Shannon Shirley

i just got off the phone with my old friend and fellow tattooer Martin Robson ,who has recently relocated back to his home England, after living in America for probably 25+ yrs. he has helped me with my delemma,working for a non tattooer is never a good idea, its all business,no love.

@dcostello are you the shop dude there?
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these are all cell phone pictures, sorry if they're a bit sloppy




















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if someone would be so kind as to post, I can put the rest of them up

you forgot to add that you ignored me in blackheart. BTW, solid story from last friday:
While waiting for Scott to finish getting ready, a really awkward stereotypical tech industry/googleish type dude comes in looking for Jeff regarding something he was drawing. Jeff comes out with some phoenix/bird looking thing (pretty sweet from what I saw). The dude spends a solid 5 minutes with it right in front of his eye... like deeply analyzing the work. Finally, he says "I think it looks really good, but the wing feathers look too... hold on im trying to find the best word to describe this... organic. Yeah, they look too organic." I think the highlight was Scott making random "Hmmmmmmmmm" sounds while the dude was balls deep in the drawing. Fuckin love that shop.

For more info on the show, click: Mike Giant @FFDG, Feb 7th
Hope to see some bay area LSTers there!

One rule that is often overlooked is when to do thick/thin lines in roman lettering. The thick line should always be on the downstroke when you start drawing the letter from the left-most point and draw the letter in the least amount of strokes possible.

Well said. :)

@SailorClaire Margo DeMello was my first wife ,I helped her write that shit. 20 yr old boring crap.If you don't believe me research who I am.
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f#ckin vampires....this is about research for the sake of research. So you can finish a useless degree....and then you become an authority on something you truly know nothing about. life experience has lead me to hate this academic BS.
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If I package a bunch of shit someone told me as facts,how does that make me an authority?
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Oh yeah Margo Demello claimed she spent alot of time in a tattoo shop with GTC and I, Bullshit ,your following bullshit. Sorry for the truth. Hope this helps with your research...remember publishing bullshit doesnt make it true. You don't look like a Sailor. A trade many are proud of ,monikers are supposed to mean something. When did everyone start giving themselves nicknames?

I'm sure any shop that uses gimmicky newspaper ads to get tattooers is putting out top notch tattoos.

Some people have better luck than others with how their skin holds pigment. I still have some white holding strong from a tattoo by Jef Whitehead from maybe 1999/2000, I think it'd be gone for most people by now. I also still have something on my palm from 97/98, which at the time was something people said wouldn't last, but it was Dan Higgs, so execution played a strong role in its longevity.
I also have to say, I know plenty of people with backpieces 3 layers deep, who's to say the option to retouch or completely cover tattoos gotten in our youth is a bad move? Not that I'll get to find out ever again, any one I get work from now only does tattoos that are built to last. But isn't everything temporary, really?

I'll be the first to admit that I fell victim to the internet/myspace era of tattoo portfolios. I saw a few "realistic color portraits" and thought they were the best tattoos I had ever laid eyes on. I went out and got myself a real expensive one from an artist held in high regard within that style of tattooing. To this day it was my least memorable tattoo experience. I didn't feel like I was in a tattoo shop, I had to deal with huge egos, there was little to no respect or care for other tattooers in the industry, and in retrospect I was paying a lot of money for a "temporary" tattoo. The internet falsely represented good and humble tattooing to me and I ate it up.
It's much like what I believe the internet has done to music on both the artist and fan side of things. People no longer physically go out and buy records to find music. They download music (usually not even full albums), claim they found an awesome band that they believe to be talented via a computer screen, then when they go to see that band live it's a bunch of pre programmed auto tuned bullshit that lacks any skill in playing an instrument or understanding proper song writing. Hopefully they leave feeling disappointed, stop buying into it, and mark it as a lesson learned. Much like how I felt after I got my "realistic portrait".
Bands no longer have to tour non stop in a van for months on end under shit conditions before they become successful. They are now fueled by internet hype and are playing sold out shows before ever even touring.
I feel that this draws a perfect parallel to this new generation of tattoo artists that have no idea how to lay down a proper outline, shade with black, paint flash, etc yet they have kids flocking to them and are booked out months before ever paying their dues at a shop.
The consumer is the only one that can stop all the garbage that happens because of the internet. If we put in a little effort into going to a tattoo shop and talking to someone about why a color portrait with no black won't make for a good tattoo as opposed to reading a blog about it we will make for a much more educated consumer and hopefully end up with quality tattoos. Fuck, I really wish I had done that and not depended on what I saw on a screen. It wasn't until I physically walked into shops like Spotlight, Classic, or Gold Rush that I truly understood what I wanted out of a tattoo.
And that's the end of my rant...

Anyone else think the old one looks like Rip Torn?

This thread needs more black.

Try that with any other professional. Like an architect - design my house. If I like the design I'll pay you.

Please keep in mind that I am in no way trying to attack you, as I don't get any sort of malice or any other such tone from your post.
The problem with this is that you're asking people to work on spec, and then maybe you'll pay one of the people involved. This is all going on your word, of which, keep in mind, no one here has any examples of the integrity.
For future reference, it rarely comes across as anything other than rude and condescending to suggest that an artist of any sort work on spec. It suggests that what they do is simple enough and that so little work goes into it that they shouldn't mind whipping something up on the off-chance that the prospective client likes it.
I, for one, won't begin a piece of art for a prospective new client without a significant deposit.

Yes, because us "artistically inclined" people really love to work for free. Go to a good shop. Show him/her your tattoo and discuss possibilities. This forum isn't really for satiating these kinds of questions.

Thanks for the mention

flash is to tattooing as standards are to music, shapes and formulas, composition to leap from. Plagarism will always exist. Its part of cultural growth.

flash is to tattooing as standards are to music, shapes and formulas, composition to leap from. Plagarism will always exist. Its part of cultural growth.

flash is to tattooing as standards are to music, shapes and formulas, composition to leap from. Plagarism will always exist. Its part of cultural growth.

WTF?

WTF?

lets pretend i still look like this...

Ehhhh.. wouldn't go that far. I'd reword it, "a thing that has sprung up in the last ten years." Or "Tatty zapper party time!" Or "That day where you don't make money tattooing people who don't really want tattoos." Blame that party animal Pecker guy! :D

So many penises..

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