Tesseracts

Name calling and insults are not tolerated on LST, let's keep it classy guys.

There's an incredible amount of high quality discussion and information on this forum. The search function is a help, but really even if someone just read through some of the longer threads they'd learn a tremendous amount.
I reject the idea that on top of that this forum should be a place for people to ask the kind of questions that have probably been dealt with before in one thread or another, and which they don't really seem to be serious enough about answering that they go into their local street shop or shoot an artist an e-mail. If you feel differently, and feel that no question is too dumb for us to have some responsibility to answer that's your perogative. But don't call people a 'cock sucker' (nice casual homophobia by the way) just because not everyone agree with you.

I kind of feel like I ruined this month by posting my back piece, no one else wants to enter so I'll post some more :)
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Done By Tim Hendricks at Frith Street Tattoo

I'm going to post some more pictures I found, and when I have time I'll try to find out who made all of these so I can credit them.
I've been doing some research on kitsune since I decided they were cool tattoos. Some are considered servants of the deity Inari, and are considered more trustworthy than wild foxes. According to Japanese tales all foxes are capable of magic, however, and wild foxes can be both good or evil. Here are some links about foxes in case anyone wants them.
Kitsune, Kumiho, Huli Jing, Fox - Fox spirits in Asia, and Asian fox spirits in the West
Kitsune Lore
Kitsune
Kitsune Page - Myths and Ancient Stories - Japanese
Kesa thru Kodansha
Main/Kitsune - Television Tropes & Idioms
I'm thinking of going down to the NYC tattoo convention to try to get this done. The website says the Horitoshi family will be there. I don't know how easy it will be to get something like this done though, I've never gotten a tattoo in my life and I've never been to a tattoo convention.

The thing about a tattoo like the one above (and the millions of them you see in spaces like Pinterest) is that they may look cool in well-lit close-up photos, but you have to think about what that will translate to in real life. Like @hogg said I would put money on that looking like a rash or disease or something-like weird blotchy skin.
I know tattooers tend to have a million other reasons as to why white ink tattoos don't work, but as a non-expert all I can say is that definitely looks like it will end up looking like a rash.

Bumping this to share some kitsune art I've found, hoping others will post more. This is a great subject for a tattoo, and not one I see often.

Excuse the awful picture, I'm out of town visiting my boyfriend and had to use his phone to try to get a pic. I'll have to try to get a better one when I get home. Had this done yesterday by Jason Reeder. This is my second piece from him, it's on the inside of my right leg (he did an owl and mouse for me on the outside of the same leg). The ears KILLED and that was by far my most painful tattoo experience thus far; it might be hard to tell from the pic, but they creep up to the side of my knee and the back one almost goes into my knee ditch. I thought this would finish off my leg, but I have a patch of open skin on my shin and the back of my calf is still open, so it looks like I have some more work to get done before the project is finished. Probably throw some moths in some of that space, and Jason is trying to talk me into getting a bat, we'll see. :D

The beardo on the left is a fireman. The bold letters on his front identifies him as being in the "Chi" group of firemen. The text on his right identifies where he's from Sensoji in Asakusa, Tokyo. I believe it was common for firemen to get tattooed for id purposes if they died on the job.

Maybe I missed them, but do you actually have any suggestions for how people can protect their work? Your approach seems to be if you don't want to get ripped off, don't show your work anywhere(?). Your pro-rip off attitude is mind-boggling.

Actually, blasting your work all over the internet is the best way to protect it. The more people can recognize your work, the more people will notice when it's been stolen, and complain about it if the need arises. Artists can't have a career without publicity, if nobody knows their work exists, nobody is going to buy it. The bottom line is, you're completely wrong and nobody who knows copyright law would agree with this, in fact I think the only people who would agree with your argument are people who have a habit of stealing art without giving credit.

Actually, blasting your work all over the internet is the best way to protect it. The more people can recognize your work, the more people will notice when it's been stolen, and complain about it if the need arises. Artists can't have a career without publicity, if nobody knows their work exists, nobody is going to buy it. The bottom line is, you're completely wrong and nobody who knows copyright law would agree with this, in fact I think the only people who would agree with your argument are people who have a habit of stealing art without giving credit.

So are you suggesting that artists should have a lawyer on retainer to go after anybody who infringes on their copyright? Because that's really the only thing I can think of that would, and in only specific cases, prevent people from ripping off artists. Ryan Begley who does Shirts and Destroy recently wrote a thing about Affliction ripping off S&D and how in his case, even with a lawyer on his side, he wasn't even able to get a cease and desist order against Affliction because intellectual property is a "grey area". I'm sure Affliction can afford better lawyers than Ryan Begley too. I don't know any artists who have the time or money to actually fight against every instance that somebody has ripped them off, and no, that does not "equal consent".

I couldn't find many examples either for kitsune ideas when I was looking around, but I just asked Seth Wood if he wanted to draw one for my back - fortunately he was interested. I think you just have to find someone you trust and go for it!

more seth wood

I actually got to watch some of that tattoo happen, that thing is no joke
this is a great kitsune from the book Mythical Beasts of Japan


Hokusai

Kuniyoshi

more Kuniyoshi

Bumping this to share some kitsune art I've found, hoping others will post more. This is a great subject for a tattoo, and not one I see often.

Horimasa Tosui from the Horitoshi Family is my favourite. In my opinion his doing some of the best Tebori oneshots (and big work) in the business. It´s very easy to recognize that his master is Horitoshi 1;



These are 12 years old. Look how bright they still are;


I got this one from him earlier this year:

I also love alot of other Tebori-artists, some of them are mentioned over here. Horizakura, Horitomo..

more of that from a link on the art thread

Tigers are so 2500 years ago:

More pics here: Pazyryk Mummy Tattoos
More info here:Pazyryk Mummies wiki

I know it's Frazetta based, but I could see someone like Brooks, Hundahl or Lehi updating this:

Reference (adding the snake would've kicked ass):

Ha-Google is my friend. Hundahl viking tattoo:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/headovmetal/3604128128
http://www.flickr.com/photos/headovmetal/3603329651

A friend of mine found this and scanned it for me.
Since it's in Life magazine--in 1961--I expected it to be on some, "Well, thank American Jesus that's illegal now!" Instead, they seem to complain about the ban. "Effete civilization is smothering the 4,000-year-old art." I'm also intrigued that a Coney Island carney still counted his 59 tattoos, all of which had devolved into "purple pictures." About this "needles and matches" method: I assume the matches are to burn paper to create soot which gets mixed with water (or, you know, piss)?

This is a photo taken by my friend, @Iwar, right after Marius Meyer did a hell of a oneshot on me. I was almost dead, at least very close to fainting. Haha! See a better picture of it in the august contest. The front is just a collection of good and bad tattoos. Some day the owl is going to taste the laser..

im going to be the grumpy old curmudgeon who offers nothing to the thread on topic save for mentioning my absolute hatred of the term plainskin. My friend Shannon tried to start that as a phrase years ago, not sure if this is the ripple from that, but its like fingernails on a chalkboard to me.
Sorry for interrupting.

Finally have a new finished piece to enter the contest! Not expecting to win, but it's a good way to show off my finished tattoo by Kore Flatmo!
The pictures were taken in May by Kore when we finished up. Yay! :D

This monster of a kirin is a oneshot from Marius Meyer.

Ah what, the hell, I'll give this a try this month. This was done by Thomas Hooper in five sessions between October 2012 and June 2013, mostly at Saved but with one session at the Rochester Convention: