 5 years. One guy with a half suit (not the term but I can't remember it) from Shinji Horizakura took 7 years.

I agree with everyone else so far @DevilMan The fox looks great. Your skin is a perfect pale white so it makes it look like the foxes breast is done. That's supposed to be a compliment..... haha.

@misterJ Not moving for 2.5 hours is a good sitting. Hopefully you ride that excitement all the way til the end and you don't start to get worn down. Great to hear that you're going to the thighs. Solid decision.

@MikeL Now that I can see the bigger resolution, I can see why he's not keen on keeping the olive as is. Brightening that up with some other green will certainly add a little flavor. I love those robe designs.

@Sparky Polastri I have never seen anything like that. Amazing.

Way too good, @Cork. You really don't deserve it.

Not sure if I should be bothered by this more than the fact that people are "liking" it. You got me.

@Cork as you know back is looking strong as hell! Won't hear no but jokes from me because I am in the same boat. I will say that you will enjoy when Dana colors in those flames...right of passage we all have to go through :)

Really...still mandatory! Might hit a few conventions in the fall. I will post a pick up here later.

Mike

Ha ok, maybe just a banana hammock if you're more comfortable in that.

@Cork LOVE all of this but that snake RULES!!!

Yeah man, I knew I needed a snake from Dana since the very beginning.

"Butt" that snake RULES!!!

Sorry, I couldn't help myself. Juvenile humor.

Seriously awesome back. Feels only like yesterday when you first began posting the start of it. So much progress made @Cork.

Everyone loves a good butt joke. Thanks, Lance, it's been a great ride so far. I'm not sure it will be done in time to win at the Pagoda City back piece contest, haha. Although, fundoshi is still mandatory @MikeL

Alright, luckily we got started late and could only do 5 hours. That was enough. I made the mistake of going in on Sunday for a deep tissue massage. That made everything extra tender and sensitive for Tuesday. Never get a massage before a tattoo. Just don't do it.

This session covered hair, robes, wind bar/cloud touch-ups, adding orange to the fire. Also a healed butt shot. From Instagram danahelmuth; (Damn, looking at my butt up close, look at that scar tissue on the red in the snake! He beat me up.)

Looks like I get to start my appointment at 2 today instead of 4. I'm going to try and survive 6 hours. We'll see.

@scatterbrain92 There is a ton of material out there to get ideas from. You can start with wood block prints and your mind should be sufficiently blown; Hokusai, Yoshitoshi, Toshidama. If these do not appeal to your taste, then traditional Japanese is not really a style you are interested in. Plenty of lotuses, but not so much fairies on heartagrams.

@Zodgrod Glad to see you signed up. Great back and arms.

Oh god yes. I had a FAST back piece and I was ready for it to be done about two sessions before it was. Or maybe it was whenever the first session on the ass was. I love your phrase "big ass ass lotus." I have a big ass ass rose. I've been done a few weeks now, and I'm still basking in relief that it's finished. Your back looks great!

Thanks @semele. Hey you finished your back without posting pictures?! I can't be the only one sharing big flowers.

Back tattoos with back tattoos. Can't get better than that @cvportagee, looks great

Get a kanji fighting a snake.

Did I do it right Graeme?

but I'm happy to answer any questions.

Do you even lift, bro?

@Cork awesome! I've enjoyed seeing the progress of this.

Looks like it is almost time to start planning sleeves.

Sent from my SGH-T989 using Tapatalk

Actually, sleeves are the last thing on my mind. It's weird but I'm more concerned with torso/legs at the moment.

It's been a couple months since some serious butt work, I forgot how fun it was. My glorious buttocks create quite the shadow in that lighting, but I've got myself a nice new pink and purple lotus. Also referred to as the big ass lotus, or the big ass ass lotus. Whichever you prefer. Also the blue is finished, and the snake got touched up a little. Very productive.

Picture is as always from Dana's Instagram because I'm lazy, and I can't really get a better picture either. Damn my rear end constitution.