TattooedMumma

i love how informative this thread is
broadening my tattoo horizons <3

You must not have spent much time here before starting this thread @tkl13

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.
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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

Here is the start of my mates chest tattoo.
Also what I would do is email Norbert and ask if he would be heading your way I am fairly sure he travels to Melbourne to tattoo, not only at conventions but as a guest artist in some shops.
A lot of artist do travel to Australia more often that you might think. Best to ask the question and get the tattoos you want from the artists you really want.
This year I had tattoos lined up from Steve Byrne and Myke Chambers in Sydney, unfortunately both fell through as they cancelled there trips for whatever reasons.
Ask the questions and you might be pleasantly surprised.

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:

Anyone defending this guy is a complete moron

Obvious comments about people getting the infections...errrrr...tattoos they deserve aside, this guy is an idiot. 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--not to mention the number of other careers that now practically require countless hours of unpaid labour in the form of internships--there's nothing at all "refreshing" about working for free. Maybe if these people actually valued artists and paid money for art that instead of complaining about how they, the oh-so-romantic-Jawbreaker-is-my-favorite-band perpetually starving artists, don't have money for things like tattoos (but please don't ask them how much money they spend on drugs), they would have money for things like tattoos. Maybe they'd have to live on tighter budgets, pick up extra shifts at work, wear clothes and shoes a little longer, and so on, to save the money to get tattooed and that it would be worth it because if you love tattoos you'll find a way to make it work even if it doesn't mean instant gratification. Not to mention that if you have a respect for tattooing as a craft, or shit, for crafts and craftspeople in general, that you should understand that this stuff always comes at a price and that the craft isn't less "pure" because of it. I can't wait for the hipsters to be eradicated by a plague of hepatitis.

"what does the heart with a knife tattoo on your ribs mean?"
It means I'm going to stab you. now please go away. I'm eating breakfast and what are you doing in my living room?

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."

What does it mean?
"It means I like tattoos".

If you really don't want to talk to them, you could always respond to their questions with a series of clicks and chirps.

I'll tell ya, Daryl Rodriguez from Hold It Down just did an awesome Dumb and Dumber parakeet tattoo.. :D

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.

I'm also curious about how you go about protecting a place like your inner bicep or inner thighs during healing, especially when wearing heavier winter clothing. The former's going to be relevant to me in the spring, hopefully.

Ha! pass... though there are plenty of people I wouldn't mind sending there......

The spirit of adventure calls, eh? :)
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Oh my god, yes! haha! would you like me to go into all of the reasons why I think this is a terrible idea?

I'll second that.
Unless there are three-boobed aliens there. Then I'm down.

Ha! pass... though there are plenty of people I wouldn't mind sending there......

Ha! pass... though there are plenty of people I wouldn't mind sending there......

Ha! pass... though there are plenty of people I wouldn't mind sending there......

Bad photos (part of the reason I dont upload many tattoo photos) heres my dotwork tibetan skull so far . Its still to get more stuff added

Fuckin spot appeared right in the eye whilst healing :)

@hogg If you're a fan of Chad Koeplinger, i got this done by him today! Took about/Just under 2 hours!

Not sure why I thought to do this tonight, but I decided to see how long of a drive it is to New York City and also to Montreal. Found out that from my house it's almost exactly the same length of trip (6h35mins vs 6h38mins).
Driving to NYC to get a tattoo is something I definitely want to do someday, but it has always seemed so far away - I really thought it was more like an 8.5hr drive. Montreal, on the other hand, I've driven to several times (mostly for hockey games) and would definitely do again.
I have the feeling that this knowledge is going to cost me money in the coming months/years.

This is an interesting topic with a lot of grey area. As a tattooer, it's pretty disheartening and insulting when someone blatantly rips off your work. As a client, well.. I was talking to Mr. Campise about not putting my piece online as to skate around the biters and he laid it out pretty simply. Nobody is ever going to do the original justice, and it's pretty much just free(albeit really obnoxious) advertising. Nothing can ever outshine true authenticity, and whoever ends up with the copy ends up walking around with a permanent bummer. So that's kind of where I sit on that matter... It sucks, it's inevitably going to happen, don't do it if you tattoo, and don't get down on it as a client.

off topic...
ha! most of my sentences either begin or end like this :Dwas going to do a huge reply but instead will just nod and agree with whats already been said...