sophistre

I think for most people this won't look like much has been done, but oh well! All of the black/shading, with the exception of some clouds we're going to add, is now done. All of the lining, too. We had to line two more dragon feet and I thought I was going to die. If I never see another liner that size again, it'll be too soon! So now we get to start color after this, and I can't wait. 

Greg Whitehead and all that.
 

I think for most people this won't look like much has been done, but oh well! All of the black/shading, with the exception of some clouds we're going to add, is now done. All of the lining, too. We had to line two more dragon feet and I thought I was going to die. If I never see another liner that size again, it'll be too soon! So now we get to start color after this, and I can't wait. 

Greg Whitehead and all that.
 

I think for most people this won't look like much has been done, but oh well! All of the black/shading, with the exception of some clouds we're going to add, is now done. All of the lining, too. We had to line two more dragon feet and I thought I was going to die. If I never see another liner that size again, it'll be too soon! So now we get to start color after this, and I can't wait. 

Greg Whitehead and all that.
 

I think for most people this won't look like much has been done, but oh well! All of the black/shading, with the exception of some clouds we're going to add, is now done. All of the lining, too. We had to line two more dragon feet and I thought I was going to die. If I never see another liner that size again, it'll be too soon! So now we get to start color after this, and I can't wait. 

Greg Whitehead and all that.
 

Alix Ge added this awesome Hannya on my forearm
 
 

Added this one tonight from Jonathan Montalvo. What a genuinely good dude. 

I love that gryphon lady! Man, I am such a huge fan of mythical beasties. You can take all of the coolest parts of an animal and just smash them together, what could possibly be better than that?

This usually shows up for me with strangers asking where I get tattooed, and saying 'your tattoos are really different!' But since they're not very different from other good tattoos, I can only assume this means that most of what they see is not good.

You just reminded me of one of my favorite images from a set of Spider Murphy flash. Love that griffin/lady at the bottom right. Of course, you won't be getting a lady face on yours, but griffins are cool. I was at Spider Murphy's only once and the person before me got a griffin from Paul Dobelman. It was awesome. If I were to get a griffin, I would have to go back there.

You don't need to incorporate anything else about your kid, his name is more than enough of a connection to the subject matter. Don't clutter up an awesome tattoo with words or dates! I think your kid will be proud when he grows up and sees his dad got a badass beast as a tribute to him. 

You could do something statuesque, new school, traditional...the list goes on. There's tons of options for a griffin since it's a mythical beast and there's no "wrong" way to draw one. It just depends on what style you want. 

Who is your intended artist? Any links to a portfolio?

I posted these in the new tattoos thread but here are my hands by Guen Douglas. They hurt like a bitch and I had a shitty heal (they need a few touch ups but neither of us are in a hurry!)  really happy I have them done. I've got full coverage on arms and most of legs but not torso - partly because this is where I want my biggest pieces - but to get my hands done was very symbolic of committing myself to tattooing. No going back to teaching for me! Plus I just feel more 'me'. Hard to explain but I reckon someone gets it. 

Coming through airport security yesterday one of the security guards had a long (favourable) chat about my tattoos.
He said he had a couple but was too afraid of the pain to get more.
Then he explained that he got the tattoos after he got paralysed in a car accident and then beat the doctor's diagnosis that he probably would never walk again (!!!).
I was like "dude, I think you could handle it" (He laughed).
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I would suggest changing how the voting works, if possible.  There was always an advantage to the people who posted their tattoos first.  If you posted a tattoo towards the middle or end of the month you basically didn't have much of a chance regardless of the tattoo.  If it wouldn't be a complete pain in the ass to implement and administrate, what about something like a ranked ballot where, at the end of the month, people can choose their first, second, third favorite tattoos and assign, say 5 points to first, 3 to second, and 1 to third and tabulate that to decide a winner.
 
Could also be fun to run contests around themes like skulls, birds, flowers, or whatever.
 
Healed up and settled in stuff would be cool too.

Got to love daggers. I've got a couple too, if we're having photos. The honeycomb one isn't settled yet, just a couple of weeks old. They wrap quit a bit.  

I'm pretty much in the large dagger category. :)

horizontal placement of a dagger would not really fit with the body on the rib cage, it will look like a bent blade in my opinion. vertical dagger would be better placement on a rib cage... but at 7cm (half the size of your pinky) horizontal/vertical won't matter, it will look extra small like a sticker on the ribs. take the plunge and go waaay bigger, at least 3x bigger.
 
 

go bigger

I got a little Richard Stell pink elephant when I was at Pair-O-Dice on the 4th. Had fun shooting the shit with Richard and Jen while Jen tattooed me. Elephant is very mangy currently. I shall post a photo when he has healed! Meanwhile, enjoy this photo of me with Richard. :-)

Having spoken to a bunch of my friends after getting a bunch of my own...I genuinely think that  most people just do not know what good tattoos look like, or even why good tattoos are good in the first place. I've had a lot of friends send me links to shops near them going, 'what do you think about this person's work?' and half of the time the shading is terrible or the lines are wonky, but they just don't see those things. Even after I show them a bunch of examples of better work, they don't seem to internalize it quickly.

I do think there's something to the control aspect, though...that most look for an artist doing things like what they've imagined their tattoo will look like, even if what they want isn't going to make a very good tattoo. I dunno.

Being young and careless? Not knowing any better? Rushing into a decision? All or none of the above? I'd say it's a case by case basis.
The first large tattoo I got, on my forearm no less, is not necessarily something I would get today. I still like the tattoo, but it's in some prime, very visible real estate that I may have otherwise used for a much different, and probably much better, tattoo today.
At the time I was younger and far less informed, latched on to a particular idea pretty early, and didn't really consider all possibilities. I rushed into it. Fortunately, I didn't end up with one of those horror stories, but despite liking the tattoo, I'd still probably do things different today.

I think this is the main thing.  Most of the time, you're just comparing different flavors of bad.  I have had untattooed people express shock at the fact that my visible tattoos weren't awful more than once.

In order to find the best things in life (food, music, people, tattoos, whatever-the-fuck you're into) you have to give a damn beyond a cursory level. You've got to put in some work. Most people don't want to do this in my opinion. More so if they're not going to be into tattoos as a continued hobby. 
Or they're just busy with other things that are more important to them. They probably don't understand why one would settle for a terrible interest rate on a loan or something...

Having spoken to a bunch of my friends after getting a bunch of my own...I genuinely think that  most people just do not know what good tattoos look like, or even why good tattoos are good in the first place. I've had a lot of friends send me links to shops near them going, 'what do you think about this person's work?' and half of the time the shading is terrible or the lines are wonky, but they just don't see those things. Even after I show them a bunch of examples of better work, they don't seem to internalize it quickly.

I do think there's something to the control aspect, though...that most look for an artist doing things like what they've imagined their tattoo will look like, even if what they want isn't going to make a very good tattoo. I dunno.

I was in a shop recently that was having a flash day. One poor soul had drawn up a couple mandalas and did pretty much nothing but those for the first few hours of the day, so he finally stuck up a piece of paper that said "sold out" over the most popular one. 

I think mandalas are trendy now, but they're a pretty harmless trend, I think they'll age well and look timeless (for the most part). I get a little tired seeing them popping up on Instagram and Facebook all the time, but I don't think too many people will be really ashamed of them in the future. It's still better than upside down scribbles on your fingers or whatever.

Pretty much.

One of the tattooers in a shop I was in was cracking jokes about girls who come in to get mandalas (not in any particularly cruel way, just in the sense that a certain kind of customer seems to inevitably want mandalas), but I don't think this would stop me from getting one. I'd still totally get a mandala tattoo. They're beautiful! IDGAF, haha.

Tattooing doesn't have a long history of catering to a crowd that cares much what other people think. Seems like most people who get tattooed have to some degree or other already said their goodbyes to that. (I mean, it would probably hurt my feelings if somebody said nasty things about one of my tattoos, but that would be more about somebody being a dick to me than anything else!)
 
edit: Apparently I've already posted this?? HAHAHA

At least I'm consistent. :p