Need some serious help!

So my plans for the next couple of years was bouncing around the world, tattooing, learning and having fun before settling down somewhere with my new occupation. However many a recent drinking session with friends has ended in discussions about these plans and the sentence "You should make a documentary about it" has often popped up.

Why not, I want to learn from some of the best tattoo artists in the world, what's in it for them, not much. So the documentary would be beneficial to all parties. It's still in the brainstorming period and waiting for a couple of friends to get back to me after the weekend about the direction of the project but I have some high hopes for this.

What help do I need, well a huge amount. from studios to host me as a visiting apprentice, to people wanted to be tattooed to professionals in the field of post production, flash animator and a whole lot more. Later this week a website for the pre-production will be going online detailing more about the project and it's aims and this is where I need your immediate help.

I've had a few Ideas for a title, 30,000 miles of Ink and Pain? Art and Pain: a global quest? and some others. now I want to hear your suggestions. If you come up with the chosen title for the documentary you will receive recognition on the website, the closing credits name and/or link.

looking forward to hearing from you.

Peace

Please leave your suggestion in the comment box below and e-mail/link of where I can get hold of you for updates. you name will also appear in the IMBD.com

thanks

Preying Mantis Tattoo

So after Ofer's birthday tattoo of peanuts on his back he came back for more, a lot more ink!
He asked me to design a half sleeve with a preying mantis stood on a rice plant with the moon and clouds in the back ground, with Japanese wind bars surrounding it. 24 hours later he had this on his arm.

We had to stop at the 5 hour mark because he had to shoot of to work so it's unfinished at the moment. Shading still needs to go into the mantis and the moon/clouds. I also want to add a hint of colour to the top edges where the moonlight catches also a faint yellow halo around the moon clouds and mantis to give it a little pop!

A Boney Hand

Mathew a great Canadian guy checked into the hostel the other week, sporting a awesome old school sleeve done by a studio back home. Only in black and a very dark piece it was still impressive. He was also showing a tattoo done on the back of his other hand however this wasn't so nice. I asked him about it and he told me it was supposed to be a rear view mirror with the words "objects seem closer than they appear" . With misspelled words and inconsistent lines it looked like it had been done in prison.

Talking more about it I found out it was from the studio I had built and invested myself in for a return of being a part owner and a full time apprentice. The guy that was supposed to be teaching was a "Yaad Kedem", one of the longest serving tattoo artists of Israel. What I didn't know at the time was "Yaad Kedem" was and still is one of the biggest lying, crack smoking, thieving pieces of shit of Israel. After leaving the studio I heard of 15 years of this guy screwing over apprentices and partners. This was good for me as they was sympathetic to my case and a few studios have helped continue to learn and tattoo by allowing me to buy supplies in small quantities.

Mathew asked me if I could do something with this awful tattoo, I could see he was quite upset about it being on view to everyone. I was happy to give it go and only charging him for the Ink and needles (plus a couple of beers) I came up with the old skeletal hand tatt. he's over joyed with it now and I'm pretty happy too. I feel very satisfied when a tattoo can really help someone cover a bad tattoo or scarring. Anyway here's the finished result...

Element Tattoo

So I've found out everyone loves talking about tattoos, wanting to get one, can you make me a design but the reality is I only tattoo about 10% of the people that actually inquire about getting a tattoo. Put bluntly a lot of time wasters.

A few months ago whilst in a bar with friends a guy asked me to come up with a design based on his concept of Last Man Standing. A silhouet of a man in a suit, standing on a broken piece of land floating away from a broken apocalyptic city scape. Nice I thought, so got to work researching on google images. 3 hours of drawing and had something looking pretty good. So I call and text and leave a message telling the sketch is done, no reply. Great another time waster but tried looking on the bright side that I got some drawing practice in. The design was slipped into my clear book to possibly be forgotten about.

To my surprise the design found a new home, a friend of a friend was flipping through the drawings and the Last Man Standing caught his eye. He had an idea for an element tattoo for a while and this one seemed to hit home. With a different background of wind, water and fire he had his piece.

Stencil with hand drawn background

I blood lined the stencil with a 5 round liner making quick passes to commit the stencil to skin then got to work with the black with the same liner and a 7 magnum.

The rock was water shaded then white mixed to give it depth, the grass was filled in with a dark green lightened with white then go back over with quick passes with the round liner and the base green. Flames and water was lined in red and blue.

Finished result, feel free to ask questions, 

is there anything I could do to make it "pop" more? would different colors work better?, or does it need more or less shading/highlights? , I'm interested to know what you think!

Thanks

Drippy Gary

Koi Tattoo

So Eddy was pretty pleased with the work I did on his shoulder and booked me in for another 2 tattoos, the first being a ''Koi Fish'' tattoo on his forearm and a Cobra Snake on his shoulder/back.
I don't know why but I just love drawing/painting/tattoo Koi fish, maybe it's because I'm so lucky.

The initial line work was rushed in and will have to revisit it to adjust the line weight in places and sculpt a few of the lines. I saw Eddy last night to confirm his next appointment and had a chance to see it almost healed. Was pleased with the scales but I did one scale without enough ink on the needle so it will need another pass.

Since he's a nice guy and I love doing the Japanese tattoos  I'm going to be throwing in a couple of lotus flowers and background for free. At this early point in my journey to become an artist it's more about the art than the money!

Peace!!

Oh Nuts!

So my good friend Ofer had his 24th birthday and wanted to do something nice like get him a gift or get him stupid drunk, unfortunatly I was broke :( Due to the fact I have to give all my money to my Landlord (Lord, of Land??? what the fuck we're in the 21st centuary, isn't having somewhere safe and warm to sleep a human right?? guess not, slavery still alive and well) so the only thing I could give was a little art. He's been talking about this design for months so thought it would be the perfect gift, I also explained because it was for life I would never have to give him another birthday gift until he was dead. He happily agreed

Unexpected butterfly tattoo

So I thought Friday would be a mostly uneventful day except for the usual religeous practice of have beers with friends. To my surprise I had a butterfly to tattoo.
Our wonderful cleaner at the hostel (Matinaz, lovely Swedish girl) had her mother staying for a few days and on her final morning requested a tattoo she'd long been planning, a Goldwing Butterfly, from a photograph.
Now to be honest I haven't done much tattoos from photo's but I felt confident after Eddy's arm and the small details I'd worked into.
I strapped up the machines with a 3RL and a 7RS and here's the result

comment and feedback are welcome

Peace!