Graeme

Ron Swanson is my hero.

You will never go wrong with getting a simple and strong image from a good tattooer, so I'm sure you'll get something great. Try not to overthink it, trust your tattooer, and keep us updated about how it goes. And then you can start thinking about your next tattoos. Good luck.

I think black IPA is stupid, personally. If you get too much dark roastiness in there it's essentially a hoppy stout (a West Coast stout maybe?) but if you don't have the dark malt flavours in there then what's the point? Maybe I'll have a black IPA one day that convinces me that it's a legit style but as of right now I think it's little more than a gimmick. I have opinions on beer, man.

@peterpoose you are a warrior with those long sessions.

Mieville is probably what you'd call "steampunk" and while my instincts tell me to run far, far away from anything that could be described by that, his books are actually really great because he doesn't get bogged down by his world and instead lets the characters and story take the lead, and there is genuinely some really cool stuff going on in his books. I started reading him kind of expecting to not like him but thinking that his books looked interesting enough that they were at least worth a chance and I'm glad that I read him. He's one of the SF/fantasy writers who excites me most. The Name of the Wind isn't at all gritty. It's actually really naive and innocent, though I hope this is because it deals with the protagonist when he's a young boy and that it will get tougher and grittier as it goes on. I think I read a Joe Abercrombie story in a sword and sorcery collection and it obviously didn't really stick out to me but I always hear people raving about him so I should read some more.

Canada is a large place, where are you from? Welcome to LST and hopefully we can help you to get many more tattoos.

I have tattoos I've put a lot of thought into and ones I've spontaneously chosen because they grabbed me at the moment and I think both are fine ways to get tattoos. I just think that if I was that big and had that much money that I would at least get a super fuck off awesome backpiece like a huge koi or dragon or tiger. But that's me, and he seems stoked on his tattoos (and those portraits look pretty decent) so more power to him.

Have you read the new China Mieville novel? It's a tribute to Moby Dick and I usually love Mieville but I want to read Moby Dick first. I started it for the third time earlier this year and haven't finished it. I hesitate to say I've abandoned it but that's probably once again the case. I used to enjoy reading difficult books more when I was a younger msn, I feel that age is making me slow-witted. I was interested in that Simmons novel when I saw it at the library a couple of years ago, let us know how it is. Last book I read was Patrick Rothfuss's The Name of the Wind which I thought was okay and got interesting enough by the end of the book that I'll probably read the second book when it comes out as a mass market paperback. I'm now reading John Irving's Until I Find You, which is the first Irving novel I've read but it's pretty good. Tattooing is a major theme of the novel, which is why I picked up the book in the first place, though I think that aspect of it is the weakest part of it. Not sure what's lined up next. @Pugilist got me a couple of books about Japanese myths for Christmas that I'm excited to read. I still need to sit down with Stoney Knows How and I have a couple of Thomas Ligotti books (Songs of a Dead Dreamer and Noctuary) sitting on my bedside table and spending a cold winter's day in an armchair with a good cup of tea reading those would make for a most disturbing and unpleasant afternoon.

Probably not the tattoos I'd get if I made that kind of money.

Super great, those must have been a couple of fun ones for Nick to do.

Welcome! I've seen your blog about your backpiece, you have a truly amazing collection and I hope you enjoy it here.

That guy kind of fascinates me because he's such a bullshit artist and seemingly manages to at least some of the time pull it off. It takes a lot of balls (or maybe just a sociopathic lack of self-awareness) to do that.

You catch Higgs when he was just on tour with Om?

Scarred Hard is amazing. Tried googling them (why??? I don't have to see their tattoos to know how shitty they are) and the results I got were either Metallica lyrics or about issues about scarring in tattoos. Least surprising thing in the world.

The one exception that comes to mind for me is the Ink Addiction Beppe works at. That is a goddammned horrible name for a tattoo shop and I hope it's only called that because of a not great understanding of the English language.

All of that sounds like Juggalo shit, probably because it is.

Like pretty much any other tattoo design, what makes a tattoo exciting or not isn't the design itself but rather how the design is conceived and executed. Look into Freddie Corbin. Steve Byrne and Tony Hundahl have done a lot of great Christian tattoos. Robert Ryan too. Look at Freddie Negrete's tattoos. I'm not into photorealism but Nikko Hurtado's religious tattoos are stunning.

Speaking as someone who is getting a raven sleeve from Thomas Hooper at the moment, I think tattoos in that style are going to look dated over time. That doesn't mean that a well designed and executed tattoo in that style isn't still going to look rad in ten (or twenty or thirty or forty) years, but I think it will obviously come from a certain era of tattooing. Personally, I'm okay with that with my tattoos. I think if you want timeless go for either traditional Americana (keeping in mind that it has gone in and out of fashion over time) or traditional Japanese.

Just saw The Hobbit and liked it for what it was. I think splitting it into three movies is unnecessary and I suspect it's basically a cash grab but it's still a pretty enjoyable adventure movie.

I've had moments where I haven't regretted my tattoos but I've looked at myself in the mirror and kind of been "WTF have I done". This has always been really early in the morning when I'm underslept and waking up for a 6am start of my workday so I'm not fully in my right mind and I find that as I get more tattoos I experience this lot less. Tattoos are a really big deal in many ways and I don't think that it's necessarily weird or abnormal to sometimes have complicated feelings about them.

Looks rad and it was nice meeting you!

Welcome! My uncle lives in Courtenay, he moved there after retiring from the forces. I don't visit there much, but it's a nice place. What sorts of tattoos do people there get?

This is the first commission I've ever done. She wanted a skeleton in a lime green Dodge Super Bee, this is what I came up with and I'm pretty stoked on it. 16x20 pen and liquid acrylic on cold press Arches board.

I don't have any experience with this, but for laser in Montreal, I'd try calling some of the good shops such as PSC, Imago, or Tattoomania and see who they recommend.

@taaarro I was following that on IG and thought it was super amazing and just a really clever and crazy take on a classic design. Congratulations!