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Tattooer's Reference Libraries


Lochlan
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I have always enjoyed looking at peoples book shelves when I visit their homes and especially tattooers. Today I was hanging out with Juan and moving some books around and flipping through them enjoying the eclectic selection. So what are your favorites books in your library? What are must haves for any tattooer for reference? In these tattoo forum threads on Tattoo Lettering and this one on Tribal Tattoos many books and tattooers are discussed.

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My favorite tattoo book of all time is Bad Boys and Tough Tattoos By Samuel M. Steward, PhD. At some point I'd like to write a review of this book. Sam Steward is also known as Phil Sparrow in the tattoo world. Steward played a hand in starting out two of the greatest tattooers of the second half of the twentieth century, Cliff Raven and Ed Hardy. I could go on and on about this book so I'll try to limit it here. Part of the book focuses on Street Shop tattooing in Chicago and Milwaukee during the 50's, Along with Oakland in the 60's. The other part of the book looks at tattooing from the psychological side. All in All a must read for every tattooer or anyone curious about tattooing. Its available for purchase on the interwebber.

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My favorite tattoo book of all time is Bad Boys and Tough Tattoos By Samuel M. Steward, PhD. At some point I'd like to write a review of this book. Sam Steward is also known as Phil Sparrow in the tattoo world. Steward played a hand in starting out two of the greatest tattooers of the second half of the twentieth century, Cliff Raven and Ed Hardy. I could go on and on about this book so I'll try to limit it here. Part of the book focuses on Street Shop tattooing in Chicago and Milwaukee during the 50's, Along with Oakland in the 60's. The other part of the book looks at tattooing from the psychological side. All in All a must read for every tattooer or anyone curious about tattooing. Its available for purchase on the interwebber.

here's a link for those who are lazy:

Bad Boys and Tough Tattoos by Samuel Steward

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Hi i personally like just the visual books. not that i cant read. just like not to get bogged down sometimes with all the kerfufal.

it could be just me being lazy. i remember buying ed hardys tattoo times. eagerly thumbing thru the pages. they was in thin soft backcovers in a few different coloured volumes.

seeing the old timers. like gregg irons jack rudy. and many others.also chris wablowskis few books. im sure thats spelt wrong lol. this was a time when i think the only mags i saw was outlaw biker on the stand . eeek . how times have changed . there are so many mags now fighting for ur attention its eyewateringly difficult to choose from. im goin off on a tangent. as for refrence material i used to buy books with the odd design that i liked so wastefull . iv used comics for refrence material n ideas . lol but i might look on amazon for some new titles to have a look at . the web has opened up so much positives regarding ideas and inspiration. which i think is a good thing. but like mp3 downloads have wiped out real vinyl u still like to handle and feel a record in real time n not virtually. so must real books outway images on an i pad to some degree .

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If you can get your hands on the images from the Mayo Clinic archives there's amazing anatomical drawings of all kinds. Saw them in a gallery not sure if they have an online library.

Antique books usually have great illustrations as well, things like eagles, flags, banners, animals, swords, crests.

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While I am no tattooer, I do have a stupidly big collection of art reference material. All of my ideas for current and future tattoos have evolved from my books. I currently own no flash books as of yet but will hopefully aquire some soon!

Gustave Dore - Divine Comedy and also his bible illustatrations

Rotten Renderings

Juztapoz (Illustrations and Dark Arts, two good books

Any Mike Giant book

Symmetry: The Ordering Principle (a few in this series)

Sacred Geometry

Kris KuksiL Devination and Delusion

The Dance of Death

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