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Well might as well since I finally have a worthy tattoo... Scott Sylvia, Guest Spot @ Kings Avenue Tattoo, NYC

Ok so here are my latest additions. All of these were done over the last week while I was in New Zealand. First is a piece on my thigh by Simon Erl, got this one at the New Plymouth Convention; I got this one from Capilli later on in the week, it was a bit of a fluke I sent him a text asking if he had any time before I went home and it turned out he'd had a cancellation. Heaps lucky; And this last one was a session on my back. Jelle did the outline one night back in April and then I sat 5 more hours on it last Thursday. It's taking shape;

Higgs piece from Dustin Wengreen at Temple Tattoo, Oakland CA.

My new roses! I think every one can guess who did them :)

I know I don't have a chance but I've been dying to finally put a picture in one of the competitions By Geo Rogers @ Last Train Tattoo

My name is Michael Bennett, I tattoo out of 2Spirit Tattoo in San Francisco. I.ve been tattooing for a little over 10 years and am grateful for all it's given me. Hope you're all having a lovely day.

@Bunny Switchblade You were right about Geo. He did a wonderful job on my chest, and on my friends arm. We had the most enjoyable experience, probably the most fun I have ever had having a tattoo done. Seriously a very chill guy and talented artist. My friend and I spent 5 1/2 hours at the shop, and well, I couldn't be more pleased.

Now, this isn't strictly speaking a serious entry, I just wanted to note how far this contest has come in the last year. Some truly outstanding work being displayed here! Congrats to all for the effort of both tattooer and tattooee in getting them! Thanks to all for sharing your pix, and thanks to Lochlan and the team here for making this site a must-see every day. Panther head by Dale Grande, probably 1974.

Forrest Cavacco aka Tattoo Forrest at Cobra Custom Tattoo in Plymouth, Ma. TATTOO FORREST

I work in IT Admin at a college and I had forearm tattoos when I got hired 13 years ago... Ive since done hands and neck to no comment so far except my boss thought my ewok hand looked cool...So far so good but I'm under no illusion that they will be used against me if they want to but knock on wood I do a good job and try not to fuck up

Some I hadnt posted yet- all by Aaron Carmody from Keepsake (RIP, best shop) in arlington Handpoke with alchemy sign for gravel on the lid Funnel of souls skullcross

My latest tattoos on my shoulders were a bizarre experience. Obviously, the collarbone sucked, but I've felt worse... We did one complete shoulder first, and so my body/brain was focusing on easing that shoulder. So when we moved to the outline of the other shoulder it was the most god awful pain ever. Worse than my foot and ribs.. My body must have been sending all of its painkillers to the first shoulder, so the second one was just raw, 100% pain. Not fun.

i'm straight edge. i have a few shirts, and a few tattoos. but, i don't make any bigger a deal about it than that... where i live, most people not into music probably think i'm wearing a shirt advertising a ruler or a razor. the straight edge kids that make a huge deal about it in every day life are insecure, need a reason to feel special, and will probably break edge by the age of 24.

I guess I'm not straightedge if I just had to google straightedge.

Forgot to post this in last month's contest... Got it done mid-fiancee visit, so I was too busy with sushi joints and Klingon Monopoly to be online. Also, in what may have been a small miracle, we got the stencil (which was two pieces) perfect on the first try. Josh Cruse JP Cruse Professional Tattooing Wichita, KS

Herb Auerbach Slippin' Into Darkness

I give it a shot with this one from Sept 2011. Mask by Yushi Takei..

Hmm just found this and hope you won't mind me adding to it. I'm Erica, 19 year old fat chick from CA. lol great opener isnt it? I am in college right now, my major is Political Science. I absolutely love govt, law, philosophy, all the things which most kids my age hate. I am hoping, once I transfer, to double major in French and Political science. Then maybe get a master's in Security Studies. As far as tattoos go, I've wanted one since I was 12. Everyone in my middle school was getting horrible tattoos, and it was the thing to do. All through high school, people would show off their garage tattoos with pride. Everyone always talked about what they were going to get "tatted" and what deep personal meaning it had. When i turned 18 I started really considering getting tattooed. But I didn't know what I wanted. Then I went to Chinatown in vegas when I was visiting my father and found a Ganesh statue. Then I knew I wanted to get him on me forever. So I searched the internet, Google images, all of that good stuff. I still had alot of predjudices when it came to tattoos. I hated japanese tattoos, i thought they all had to have meaning, didnt think girls should be heavily tattooed. But in the course of my research and lurking, my attitude changed. january of this year, on the 31st, I got my first tattoo. I was in love and I wanted more. So back to the internet I went to lurk on tattoo websites and looking around and learning what a good tattoo was. Found myself here, and I love it. I know sometimes my posts are foolish, or awful, and I do apologize. But I love the vibe of this place, and have learned so much. Changed my ideas about tattoos and tattooing, and it makes me want to go spend all my money grinding images into my skin! Tomorrow I will be getting my 3rd tattoo, in a year, and the 3rd tattoo so far in my life. I just want to thank you all for opening my eyes... and creating a new passion in me!

So, this happened this evening: Done by Richard Pinch in Aberdeen Scotland. Got the Foo Dog done last year and always wish I went bigger. Richard added all the background and more flowers and I think it fits my back a lot better now. Very happy with it. There is another chrysanthemum going in on my ribs that you can't quite see. The flower on my hip will be the same colour as the one on my inner biceps, dark reddish. The yellow on the spots on dog will also be getting more dark tones too, like the mane. Very, very happy with it but also slightly freaked out at the size of the tattoo on my back now!

Hello everybody! The last time I was in getting tattooed (mid- September) my artist mentioned this site as we were talking other tattoo sites. Since then, I've been lurking and reading and figured it was time to say hi so I could join in the conversation. I took about a 9 year break from getting tattooed and then decided that life was too short and I was back in the chair for more! I look forward to reading more and hopefully contributing to the community.

If my kid is that big of an incoherent, inarticulate moron when he's 22 or 23 I'll tattoo his face for him to distract people from how dumb he is and how poor of a parent I was.

The lady head you posted in the tattoo of the month competition looks great.

cant quite figure it out but I have seen roses similar to those before. beautiful @HaydenRose

Yea those off-hours functions suck, especially now that they are mandatory sometimes. Fuckin Christmas parties...oh wait I forgot "Holiday Parties".

Who did your tattoos? As a fellow Virginian, I am curious. This forum allowed @cervixalot and I to realize we are Eskimo brothers in the tattooing world.

Scott Ellis at Triple Crown Tattoo started my 2012 Mayan jaguar thigh panel today- halfway there and already awesome:cool:

I cant pic which one to show, so I'll do this one

thanks everyone and @Scott Sylvia again if there is an east coast lster that was put out by Sandy private loch and claim my shirt first come first serve.

After reading everyones stories i feel obligated to share my own. Well here we go. I'm Chris, a 19 year old kid from Leiden, The Netherlands. High-school for me started being the worst time of my life. Being a metalhead since the age of 9 I went to high-school as a 12 year old chubby kid with long hair and a squeeky voice. Since i was the only longhaired metalhead 12 year old the bullies thought of me as an easy target. This led to delving deeper into my music and finding hardcore. Looking back to that time i'm just glad i stayed true to who i am despite all the shit i got for being me. Forward to 16 years old. The hair and the squeeky voice were gone, the bullying wasn't. One day i had enough of it and went apeshit crazy. The little 12 year old turned into a 1,85m high 83kg heavy mass of hatred. No one messed with me after that. Met awesome friends in classes and been hanging out with awesome people ever since. Lot's of parties, lots of concerts. Good times. After high-school i went to University to study law. After 2 months i realized it wasn't for me. Not only was it boring as fuck, the entire system was just build around being a lawyer that makes money of off unfortunate people and i was surrounded by the most self centered people i have ever met. Dropped out and started working at an indonesian take away place where i worked till last summer. I also did and still do vollunteerwork at a homeless shelter. This is where i found what i want to do in life. Helpin people. Started college this september to be a social worker and aced my first testperiod. For aslong as i am into metal/hardcore i've been into tattoo's. All my favorite artists and bands had tattoo's. They were badass, therefor tattoo's are badass. I had to get tattoo'ed. Luckily I waited till I was 18 years old and went to a good local shop. This was last year. I got the crest of the city i grew up in on my left calf. This city gave me my friends and made me who i am. Everything that happened to me happened in this city and it just felt right getting the crest permanently on my body. More tattoo's will definitely follow in the future but at the moment I simply can't afford quality work. Take care, Chris

i'm at least glad that they're good at clean, readable graphic design, with a heavy emphasis on the hierarchy of information.

earth pounding pachyderms !! lurking the stells https://twitter.com/i/#!/StellTattooArt/media/slideshow?url=http%3A%2F%2Finstagr.am%2Fp%2FSs3WeOtFtv%2F got me searching for great elephant tattoos zach nelligan http://www.triplecrowntattoo.com/ and richard stell painting http://www.richardstelltattoos.com/

Forrest is a GREAT tattooer and a really nice dude.

Hi all. I am slowly finding my away around this little space on the inet you've carved out. I am Tiffany, a 32 year old insurance analyst living in Tampa, FL. I am originally from the burbs of Cleveland Ohio... went to college in BFE PA, then grad school in Atlanta, GA (Go yellowjackets!). After a short stint in Missouri, I moved back to Ohio for a few years and now I am down in the sunny south. I've been here for over 4 years now and don't plan to leave anytime soon. My husband and I adopted a (slightly) deranged dog this past year and are looking into buying a house when our lease is up (sadly, not for awhile). In my free time I like to knit/crochet (I am awesome at it), visit theme parks (big Disneyphile), and go to my 2 fave local bars/eating spots (where we spend way too much money and know too many of the people). We also love travel and take way too many cruises (leaving this Saturday, in fact, on our 10th Disney cruise)! Weird combination, probably. I got my first tattoo on my 25th bday... my stepfather bought it as my gift (noone should pay for their first!). I got a couple more within a year or so... all small... and then got busy and didn't get anymore until last October. Now I have several more with ones definitely planned. I just like the art of it... also, my skin is very pale and shows veins and imperfections really well so I like to cover that up.

I think if I do go to the holiday party this year, I'll get shtifaced with the people that bring us our mail. Rob

Gonna be interesting to see that boy when he's 50 or 60.

I spotted this on the front of a copy of one of the local papers that was laying around the break room at work today: So there are always job options with visible tattoos. Probably helps if you're a local celebrity though.

Kim Marks made this rad Sailor Jerry elephant on my leg at the beginning of the year at the Philly Convention!

That sums up what I do for a living. Most of it is flat-out boring as hell with office politics mixed in. Did I mention working for someone that makes a lot of wrong decisions? I make damn sure I don't associate with anyone I work with and I skip 99% of the off-hours functions. Rob

hardcore-ish metal or metalish hardcore, what ever you wanna call it...or just good stuff: and then this which has nothing to do with hardcore

I'm not so old that I'm now "older folks" am I? Though I found going on to the forearms (which I did a whole month and a bit ago) was a pretty heavy decision.

awesome.

Just in case anyone was wondering or didn't read this. Dear readers, First of all thanks again for all the support! We can’t thank you enough! A lot of people are asking questions about the situation at the moment. The story is so complicated I can imagine it’s not really clear if you’re not in it as we are. It’s not even clear to ourselves actually… I will try to explain it as clearly as possible in this blog. Most of you probably don’t know me. I studied cultural heritage and started working at the museum 1,5 year ago, a few months before the opening. I primarily joined because I love what Henk is doing as a collector. There are not many people that have such passion for collecting as he has, these days. Henk spent a few years searching for a museum to take care of his collection. Curators and experts told him the collection had the most value if it stayed together. That’s when he started thinking about building a tattoo museum again. He met a reintegration company that was looking for working places. They had some money to invest, Henk had his collection, and so the idea of a cooperation was born. This company would pay the rent for the first 10 years and the museum offered working places to people who are fundamentally separated from the working community. Due to a lack of time and in good trust we started building the museum without putting any of these agreements in a contract. Part of the agreement was that the foundation Amsterdam Tattoo Museum was going to pay for departments like promotion, events, exhibitions, etc. But as long as there wasn’t a signed contract al the revenue went to “Partners aan het werk” (the reintegration company). And also the invoices because the museum was already up and running and you can’t have a museum without promotion, events and exhibitions. But during the short time the companies were working together it became clear there was somewhat of a cultural difference. Something simple as replacing a lightbulb became a bureaucratic process. And as you can imagine this is not really how Henk was used to work. I’m not saying the lightbulb caused the problems, but it might have something to do with it ;) Henk might have had a bad temper now and then, but I know this was always from his passion for the museum. Small discussions turned into bigger ones and the fact that there still wasn’t a solid contract didn’t help either. In the meantime board members left, some just gave up because of the nasty negotiations, personal accusations. This was not what they signed up for. The board members leaving slowed down the process and the whole negotiation thing turned in a vicious circle. In the meantime the Dutch politics changed and less money went to commercial reintegration companies, so also to “Partners aan het werk”. These changes hit the company hard, salaries were payed later every month. From the perspective what’s best for the collection the new board of the foundation Amsterdam Tattoo Museum decided to end the cooperation with Partners aan het werk. The unpleasant way the meetings went had a lot to do with this decision. There just were too many accusations and disagreements. Then everything went really fast. One day we where negotiating with “Partners aan het werk” and the landlord (the building is rented by “Partners aan het werk”) and the other day we received a letter that told us we were all banned from the building: Henk, Louise, his kids, the board and his employees. The letter also said we were given 14 days to get our collection out. We were surprised by this development and decided not just to give up. We see the design of the museum as an artwork on its own that Henk made and don’t want to just give this piece of art away. We tried to get the art we lent from Sailor Jerry out, because the owners don’t trust the art to be save in there without Henk around, but the answer was no. So much for them telling us to get our collection out… What’s happening next? I don’t know. The most important is to get our collection back. We hope we can stay at the Plantage Middenlaan but there is a chance we have to look for a new building. One thing is sure: we need money. For starting up -again- in our old building. Or to build a new museum somewhere else in Amsterdam. I know one thing for sure: we can do this. I’ve never seen something like this before, the support is overwhelming. Tattoo and art lovers got together and are ready to fight for what is ours. Even without a clear plan we already received a lot of donations. There are some events organized: auctions, tattooing, benefit events. I tried to make a complete list here, if you miss something or organizing an event to raise some money yourself email me and I’ll add it to the list. Thank you all so much for everything, all the support, donations & offered help. Hope to welcome you all soon in our museum. Tessa

Not discounting Spider Murphys or any of the other suggestions but Geo (Geoff Rogers) from that shop is a solid tattooist! I know Geo has been out to Matt Amey's shop (Independent Tattoo) in Delaware to guest spot in the past!

Right now the tattoo I am working on means about a 360 mile drive each way...I did the same drive for the consultation. I have absolutely no regrets about it because it's a tattoo I am super stoked on and get excited to look at by an artist who I greatly admire and who if I could choose anybody to tattoo me, with no financial or travel constraints, I would still get tattooed by. I'd hate to settle for something less and then regret later on that I could have gotten tattooed by people I REALLY wanted to get tattooed by but didn't because it was inconvenient. I also totally understand feeling a real need to get tattooed--my wife's tattoo artist actually called me a "bitch in heat" once (not to my face though...if she had I would have found it hilarious...and true) because I was climbing up the walls being in a tattoo shop not getting tattooed. But still, tattoos are worth waiting for.

I spend $15 in tolls and $15+ in parking plus a quarter tank of gas every two weeks to get tattooed. Its a small amount compared to the satisfaction I get from looking at my killer tattoos. You dont have to travel the world as some do but don't sell yourself short to get immediate satisfaction.

you can always take some examples of lady heads that you do like to show how you like the lips and noses. just because someone has drawn some faces or heads in a certain manner doesn't always mean that they aren't capable of doing them different.

@Dhopper I got tattooed by Chris back in June. When he announced his comeback he also mentioned that his hourly rate would be $500. Do you think Chris would appreciate that I openly named the price of my tattoo and how long it took to finish on a public internet forum? This is what I wrote in another thread after my visit with Conn: “I won't elaborate much on my stay there, but it was probably the most memorable tattoo experience I've had. I left LA with much more than just a new tattoo, and I'll remember that visit the rest of my life. If someone still is on the fence because of his price, don't be. You'll get your moneys worth, and a whole lot more. That's my opinion anyways.”

Just finished my first tattoo from Josh Wrede at Bound by Design in Colorado. What do you guys think? Photo by jwredetattoos • Instagram

Some stupid lady went and soaked her feet in hot ass salt water four like three hours after getting a tattoo. "Why does this look so awful?"