"Those" Shows

So I recently had the honor of being tattooed by Joe Capobianco. He's kind of a legend in the tattoo world-- which until a few years ago meant you never would have heard of him.

Now, you probably know Joe as the lead judge on Best Ink.

Now, meeting Joe was an incredible pleasure-- he's down-to-earth, passionate about our art, and pretty fucking cool. Over the course of the day-long tattoo, we talked about all the usual stuff: people we knew, materials and techniques, the state of the industry, These Kids These Days and, of course, 'those shows'.

TV has changed everything.

Waaaayyyyyy back in the days before Miami Ink started us on a steady diet of backbiting, bitching, and drama, back before it started a slew of imitators and turned a mediocre egomaniac into something resembling a rock star, tattooing was a different profession.

TV educated our clients. In with all the sob stories and fake 'interactions', the public learned about making bookings and giving artists time to draw. They learned what good ink looks like, and yeah, too many of them got the impression they had to tell some sad story to justify that pinup girl or Sacred Heart Hotdog tattoo....

The 'soap opera' shows paved the way for the competition shows: Ink Master and Best Ink. Now, Joe has his misgivings about going on TV. Ours has been a clannish and secretive profession, and we still tend to act a bit like punk rockers whose favorite band just got a recording contract. Me, I say the competition shows are some of the best things to ever happen to our industry!

Now for me, I'm a Best Ink fan: the contestants bitch at each other less, and that goes a long way with me. But for both shows, we get a regular weekly treat of solid tattooers pointing out the good and the bad in a whole bunch of tattoos across a range of skill levels.

For anyone thinking of getting a tattoo, it's a hell of an education.

Now, we've also got the coverup shows. I have my own pluses and minuses with Tattoo Nightmares and America's Worst Tattoos, but overall it's great to have someone out there showing what's possible.

The more people know what to expect, what a GOOD tattoo looks like, the better for our industry. Yeah, it's gonna suck if you're the sort of needle jockey who ten years ago would have got by on bad tracings and lots of attitude. But for artists who make the cut, and the clients who wear our ink for the rest of their lives, "those shows" are definitely making it better!

Silver Already

Somewhere around this time, wwwaaaayyyyy back in 1988, I did my first tattoo. Like all great love affairs, I had no idea what I was in for, and I was too excited to care.

Mostly, I don't think too much about how long I've been doing this. I'm too busy lifting my game to care. And those of you who've been tattooed by me know that I rarely mention all those years of experience. Between the tattooers who haven't gotten better in decades and those who will flat-out lie to your face about how long they've been doing this, I'd *much* rather have you look at samples of my work and decide that you want my art.

But twenty-five years is one of those big round numbers, the kind where it's hard to escape a bit of looking back.

It's amazing how much has changed.

When I started, we were a profession of thugs and tracers pretending to be gentle-souled artists. To be sure, there were definite exceptions. Ed Hardy was so far ahead of his time it was ridiculous, and he inspired and led so many of us into the art form we now enjoy. But by and large, it was "Stop calling me a thug or I'll stomp the shit out of you," and "Hell yeah I'm a real artist, now which design off the wall you want me to trace?"

Now, of course, it's just the opposite. We've got this enormous, gorgeous, vibrant art scene, with materials and techniques that make our only limits our own skills and imaginations. I haven't had to work with a pistol on my hip in fifteen years. It's amazing and wonderful, so of course it's only natural that a generation of tattooers who enjoy all these advantages romanticize the bad old days.

It's all good.

For me, well, like I said, I don't focus much on the past. There's so much that' s beautiful and good happening right now, and just starting to happen, that I've got my hands full. Every day I wake up excited to do the absolute BEST tattoo I possibly can, and every night I go to bed thinking about how I can make tomorrow even better.

Jack Rudy (a guy who's been one of my heroes ever since I started, and who constantly amazes me with the way he evolves and matures and just plain gets better every year) is fond of saying, "If you don't keep up, you get left back."

Check back with me in another twenty-five and see how I've done... :)

Why the Bad Ink?

So after my last post, I've been wanting to follow up with a post about what makes a good tattoo.

Turns out, for me, this is harder than I originally thought.

I mean, do you really need me to tell you that lines should be graceful and clean? That blotches, clumps, points that blob or form x's or don't actually meet at all, that these things are no-no's?

Do you need to hear that shading should be clean and even? That patchy and scratchy is bad?

Does it really need saying that you NEVER trust a portrait tattoo to an artist without samples of portraits you like? Not Japanese, or tribal, or any other kind of tattoo? Do I need to tell you how badly this can go?

I don't know. Maybe I do.

I have to admit, I have a sort of sick fascination with why people get bad tattoos.  Last post I touched on why I think certain people GIVE bad tattoos- basically more ego than talent or judgement. What I want to understand is, how do these folks keep getting blank skin??

Is it an underdeveloped aesthetic? Are there people out there who can't tell the difference between this tattoo and this one?

Is it price? I realize it costs a fair bit to have someone who knows what the hell they're doing mark you for life, but seriously?? What is the only body you've got worth to you?

Is it geography? I get that not everyone has a mega-talented artist right next door. But if you're out somewhere in the wop-wops where the only artist for miles around can't spell, built his own 'gun' and takes frequent breaks for bong hits (it helps him focus, man), well, why WOULDN'T you make the trip into the Big City to get work you can be proud of? Make a weekend of it, have fun!

Is it impatience? Good artists tend to be busy, and you may well need to wait to book in. Is getting your tattoo RIGHT FREAKIN' NOW so important that you don't care if it's spelled right?

I just don't know....

There *is* one cause of bad tattoos that I've seen often enough to understand, and sympathize with...

Con men.

I've seen it myself - certain tattooists will, for a variety of reasons, do or say *anything* to get you in the chair. They'll promise the moon. They'll talk fast and loud over your hesitation or objections. They'll even physically intimidate you, anything so that they get that job.

My heart goes out to those of you who have been victimized this way. You thought you were getting some great art. You may well have paid top dollar. And when all was said and done, all you wanted was to get the hell out of there.

 And when you're in my shop for a cover-up, angry, gutted, sometimes crying, I feel for you. I really do.

So tell me, what happened when you got bad ink?

(many thanks to the good folks at EpicFail.com, for an amazing, if disheartening, journey through the dark side  of this art I love...)

The Myth of Experience

"So, how long have you been doing this?"

It's a question I get asked a lot. Clients get nervous. They've seen good tattoos and bad, and they can't help but be aware that they're going to wear their art for life. They want to know they're in good hands.

Thing is, they're asking the wrong question.

There are some incredible artists who have been tattooing just a few years. And some old timers who just can't cut it. Likewise there are old timers who have grown and matured and improved with age and young artists who approach this art like nasty little kids tagging restrooms and bus shelters.

Tattooing demands a certain dedication. Today, we have such a wealth of information and new ideas to draw on, our only limits are our own talent, drive and hard work.

But there's always the flip side. Most art forms are ruthless about weeding out the lazy: lazy dancers don't win auditions, lazy musicians don't even show up. Lazy painters don't sell work and lazy writers don't finish books. (Monster egos are still a problem, but at least they have to be backed by actual work. That, as they say, is a topic for another post...)

Tattooing, because of its culture of secrecy, has long been a haven for lazy artists.

Once upon a time if you could make the machines work and solder needles, you were a tattooist. Do a halfway decent job of tracing stencils and you made a living. Done.

For some, it was enough. They didn't, or couldn't, grow past that. Tracing off the flash was good enough for them. Now, their art form is changing around them and they're being left behind.

That laziness is different in the young ones. Or maybe it just looks that way from where I'm standing. I see new artists - the ones who aren't willing to do the hard yards required - treating this art as a path to a quick buck, or a way to be 'cool' or something. They put more energy into 'looking' and 'acting' like tattoo artists than they do into their actual art. When it comes to learning more than the bare minimum, they can't be bothered.

(NB: There is also something called the Dunning-Kruger effect, where the useless and untalented think they're awesome. Mix that in with some Narcissistic Personality Disorder so that any suggestion they're less than awesome is met with hostility, and you may have a fair portrait of some of these guys. But I digress...)

Reason I mention the young and lazy is, they tend to lie. After all, as long as you're putting your effort into dressing and acting like a tattoo artist (instead of, you know, actually working on your ART), why not tell folks you've been doing it long enough to make them feel better?

Do not feel better. I said it before and I'll say it again, how long we've been doing this DOES NOT MATTER.

Advances in ink technology, machines, needle groupings have all made it possible to do work today that we could only dream of years ago. In the last four or five years, I've had to rethink EVERYTHING. I've had to throw years and years of experience out the window. To tear down my ego and destroy my own misplaced pride and start all over again at the beginning. To rethink EVERYTHING, from my hand movements to color theory to how I put on the goddamned stencil.

It would have been easy to retreat behind a wall of pride and refuse to change. Hell, it would have been easy to do more illustration work, or comics, or sell more novels, just turn my back on the whole thing. But the thing is, for me, this is the most incredibly exciting time in the history of this art to be tattooing. It's amazing!

So yeah, I've been tattooing for ages- a decade in Christchurch alone. But I'm also constantly rethinking and relearning my trade to lift my game. My work has jumped by leaps and bounds, and I'm still humble, still working to do better, to make every tattoo better than the last.

And that's got nothing to do with how long I've been tattooing. Or not much, anyway.

So, if we're nervous about that tattoo, if we want to know that we're in the right hands, that we're going to get ink that we'll wear with pride, what question should we ask?

Can I see some of your work?

Check out that portfolio. LOOK at the work on offer. Don't look at the photos hoping to see your design- look to see how your design will turn out. Whether the artist has been tattooing for two years or twenty, make sure you're looking at the sort of tattoos that would make you proud.

Next post I'll get into what to look for in a good tattoo. For now, check the artist's portfolio and ask yourself, is something like this what I want on me?

Big Shifts

by Steve

 As most of you probably know, I write. Like, novels and stuff. :)

 (Don't worry, this really *is* about tattooing, I promise)

 Eight or nine years ago, more or less, I wrote my first novel. Blood and Skin was a paranormal thriller(like a ghost story, but with more action) set in a tattoo shop. (See? tattoos totally figure in here!) That first novel written was not the first novel published - these things happen. However, this year I pulled it out, dusted it off and gave it a good thorough rewrite.

So much has changed in the last nine years: My cellphone references were laughable. A trip to the bookstore had to be replaced by the gift of a Kindle. And virtually everything about the way I tattoo is different now.

 For a long, long, long time, I was what you might call a Classic Tattooist.

 -Work the whole tattoo over in a black outline, then color it in.

 -Smaller work, mostly. Bigger pieces, sleeves and the like, got done an hour or two at a time.

 -The tubes were metal, and they went into an autoclave for sterilization between uses.

 -Most clients picked designs out of flash books. It was just the way things were done.

Now, there are still plenty of studios out there like that. Probably will be forever. But rewriting that old novel I saw that nowadays I:

 -Rarely use a hard black line, and often do the entire, nearly finished tattoo in a single pass from bottom to top.

 -While I still enjoy the odd small piece, full-day bookings are the norm. Half-finished work rarely leaves the studio.

 -Like our needles and bags and inks and everything else, our tubes now are also disposable. The autoclave still gets used for piercing, but we run a clean, safe and hygenic tattoo studio without having to do our own sterilizing.

 -All of our work is custom now. When you come in, don't expect a bunch of design books. Do expect a conversation about what you want, how you see your art looking, etc. That's just how we roll :)

 It seems like tattooing is changing. Except that tattooing doesn't change, not exactly. From 90's tribal designs to hundred year old traditional Old School to folks tapping a mallet on the back of a stick full of needles, nothing in tattooing has gone away. We just keep adding to it, making room for more. And in recent years, this art I love finally made room an artist like me...