Joel H.

ill work on getting my random picture up once i find one worthy of discussion and laughter

I got my first tattoo when i was in Rosarito, Mexico. i was 16. the day started out with my uncle and i trying to bribe the guys at 454 tattoo in san diego to just tattoo me. needless to say they weren't having it. So we decided to hop the border and try our luck. Well we ended up in a "shop" and i use parenthesis because it was a small room on the top of a senor frogs with old paul wall and chamillionaire banners for a roof. Fortunately the artist who was there had just gotten deported from Idaho and was trying to get money to hop back over to the promise land. the unfortunate part was that i had to stand for the two hours it took him to pump out some script on my hip. Yeah i know its a super gay spot but it is what it is. I was the coolest kid in my small midwest high school for about a week. then the gang bangers from chicago moved to town and they had cross tattoos on there shoulders from when they were like 10 years old. and im disease free to this day lol. thank god.

thanks for the feed back. in all honesty i dont like ami james because all the gangster wannabe drug dealers where i live throw his name out to try and act like there big in the tattoo world. also the miami ink walmart clothing. thats just too much for me. im 100% with corbin on the idea of having tattoos become illegal. im not big into japanese tattoos but i love the idea of the Yakuza with his full body suit hidden under his expensive business suit. im young and dumb and i dont have any type of reputation but i will fight to the death to defend the reputation of the true craft. the true artist who draws everyday and always tries to improve. i dream of becoming a pro like many of you some day and i want to earn my spurs. in my ignorant opinion i think an apprenticeship should start with a punch in the face every morning to make sure you really fucking want it. i want the respect beat it into me. i got way off subject and i apologize. Jeff Zuck in ann arbor, mi. his work is immaculate. i love his work.

i heard about this site from an artist at my local shop. im here to learn as much as possible. i want to start tattooing professionally in the near future but i will not put ink in anyones skin until i know its going to be as close to perfect as i can get. so please lend me any advice. im a huge fan of most of the artists on here and would like to plan some tattoos with them.

Andrew Stickler at odds n' ends in rockford, il does great work. the whole crew at smith street in nyc does some great stuff too. id love to get tattooed by steve boltz and bert krak. most of my tattoos are from my local shop in dekalb, il, protontattoostudio.com. Im happy to say that Justin Duncan from Proton is not only my man when it comes to tattoos but he is also a very good friend of mine. he never updates his online portfolio so almost all of the work of his on the website is super outdated ill try and get pictures of my tattoos hes done and upload them soon. Im new here and i dont want to start any drama but i thought the point of this site was to piss on the mainstream bullshit thats killing the reputation of tattoos yet ami james' shop is represented on here. Ami can tatoo and draw and thats all well and good but he sold out. His shop should not be anywhere near a list with spotlight and temple. You put a mcdonalds on a five star restaurant list.