Duffa

By Scott Sylvia last month at Blackheart.

Horitomo cats & my cats :)

Horitomo cat from a few months ago ...
sorry for the dark picture

New one from Chris O'Donnell. Flaming traditional dragon head.

After 1st session with Horitomo. Back was much easier than I thought/ heard, of course we haven't hit the problem areas yet...

My arms are all pick and stick tattoos, and if I were to start over with the same aesthetic, I would definitely get large tattoos in the large spaces first. Nothing sucks more than wanting a big tattoo in a certain area and realizing that you don't have enough room for it. Also, when advising clients on where to put a design that they have already chosen, I tell them to put it in a spot that is the same size and shape as the design. So if I were starting my arms over again, I would start with larger pieces on the inner and outer biceps, large vertical designs down the backs of the forearms(mid upper bicep, over the elbow to upper wrist) or a large diagonal design wrapping from back of the elbow to front of the wrist, central/circular designs over the ditch, and then porkchop sized pieces on the inner forearms and wrists. It is always fun to put smaller tattoos between the spaces that are already well-framed and fit nicely in the area.
That is just my own opinion on what I think looks best in terms of placement on the arms, but really it is up to you. I think the most solid course of action is to definitely start from the top to the bottom and place things where they fit best.

A good read. Apologies if it's been posted before.
Horihide still practices the dying art of hand tattoo
Hand tattoo artist Horihide is one of the few tebori practitioners who remain, as body ink carries a stigma in Japan and young apprentices are few.

GIFU, Japan — Hidden away in the backroom of a modest apartment in this central Japanese city, one of Japan's last remaining hand-tattoo masters is preparing his tools. Over the last four decades Oguri Kazuo has tattooed notable geisha and countless yakuza, members of Japan's notorious mafia. Today, the 79-year-old artist, known professionally as Horihide (derived from "hori," meaning "to carve"), is working on a client who is a little more subdued.
Motoyama Tetsuro has spent hundreds of dollars, traveled thousands of miles and waited more than three decades for a session with Horihide. The Japanese-born American software manager wanted the master's ink in his skin — a living legacy for a dying art. With old masters passing away and young apprentices lacking the patience to learn the painstaking craft of tebori (hand tattooing), many followers believe its days are numbered.
"If you know the master, why would you want to work with someone else?" asks Motoyama, 62, who first received the outline of a dragon by Horihide on his right shoulder in the 1970s. Motoyama lost touch with the master — who works only by word-of-mouth introductions in backdoor locations — before the work was complete. Last November, after a 30-plus year search, he finally located Horihide and traveled back to Japan from his home in Cupertino, Calif., to finish the piece.
Japanese tattoos are steeped in thousands of years of history and bound by rigid tradition and social mores. This distinguishes them from American tattoos, which are largely personal expressions of individualism. Japanese masters spend years perfecting their craft and learning the stories behind the tattoos, derived from woodblock prints and Chinese folk tales. The body-suit tattoos, spanning shoulders to below the buttocks, can take hundreds of hours to apply and cost as much as $20,000.
Banned during the Meiji period, irezumi (literally "to insert ink") remains underground today; many hot springs and bathhouses still bar tattooed individuals. Artists such as Horihide work under a cloak of secrecy plagued by associations with criminality. Still, social stigma has not put off the soft-spoken Motoyama who, with square glasses and salt-and-pepper hair, appears the epitome of respectability. Although the grandfather is happy to show off his tattoos in California, he, like most, is careful to hide his arms in Japan behind long sleeves despite searing summer temperatures.
Controversy is now flaring up again. Last month, the right-wing populist mayor of Osaka, Toru Hashimoto, ordered all government employees to voluntarily divulge any concealed or visible tattoos. The 100 or so discovered to be inked, who mostly work in waste disposal and transport, are likely to face an ultimatum: Get the offending tat removed or find another job.
Such pariah status has led to a decline in tattoo masters, with Horihide estimating that there are only five or six left who can do the traditional black-and-white tebori as opposed to the machine-operated colored tattoos. (Horihide offers both.)
"Specializing in tebori is not commonplace," says Kip Fulbeck, an art professor at UC Santa Barbara, who is organizing a 2014 exhibition of Japanese tattoos at the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles with tattoo artist Takahiro Kitamura (known as Horitaka). "For one, it takes a great deal of time to traditionally learn how to do it correctly. It's also a much slower tattooing method, so it takes much more time. [unlike machine tattooing] it's very subtle, it's very quiet." Although Horihide has eight students, none can yet draw their own designs and just a few are learning tebori.
Horihide became an apprentice at age 19 and spent five years learning the craft. "It was very strict. In the morning you have to get up at 5 o'clock and clean the house. If you didn't do it right, you could be beaten," recalls the artist, as he sits cross-legged on the floor, carefully filling in the yellow hues of a tiger on Motoyama's other shoulder. "But nowadays young people can't do that. Some people who want to be students ask me, 'How much can you give me as a salary?'" He laughs, shaking his head. "So things have changed."
As a teenager, Horihide fled to Tokyo after a street gang fight. When money ran out and hunger started to gnaw, he saw a sign offering room and board to a tattoo apprentice. Despite lingering prejudices surrounding the once-forbidden art (the ban was lifted in 1948 by the occupying forces), Horihide carefully practiced on his own skin — scars of now faded squares and circles on his thigh today.
Past clients were largely the yakuza and an occasional hot spring geisha, who marked themselves with phoenixes, dragons and killer whales. Horihide's memories of the yakuza — who provided generous gifts — remain fond. "Younger people do not know how to be courteous and do not know how to speak to me," he complains.
Today, however, his clients are largely construction workers and firefighters, members of fraternal organizations who are traditionally tattooed. Asked what a popular design is, Horihide describes the Japanese carp. When caught by a fisherman, the carp does not thrash around like other fish, but remains still, quietly accepting its fate. "So Japanese guys take the spirit of the carp," he explains, "rather than struggle against fate."
Motoyama pulls a white T-shirt back over his head and then buttons up a black shirt — carefully hiding both the dragon and newly inked tiger, which still bubbles with small specks of blood. "Today, tattoo artists just use a stencil and copy designs," he says sadly. "With Horihide's designs, every one is unique. [but] in the long run I don't know how long they can survive."
Horihide still practices the dying art of hand tattoo - Los Angeles Times

its hard to say. i normally set out to do the exact opposite of what inspires me for the soul purpose of trying to bring something of my own to the table.
i definitely love his tattooing from the late 90's and early 2000's( i started tattooing in 97-98) and have always loved his painting. the little that ive seen of what he does now still gets me going but i dont try to emulate it consciously. there are so many things that are floating in the back of my head. i honestly can say that what i like the most, is the art that would be associated with metal. specifically heavy metal magazine but i cant stand most metal. puss head, biz, frank frazetta... shit like that. i also like the classics. my whole point to to build off of history. to copy your contemporaries just helps you produce whats popular which is definitely necessary to survive.
i have more thoughts but i cant sort them right now. kinda feel like i jumbled a bunch of shit together to answer your question. :p
ive been doing off beat weird shit for a long time took a long ass break to clear my head from family shit so im just getting back to where i feel i should of been a few years ago... see im rambling again
anyway hope i answered your question lol
- - - Updated - - -
heres a couple more

This is probably the most comprehensive explanation I've found on the internets of the "what goes with what" vis-a-vis flowers that I think you were referring to. Some of this seems like common sense -- like don't mix plants from different seasons -- but I agree: if you're not super hung up on what's "traditional," get what you dig. From an interview with Horihide:
"Tattooists who have not been apprenticed and trained by tattoo masters do not know the reasons or meanings of the traditional designs. For example, there are four seasons (spring, summer, fall and winter) in Japan. The seasons should be expressed in tattoo art as well. Real Japanese tattoo artists express each season on the skin. However, the untrained tattooists do not know traditional thoughts on Japanese art. The untrained tattooists draw a snake and cherry blossoms, but this is a wrong way in tradition. When cherry trees begin to bloom in March in Japan, the snake still hibernates under the ground. So the snake and cherry blossom cannot be seen in the same period. In other words, it does not make any sense if the snake and cherry blossoms are drawn together.
Some tattooists draw a carp climbing up the waterfall together with peonies. Actually, we can see the carp climbing up the waterfall from the late September to October in Japan. It is supposed to go with maple leaves, not peonies. (The symbol of maple leaves refers to the autumn.) When hutatsugoi (twin carp) and huhugoi (a married couple carp) are drawn, two carp (one carp for the arm, for example) can go with peonies, because we do not have to express seasons in these cases. There are several traditional combinations: Karajishi, which is a combination Shishi (lion) with botan (peonies), and ryu (dragon) with kiku (chrysanthemum) and menchirashi (men means “a mask,” and chirashi or chirasu means “to scatter”) with cherry blossoms. Those images are particular sets for Japanese traditional tattoo designs.”
Re-post from: ANCIENT ART OF THE JAPANESE TEBORI TATTOO MASTERS | INK IN HARMONY | The Selvedge Yard

I was told Kumonryu Shishin can be paired with almost any flowers assuming other rules (i.e. seasons) are observed. I have a Kumonryu Shishin back piece with kiku.

Nico softmachine tattoo

Henning Jorgensen

Have my fourth and final session with Nick Colella at Great Lakes Tattoo this Thursday. I am excited to see the background filler put in. I have one in mind but also will ask his advice/opinion on which way to go. Thanks to everyone here who took the time out to teach me what a good tattoo and better yet what a good artist is. I was fortunate to stumble across the forum and I have tried to be a sponge with all the information. Thanks
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Got this subtle vag-rose from Olivia at Mom's Body Shop in SF today. Super fun! Loving the pink and black.
The little 13 is cause this was the 13th tattoo of 2013 :P

Ask and ye shall receive my friend ;) in all its glory - The "Vans Warped Tour Body Suit"

God bless the internet. That is all.



Your Favorite Disney Princesses With Beards

LMAO…Ghostface Killah’s 3rd Annual Top 10 Softest Rappers in the Game List! | Word On Da Street
This has made me laugh out loud for the past 30 minutes now, thought i'd share it with all of you.
You gotta read it out loud though or you won't understand a single thing.
example: "This nigga looks like a transgender Vietnamese prostitute that got abducted by aliens n was cloned but never really finished the process of turnin hisself into a actual human n shit so he came out lookin like he do…but he still part alien n only kinda human lookin now namsayin. "
or how about "Soulja Boy
Aka the 2011 Mr Bojangles. This nigga also deserves recognition as the coon of the decade namsayin. I dont even kno how muthafuckas listen to this niggas music….nevermind callin that shit hip hop. If it was 1930 this nigga would be rockin a necklace made of chicken legs n pigs feet n be tap dancin on watermelons for a livin."
Enjoy!

I'll list mine, don't judge me (no particular order):
El-P & Killer Mike - Run The Jewels
Deafheaven - Sunbather
Violent Soho - Hungry Ghost
Inspectah Deck/7L & Esoteric - CZARFACE
Church Of Misery - Thy Kingdom Scum
Red Hare - Nites of Midnight
Dead Confederate - In The Marrow
Morne - Shadows
Diarrhea Planet - I'm Rich Beyond Your Wildest Dreams
Russian Circles - Memorial

Top ten of what I actually listened to and enjoyed most in 2013, edited to not have duplicate artists, and in alphabetical order:
Current 93 - Of Ruine or Some Blazing Starre
Graveyard - Hisingen Blues
GZA/Genius - Liquid Swords
Iron Maiden - Seventh Son of a Seventh Son
King Crimson - In The Court of the Crimson King
Matthew Sweet - 100% Fun
Mercyful Fate - Don't Break the Oath
My Bloody Valentine - m b v
Saint Vitus - Born Too Late
Wu Tang Clan - Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)
I'm old.

I can usually stomach to see pretty gross shit, but that video takes the fucking cake!!! I'd rather watch Two Girls and a Cup before ten more seconds of that thing. Damn @TaeTae! I should have taken your warning more seriously.

Szazi suit sir !! tattooed by Ivan Szazi , Four Elements Tattoo Studio Brazil .

Ichibay

Uesugi Kenshin vs Takeda Shingen is paired with Sakura.

Off the top of my head the story of Taira no Koremochi involves maple leaves.

i had a show open recently here are a few pieces that were in it... hope you enjoy