briankelly

Thought I would throw in this little tatty from Kirk Jones.

Soooo, I was trying to take an all-things-tattoo-hiatus until October but the boys were getting tattooed so I thought "Oh, I'll just get a little gap filler from Paul" (like I did the previous day with Bryan Randolph)...and this happened. No really, I can stop whenever I want...

Paul Anthony Dobleman - Spider Murphy's Tattoo, San Rafael, CA

So here's my super awesome lady head by Kim Anh Nguyen, done at the Montreal Convention last year.

I'm gonna submit the smallest tattoo to win the monthly contest (ok, not really, that back, gahhhh)!
RAT HEADS GET NOTHIN' BUT CHEESE Y'ALL, done by Cody Miller at Blackheart. Photo pilfered from his Instagram.

I'll enter this one because I love my eagle. Happy to see her every day, and she has a name :o

By Chad Koeplinger at Congress St. Photo from his Instagram.

one thing that i tell the people who come into the studio and want an apprenticeship is, that just because you want to learn to tattoo, doesn't mean you get to. The other thing i tell them is that the only way to learn is to know some tattooers. I'll help friends of mine, but not some random person who has walked into the studio or sent an email.

Maybe you are a difficult customer and he is passively avoiding you.

i had this one done by Björn Liebner.

yeah, leg sleeves has to be the most stupid term ever. when's the last time you woke up, put on a shirt, shoes, and a pair of leg sleeves and went to work?

yeah, i've noticed a lot of swastikas in work too. in germany, where i live, it is illegal to display the hooked cross. my own theory on why it is so popular, especially among the dirty hippy hand poking crowd, is that it has become a reverse symbol of rebellion, since it is illegal. and i know at least one guy who does it because he thinks he's so clever and wants to be confrontational. outside of germany, i don't know why anyone would get it. even the indians know it is a nazi symbol now.

Giving this a shot. This is my alligator tattoo done by Seth Wood who works at temple tattoo in Oakland California. We finished at Saved Tattoo in Brooklyn this Monday the third of march

I'll toss in my new chest piece done by Tim Pausinger at the Pearl Harbor Gift Shop, for this month's contest.

Done by Ron Henry Wells at the Philadelphia convention. It's finally healed, so I figured I'd throw it in here.

just started instagram. @brianmfkelly

to clarify, i don't think the non-tattooers understood. the girl wants a half sleeve based on the solar system (whatever that means) finished in about a month. she also lives several hours outside of berlin, meaning she will need to make one 5 hour trip just to talk about it and try to work out a plan. people with this sort of vague idea usually do not understand what sort of commitment getting a big tattoo is. i am interested in making nice tattoos for money, not making money making crap tattoos. and i do tattoo for free, but only on friends. and yes, dan. that one on the guestbook is pretty good, but i don't read german. i also fully disagree that if someone wants a tattoo that automatically means i have to reply to them.

The Tom Of Finland stuff is pretty funny, but I'm gonna bring this thread back to pinup tattoos with my Iowa farmgirl pinup from Chip Douglass.

no tattooer would be excited about fixing this. i would advise getting another tattoo from a good shop and if you can hit it off with the tattooer, he/she would be much more likely inclined to fix your old crappy tattoo. sometimes crappy tattoos are a great memory too. like that tattoo is a mark of being in iraq and of your buddy.

no tattooer would be excited about fixing this. i would advise getting another tattoo from a good shop and if you can hit it off with the tattooer, he/she would be much more likely inclined to fix your old crappy tattoo. sometimes crappy tattoos are a great memory too. like that tattoo is a mark of being in iraq and of your buddy.

no tattooer would be excited about fixing this. i would advise getting another tattoo from a good shop and if you can hit it off with the tattooer, he/she would be much more likely inclined to fix your old crappy tattoo. sometimes crappy tattoos are a great memory too. like that tattoo is a mark of being in iraq and of your buddy.

no tattooer would be excited about fixing this. i would advise getting another tattoo from a good shop and if you can hit it off with the tattooer, he/she would be much more likely inclined to fix your old crappy tattoo. sometimes crappy tattoos are a great memory too. like that tattoo is a mark of being in iraq and of your buddy.

no tattooer would be excited about fixing this. i would advise getting another tattoo from a good shop and if you can hit it off with the tattooer, he/she would be much more likely inclined to fix your old crappy tattoo. sometimes crappy tattoos are a great memory too. like that tattoo is a mark of being in iraq and of your buddy.

I think sometimes that our good friend Scott is too humble to use LST to advertise Yellow Beak Press books. But I don't work for Yellow Beak, so I don't see a conflict in being geeked about a new book release and sharing it with folks here.
I think that the Zeis book is one of the top 10 tattoo books at all time and will go down as a classic. Born Weird- it's a much more niche book but honestly, one of my favorite design books ever. I can't even say the title without thinking about the Gillespie Royboy Hotstuff devil.
Now they have LOST LOVE coming out for a February 2014 release.
Here's the video:


I'm super excited about this one.

WT Norbert. Real solid work. I'll be getting a piece from him in a few weeks.

I guess this is probably a bad month to enter given how great the tattoos posted so far are. But I see that as a good thing, it just means more people are out getting great tattoos. Anyways, I've already posted this in he latest tattoo lowdown, but here it is:
Phil Hatchet Yau at Tahiti Felix's Master Tattoo, 4 hours, one-shot:

So many killer tattoos so far, and I don't want to win, but just to make things fun, I'll throw this one in the ring:

Done by Chad Koeplinger at the Montreal convention in September.
Also because of this forum I have this impression that Scandinavia is full of super nice people with jaw-dropping tattoos.