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Same site has a bunch of other rad sweaters

i entered the top part last month now i am entering the bottom part. done by jeff gogue. sorry for the blurry pic and this pic was taken the day after so it wasnt "fresh"

Here is my back-piece from @Stewart Robson Started - 11/25/2011 Completed - 11/24/2013 The tattoo has 78 hours in total.

Holy shit the never ending stream of tattoos continue. Mind boggling. And to think I was even gonna attempt to enter one of mine. Keep em coming!

Funny thing is one time I was at a public function couple of years ago and there in my official government capacity. Think town hall style type of meeting. Most times these things are pretty civil with people inquiring about quality of life issues and who is responsible for such and such. This go around I get the luck of the draw and it's a tow truck driver (a business type which my agency regulates and oversees) and he's laying into me saying how terrible we are and I'm sitting up there all high and mighty and looking down on him cause he's an average working joe with tattoos on his arm. I told him he was wrong and we treat everyone fairly and he was mistaken if I'm judging him on his appearance. He continues to rant and said he noticed me sneering at him when he first walked into the meeting and gawking. I tell him if I was staring, it was probably more in admiration of the artwork on his arms and I basically tell him he is unfairly judging me based on my professional appearance to which I take off my suit jacket and role up one of my sleeves to expose my 3/4 sleeve. Couple of people in the audience laugh, some applauded. He catches me at the end of the meeting and apologizes for pre-judging me and states he's just frustrated with the regulations thats putting a strain on his business. I give him my card and tell him to call/email me so we can discuss his concerns further.

I got this from Chad Koeplinger earlier this year. I love it, and I want to share it with you:

Saw this on FB today.. Kick ass piece and awesome to see it getting recognition!!

Ha! Shredders is where my buddy/coworker scored a rad black metal snowman/burning church sweater. @cltattooing, now you know.

I was actually going to put an order in for one of these a few weeks back. I love that damn thing.

Krampus rules. Here's a cool Krampus tattoo by Steve Byrne:

Thanks mate, interseting stuff. I also really like the small tattoo under the sleeve. My tattooist told me about this tradition, not many people are aware of it so it is quite rarely seen especially by western artists. Here is mine Now I am considering these type of roasary/beads.

Hey guys, here is a link to the Catclaw Blog that shows the progress over the first two days if anyone is interested ２日続ã‘ã¦ï½œCATCLAW TATTOO-Z I'll wait until I get home and see if they have posted the final pick and I'll put it up :) After some sight seeing today I feel like a grandpa but I think I need a nap lol. I fly out tomorrow and should be hitting it, but I am buggered!

I sat in the chair for 4 hours last nite having an old fu-dog freshened up. My forearm is still swollen and bruised up here and there. I have the 2nd appointment for early 2014 to finish the whole forearm. Rob

First time posting hopefully I uploaded the image correctly. Finished this little guy in the summer.

Its also on their IG feed.

Yes sir! Recognized it instantly!! That's fucking kick ass man!Lol you have arrived!

Oh shit!

Ended up booking in with Frank Carter this coming January at FST. Can't wait to get tattooed there, having heard and read so much about this shop over time. Hopefully just going to pick something out of flash or drawings.

Same artist. I've got four fairly large pieces from her so far and now she's working on my back right now. It's very important for me to feel comfortable with the person and we definitely have this kind connection.

When you really get off the beaten-path in the US, you either see people with bad tattoos or no tattoos. So anyone with good artwork on them stands out. My son went to an upstate NY school for a while. There were 2 tattoo shops in the town and we stopped in. Man... they were turning out some awful work, but they were busy all the time. Rob

Incense and green soap take me way back. Now they don't use the same type of green soap and the smell isn't nearly as strong. - - - Updated - - - My a-hole brother and his dipshit wife are in town and popped in on short notice earlier today. I have a very fresh tattoo on my forearm and the outline has some red around it in a few places. It happened seconds after the lines were done and the artist said it is bruising. It has gotten much better since Wednesday. So the dipshit sister in law is (was.. currently disabled) a nurse and starts telling me my tattoo is infected. I say no, she says yes. We go back and forth and I question her knowledge of nursing and tell her I do not normally discuss tattoos with those who are without them. This shuts her up somewhat and I ask her how long it takes for an infection to be visible. She goes into some clinical rant and I get her to agree it would take at least 12 hours to a full day. Then I tell her how they showed up. She had very little to say and her and my brother made an exit shortly after that. Rob

I've seen them in my tattoo books in pairs, not really enough room for another one. I shoulda thunk it out a little better back in 1982. The rest of my tattoo work is fairly new, this was the oldest piece on me and it was getting hard to make out the features on it. The hair could be a little finer now that I look at it, I'll discuss it when I go for round II with my artist.

I bet this is the time of the year when child therapists make all their money

Austria (and other places) have big Krampus parades with unbelievable costumes.. check the google image search: krampus parade - Google Search

Oh shit, those are cool. Might have to start a painting!

with a bit of luck i can snap a pic tomorrow. They got the tongue rolling out of their mouth n everything

@TaeTae There's a cool one in Mike Rubendall's portfolio page 4 http://www.kingsavenuetattoo.com/artists/mike-rubendall-g4/

That turned out great, but I think the original looked really fuckin' cool for a thirty year old tattoo! I really dig how the long fur looks when it's a little "blurred" from old age too. I would definitely have kept it if that was on my arm.

I have a large peony to the side of it now (see above), done less than 2 years ago. The original tattoo was done in late 1982, almost 31 years ago! Fortunately there wasn't much dark shading in it and the brown went right over the black hair. The dog itself is a light purple, which will come out when it heals up. The flowers will be done in pink and other colors and I'm going for the sleeve. It was done at Studio 69 on Long island, NY by Gina Sherry. I have forged a great relationship with her over the years. She was totally psyched to do it and we made up a lot of the details as we went along. Rob

Finished my first session with Katja Ramirez at Perfection yesterday. I'm super happy with the result and I'm going back for another round in February.

Imo it doesn't just demean the artform, but is a step towards undermining the whole craft. The more people who do this kind of thing, the more people will expect tattooers working for nothing. @Graeme noted earlier, that "Given that it's a pretty nasty feature of contemporary capitalism that it's even harder to make a living as an artist, illustrator, photographer, musician, writer, etc. because increasingly fewer people want to pay for that kind of work." Which is spot on. I make my living as an artist/illustrator, and I get request to do freebies all the time. Make me wanna fucking puke. Just last week a danish music festival contacted me: "We would love to have you decorate one of our bar areas, but unfortunately, we do not have a budget for this, but there will be lot's of publicity". Seriously - these guys have a million dollar budget, but expect me to work for nothing? Fuck that. It's come to a point, where I don't even write anything back - I just send them this:

This is my favourite. Chris Trevino is a machine.

Amazing! I doubt I will ever do my hands but if I was going to do them I would want him to do them.

I just made my appointment to get my life-ruining hand tattoos from Thomas Hooper. It's gonna be way cool.

Well LST, I am happy to announce that after a brutal session we have finished the motif on my back! Not going to lie there where some moments when I wanted to tap but half way through Hiro dropped into the shop just to see it completed and that gave me what I needed to keep on keepin' on. All I heard was the door open and the war cry of "No Pain, No Gain". I nearly laughed but figured it wasn't the best time. Funny how the little things can keep you motivated and focused. I would have been pissed if I was so close to finishing and tapped on the final leg. I'm so wiped out but am also on that high that's probably going to keep me awake most of the night lol. Don't worry I'll post pics as soon as I can ;) and @RoryQ I don't think there will be any hard liqour tonight, I am well and truely spent.

WOW we are off to a GREAT start!

Second session just finished on my thigh. 6 and a half hours in. Swollen, bloody and inky but here is a pic. Tried to get some details in on the right side pics.

I got this Cowgirl head from Rich Hardy while he was doing a guest spot at Third Eye Tattoo about a month ago.

Tattoo shops smell like the best smells in the entire world. Aaahhh, I miss the shop!

On my recent trip home I had the usual light-hearted debates w/my mom over tattoos. We were talking about me wanting to change schools and she said I couldn't get a job at another school w/these tattoos. I said that I keep them covered w/long sleeve shirts. She said, "You can't wear long sleeve shirts all the time in LA!" I explained that yes, I already do...we have air conditioning. Blah blah blah. So then later, she tells me that Adam Levine was voted the sexiest man alive. I asked her if she agreed with that assessment and she said, "Yes." I said, "But he has tattoos!" And she goes, "He's an entertainer, not a kindergarten teacher." Oh lordy. I knew she already had a double standard about it being more ok for men to have tattoos than women. Now I see, it's also ok if you are an entertainer. I told her he is a grown-ass man and I am a grown-ass woman and that my job requires me to be an entertainer most of the time, too. Then MIL told my hubby that if we keep getting tattoos we won't be able to move back to Boston. Oh parents. They are so silly. We are in our forties and these are the conversations we are having!

That's Fred. And Higgs, also by Hardy.

Opie G. Ortiz posted this 20 year old Hardy backpiece on instagram a few days ago

i travel a lot to get tattooed. sometimes i get tattooed by someone multiple times, sometimes i get tattooed once by someone and then don't really have the opportunity to get tattooed by them again because they live across the country.

I am a fairly social person but do not like talking about my tattoos with those that I feel are just being nosey. My standard answer... Them," Hey where did you get those tattoos?" Me, "prison" Although my work I think is exceptional and def not prison work(Ive never attended!) this response typically pushes people way from me while they make sure they still have their wallet and/or purse. If you want to be flat out mean and are in a bad mood....When they ask "Did it hurt"....just reply, "not as much as the sex I traded it for."

I usually tell people that I got mine so have something to look at if I forget a magazine when I go to the bathroom.

Last night a girl asked me why I had a butterfly tattooed on my hand, I told her "Because when you're an actual tough guy you can get whatever kind of girly tattoos you want."

It could be because I'm a long-haired and bearded burly dude with skulls tattooed on my arms, living in a place where I feel I see more tattooed people than non-tattooed people, but I don't really experience people asking me about what my tattoos mean. I think that women on the whole get this a lot more than men. People mostly leave me alone. I was a little bit concerned about getting "what does it mean" questions about my (in-progress) sleeve because there's a specific visual reference there that I don't really want to explain, but thankfully the raven's head there is hidden by a t-shirt so hopefully I'll mostly avoid that question while I figure out a stock bullshit answer. I have nothing against tattoos with meaning (for that matter, I have nothing against tattoos without meaning either) I just think that the way most people go about getting a "meaningful" tattoo is all wrong. From what I've seen on the internet, the "meaning" takes priority over the strength of the image, and that's all backwards. You're going to associate your tattoos with whatever meaning you choose to give them anyway, there's no need to have hidden initials or a representative number of flower petals or whatever there. I spend too much time looking at pictures of tattoos on the internet.

Face tattoos can be the worst or the best thing ever. Just don't be the guy doing the type of shit in the first photo!

higgs is a talented, eccentric MAN. not a divine guru. this whole "cult of higgs" that has sprung up the last few years is fucking stupid.