Hoople

2nd year in a row that I honestly think the best piece of the day wasn't even allowed to compete. Kelly's American Traditional chest was amazing. I guess they spent the time that they normally would give the third finalist to Dave hanging from hooks and trying to find a way to make that mics sound less like a hot mess in the new finale studio... Bonus points for Oliver taking a huge dump on the (yes, admittedly controversial) watercolor style and every artist who works in it with those "This is how real tattooers do watercolor.." rant.

With Oliver, I imagine it's a little different. Running two successful shops in the Southwest, years on Kat Von D's shows, and then judging every season of Ink Master, I imagine he's pretty burned out on it in general. I know at his True Tattoo they have varied input on the show itself. (I've never seen him in the shop, just have a few from his staff.) In this case, Kruseman brought the show up first, saying he was always excited when he got new clients who had seen the show. I mentioned that Duffy had the classiest episode of Redemption to date and he lit right up. He got so animated talking about even little details that I don't think I was bothering him at all. I do some press work in and around reality TV in the L.A. area, and I'm pretty good at knowing when I'm bugging a celebrity. Like you, I tend to be chatty through the painful parts. It was a two-hour piece, and he talks while he works, so we hit a number of topics. Did I see you say somewhere that you were getting tattooed by Oliver at Bay Area? I'll have to live vicariously through you. I blew my budget at Desert Trip and can't swing it, or I'd be trying to get a small piece by Oliver as well. Side note, while you're there, Ian "Jonezy" Jones is in the True Booth with Oliver, he's one of my favorite LA True Tattooers and a hell of a guy. His work is definitely worth a look, especially if you're right there. I don't think anything here is technical information or even info that isn't out there in his(and other artists) post-show features/interviews. I would feel a little different if it wasn't a conversation about publically available media. I certainly don't share shop banter or casual conversation that I've had with my artists, things get a little too Rock&Roll for general consumption. From my own experience in press writing, I can say pretty conclusively that I left a ton of awesome inside info and a lot of banter/stuff that no one needs/wants to hear. I cherry picked Ink Master safe stuff to share here. Thanks! Hoping it heals as well as my last jammer.

I got tattooed by Dave Kruseman yesterday, had some time to ask a bunch of questions about the show. I thought everyone might get a kick out of some of what I did think to ask. Just woke up because the new design (posted over in new tattoo lowdown) was throbbing under the tegrederm. May not be caffeinated enough to remember all the details, but here's what I remember pre-caffeine! First off, Dave is a super nice guy, every bit the guy from the show. He said outright that his wife told him he had to go on and not be an asshole, which helped him stay level on the show. The producers are pretty typical for reality tv. The embrace/cast for the drama, and push buttons/stir the pot off screen to make things extra dramatic. I had read once before that the timed challenges were faked, and the artists got all the time they wanted. Kruseman said that was not the case on Season 6, where they had very stiff time limits. He also noted that when they do the big finale pieces, an Ink Master rep has to be there to turn the clock on and off, and to monitor while it's going on. The critiques are one of the hardest parts on the artists. Where we see 1-2 minutes of critique, in actuality it's about 30 minutes for a good one, and 60+ for a bad one, worse if it's really bad. The artists do stay up on that raised stage thing all day while they're shooting but do get breaks. The artists only receive a small stipend weekly but are fed very well and basically catered to with whatever they want while in the house. He specifically mentioned St. Marq requesting, and happily receiving, what I will politely call limetless supply of Jack Daniels. In additional, all the ink/needles/general supply are covered by the show. Everyone was legitimately terrified to deal with Dave Clarke's "Wolf Head" guy. While some reactions are faked, or split from other scenes, the terror on everyone's face at Wolf Head was 100% real. We also talked quite a bit about how the show(and other tattoo shows) tend towards the silly and dramatic, but it has lifted some of the taboos surrounding our culture, and gotten a lot of info about there about good vs bad tattoos, and practices, which is opening the door to a huge amount of new people. In Dave's experience, that's been a lot of much older folks who have secretly always wanted one. Fun Fact: Kruseman will tell you in person that if you've seen Ink Master, and want a portrait tattoo made by him, you're either crazy or a fan of bad portraits. That tattoo didn't send him home because there were worse that day, but he totally expected to go on that one. Fun Fact #2: James Vaugn, of Seasons 1 and 7, was Kruseman's mentor in the industry, with only 4 or so years of experience himself. Kruseman was going to be in Season 1, but they thought that there may be a conflict of interest with James' being on the show as well. Fun Fact #3: Kruseman told my wife, after the fact, that I was "An expert at getting tattooed." Which was F*$%ing awesome to hear! On "current" Ink Master news, he and I both agreed that Gian Karle's male pinup was outstanding, and looked like a 70's cigarette ad!

Had this done yesterday at 454 tattoo in Encinitas by Dave Kruseman. There's a little warble in the line at the top, that was 100% on my twitchy leg, not Dave. I'm super stoked about this tattoo though. Probably my last of 2016 and my last American Traditional for awhile. Hope ya'll like it! If anyone is curious, Dave is a super nice guy, and happy to talk about winning the show/shooting the show, but also about just about anything else. Everyone at 454 was super friendly and helpful. Great little shop.

Yea, they were pretty rough. But I assumed that was easily as much "Way to big of a tattoo for the time, in nearly every case." That's true. It is nice the direct "vs" stuff is gone. I just think it's going to get way worse with the inter-team stuff because there's a buy week from time to time.

I'm torn about Ink Master right now. This season is a marked step in the continued push towards "good reality TV" as opposed to a "good tv show about skilled tattooers." It's been on the decline this way for years, but this time it seems the worst. Which is weird, because this may be the most skilled field they've ever had on the show. I legitimately don't see much in terms of Sub Par work. Even last night's elimination, which was a rough tattoo, was made by who I think is a pretty talented artist in their own right. The drama is super amped up by the new flash/elimination format, which had a major change that we didn't see until last night. Not wanting to spoil anything, I'll just say Iape above has a great point. Someone is always going to get the hardest skull pic. (I think in last night's case, the Flash Challenge winner was gunning for the two people he seemed to be, but at the same time, I feel that if you want the human canvases to walk away happy with great tattoos, it's a good idea to give the tough skulls to the best artists, so I really don't know the strategy yet...) That the canvasses are also absurdly difficult on last night's ep, which I know is something that they find out in casting. One of the questions has been "are you willing to change your mind at all about your tattoo" and I'm sure they pick some of the nuttier canvases that way. But I've not ever seen a set of canvases stacked this ridiculously. One of them was so difficult that Navarro lost it in the background on the shot and started laughing, half amused/half incredulous. That's the other big thing that makes me feel like they're ramping up the dumb reality TV drama even further. They're using broader cuts, like the one of Dave laughing, and more black and white flashbacks to stuff that happened in the episode, to ramp up the drama even further. Even with the hyper-talented field this year, I'm not sure if I can stomach a full season that's moving even more towards Survivor levels of drama. At least not until it's all available to binge watch, streaming. Though, if they can find the balance, and last ep's big new "alliance" works out, there could be some firsts on the way, and some really, really great work coming out of this season. **I'm not just dogging on the show, either. I'm a big fan, and I'm starting a collection of my favorite artists and Ink Masters starting next month, I just paid the deposit to Kruzeman a few days ago. I just really want it to get back to something that resembled the original format, before Kyle lost his shit and the show dove straight for typical reality show material!

I guess these aren't technically my newest, but they are only a few months old. (Friday 5/13) they were new to me in several ways, and I love them. I also wasn't' sure where else to post them!) I wasn't really that big of a Traditional American fan until I saw Dave Kruzeman's winning back piece from Ink Master. Side note: I'll be seeing Dave for a piece on my knee in a little over a month. I'm super pumped. It pretty much blew me away, made me dig deeper into tattoo culture and to do a ton of reading and researching on Norman Collins and his apprentices. That lead me to the Friday the 13th tradition and got me thinking about some fo the bad luck I had with tattoos when I was younger. When I saw this rework of Jerry's "Superstition is for Sissies" black cat, I knew it was time to choose my own tattoo luck, and pick better artists and tattoos So, I made sure I always have a black cat in my path. Ian "Jonezy" Jones did these for me at True Tatoo, Hollywood and was insanely fast getting them in. I think the whole thing was under 90 minutes and the shading was my most painless shading I've ever had. After the fact, these hurt so bad I mentioned them in the "most painful tattoo" thread. This is the un healed picture, but they healed nearly perfectly. This is just the only picture of them where my actual feet(not the tattoos) don't look super gnarly because I can't take a good picture of them with my phone, and I don't want to bother anyone else to take pics of my big gnarly man feet.

I've got 6 on my arms, one fairly large scratcher done mess of a mistake from my youth. I'll put it on the bad side later. I've got one big leg piece, and both of my feet done. The final pass of shading and highlights on my 3 hour calf were pretty intense, but I'd say the 48-72 hours after having both feet done at the same time with a very thick black traditional tattoo was one of the most painful experiences of a very colorful life. Pretty much every step that I didn't aim for the balls of my feet to avoid stretching was like a light to mild burn, and if I had to put all my weight evenly on my feet it would get so intense that it would nearly buckle me. I would have only gotten one foot done at a time, but I had intended to get ankles. The placement was just way cooler on my feet, and when I saw the stencils I had to go for it. Friday the 13th and my first super traditional tattoos.

Thanks! So far so good! I posted one over in latest tattoo lowdown,I'm going to wait until it heals before I spam the joint up too much though. New and all. ?

Hey all, yea, I went back and edited to bring it in line with standards. And yup, it looks like this forum architecture does edit quotes to match the quoted area of text. I was wondering that myself when I did my editing last night. Thanks for linking that! I do want to join that discussion as well, because I did notice some differences and was wondering if anyone else had!

No worries! Forum rules, and I'm still just getting back into tattoo culture after a 15 year hiatus. I appreciate you being straightforward and cool about the rules, and taking the time to explain why they're there to a noob like me.

Thanks! I totally missed that rule in my skim. I edited it down quite a bit, and I hope that falls more in line. In this case, I was literally just sharing info available on his public Instagram in the last 5-7 days, but I totally get it. People can get that info themselves. Can I ask, and I'm totally not trying to be a smart ass here, is this post ok now? In terms of generic rotary machine, and Saniderm sheet?

Got this yesterday! A lot of firsts for me here. First real post on this forum(barring the introduction thread), first real large scale custom piece for me. It was also my first time under a rotary, and first time trying a new healing method. The machine felt quite a bit different than what i was used to, but this was my first leg tattoo, so that could simply have been the tighter skin on my legs. In general, more of a light pressure, then a pinpoint stab. James Mullins of Lotus Tattoo, Hemet CA, was very patient with my 3 or so hours embarrassingly twitchy leg, and constant nervous tattoo chatter. (Also my neurotic aftercare questions, and emails.) Obviously, yes, I'm a Fallout Fan. I put a mid way tattoo up because I honestly thought he was nearly done here. I laid back and let him finish the final pass without looking too much. When I saw the final pass, I was pretty much giddy. He asked, just before I sat down, if he could go a little crazy with the color. I was super glad that I agreed. I hope it's ok to post this pre-heal! If not, I can pull it down and repost when it's done!

Hey everyone! Just found this forum looking about healing processes, got my first big fancy fully custom work yesterday, and am using Saniderm. Some googling led me here and this already seems like the kind of community I've been looking for! I got a few bad tattoos 15+ years ago, along with a good one. I'd all but given up until recently, where I've had some good and bad experiences. The #getgoodtattoos hashtag is certainly meaningful to me at this point. I can get wordy, so I'll spare everyone that for now, save to say Hi!