There are two very important kinds of research you should do before you make an appointment to get tattooed. One is DESIGN RESEARCH.

I guess I’ll start with a story that happens in the shop pretty much every day. So a client emailed me telling me he wanted a tattoo of a phoenix, and sent me a picture of a phoenix tattoo he wanted me to copy. It was a very thick, heavy, hard to read tribal phoenix… think the firebird car logo. He wanted it to take up his whole upper arm. So I searched online for phoenix tattoos (and I’ll give him credit that it was hard to weed through all the tribal ones), and sent him a dozen or two pics of different styles of phoenix tattoos, as well as some traditional phoenix paintings and illustrations and folk art. When he came in for a consult we checked out a few books I have around of Asian art as well as mythical animals. Traditionally a phoenix is a hybrid mix of what was considered the most beautiful birds (peacock, pheasant, crane, etc), so I asked him to pick out styles of wings, tail feathers, heads, etc from different pics to put together into one design. Then I sketched it in a pose that would fit his arm better than the one he found that was already on someone else’s body. Anyways, he ended up getting that tattoo to the below, and thanked me for stopping him from getting the first tattoo picture he found.

That’s pretty much why I was telling this story, to emphasize not just getting the first picture you find necessarily without looking around, seeing what options are out there, and researching what it is you’re getting tattooed to know what its all about. You can always ask your tattoo shop if they have reference books on a certain subject you can check out (they often will) and also if you’re getting something really involved, don’t be afraid to actually buy art books on your own on the subject. It’s going to be on you long after you forget about how much you spent on amazon for references. The easiest way to get a tattoo that doesnt look dated is to base it off of beautiful, tried and true art that really speaks to you. Just also remember that existing artwork and even flash designs are not a menu. They’re meant to serve as starting ideas, that then someone experienced in designing art for the body can work with to give it a sleek, tattooable makeover that is tailored especially to your needs and wants in the most flattering way possible.

Which brings us to our next research point: YOUR TATTOO ARTIST

That’s it! Research your tattoo artist, its really not hard! Almost every tattoo artist out there has an online portfolio. Check out their work, and find someone who’s quality and style match what you’re looking for. Try to look more at quality and style more than the subject matter of the tattoo. Just because someone has tattooed lots of say, roses, and you want a rose tattoo, if the roses they’ve done are of poor quality or are in a very specific style that you don’t want, it doesn’t matter how many roses they’ve done, this doesn’t prove they can do the tattoo you want. On the other hand, if they do beautiful, feminine work with good colours and lines, but don’t specifically have roses in their portfolio, the quality and style of their work will show you whether or not they can tattoo a rose the way that you want.

Pretty much: DON’T RUSH. Don’t be in a rush to get tattooed until you’ve researched your design and artists, your skin isn’t going anywhere. Clothes fit better when made by a tailor than a factory, and tattoos fit better when made by an artist’s hand than an inkjet printer.

When thinking about your first (few) tattoos, you may not think you are interested in being a “heavily tattooed” person. Maybe you’re not at a point in your life for a lot of coverage, or your worried about what people would think about you, so you want to test the waters with something small first. There’s nothing wrong with that! Just keep in mind that you have an interest in tattoos, and that you are doing just that, testing the waters. There is a more than likely possibility that you will get more, and if you get one on, say, your arm, there is a possibility you may one day want a sleeve, or a tattoo on your back might want to become a back piece, etc. What we want to do with these smaller pieces is leave the door open for them to become something more is the desire arises. Remember tattoos are mostly permanent, but the desire for change will always be there.

What you want to do to avoid being stuck as much as possible is have a planned theme for whatever body part your tattoo is going on (or your whole body if you plan on going the distance!). You can figure out a theme a few different ways:

1. Subject Matter, this is easy enough. A theme like this would be anything that can go with this tattoo. your theme could be a thing like flowers, a specific type of animals or scenery (like ocean, jungle, desert, etc), an interest (like music, science fiction, a favourite book, movie, etc), things specific to a region (like japanese things, western, tropical, etc)

2. Style. This means your tattoos would’nt have to be of things that go together, but the style in which they’re drawn and tattooed is the unifying point. This would be like getting all your tattoos in say, Japanese style, Salvadore Dali, Baroque Ornament, 70′s pop art, Traditional “sailor” Style, cutesy-girly,  Etc.

THINGS TO REMEMBER:

-Size. Don’t get a tiny tattoo in the middle of your arm/back/calf/whatever. When you want a half-sleeve full of huge, beautiful flowers that tiny rose you got on your bicep is going to look stupid and probably need to be covered up. A good alternative would be a medium size tattoo of a smaller flower, that would be easier to incorporate more things to scale to it. Always think of your tattoos and adding on to them in terms scale, and if the scale of your new tattoos will make sense next to them.

-Placement. I’m going to reference bicep tattoos a lot because they say a lot about poor planning. When you get a tattoo in the middle of your arm, you leave dead space both between your tattoo and the elbow, and the tattoo and the shoulder that are going to be a pain to fill up with anything worthwhile. It is just awkward. You only get so much space, use it properly and fill it up! A tattoo in the middle of your upper arm wastes the whole upper arm, shoulder to elbow.  Get the whole thing a bit bigger, higher up, and with enough planned background to round off the whole shape of the shoulder. Then that space is filled properly, and you’ll have enough space under it to put something else if you ever want to. If you want a tiny tattoo on your foot, just grow a set and fill up the whole foot. You’ll thank me later, when you’re coming back to fill up the other foot because it looks seriously bad ass.

-Theme. If you get a giant tribal on your arm, across your back, wherever, your only option to fill the rest of that body part is with more tribal! That is your theme! If you get a Celtic cross your theme is Celtic! If you get praying hands your theme is Jesus! If you get giant Old English writing I don’t even know what your theme is. Keep this in mind, and don’t get tattoos that don’t fit a theme you feel passionately about.

-See the big picture. You may not want a giant tattoo now. But you have your entire life to live with what you get and work with it. Don’t get a half sleeve with a border around the bottom (or an armband, THEY ARE THE DEVIL), that totally fucks up your options to ever continue downwards without it looking dumb. Same with a lower back tattoo that would never work with a back piece. A key here is to make sure the edges have varied, organic shapes and lines (like cascading flowers, flowing wind or water, creeping vines, etc) that will disguise where your first tattoo ends and your new work starts. A good thing to do if you’re thinking of ever getting alot of tattoos: look at large pieces in tattoo magazines. Can you tell where the “first” tattoo was that was then added on to? If not they planned it out right.

HELP ME HELP YOU:

If you come in for a tattoo knowing you eventually want to add on to it, LET YOUR TATTOO ARTIST KNOW. A good tattoo artist will always design your tattoo to be “open ended”, but its always good to know. Also try not to go for the instant gratification. If you want a sleeve, don’t just come in with no plan and get little pieces at a time because you want a finished looking tattoo right away. It costs no extra for your artist to design a sleeve (all designs are no extra charge! duh!) than it does to design a small tattoo. Then you have a plan and can get it worked on as much at a time as you want. It takes a longer at first to do the drawing, but then it is done and you don’t have to wait before every session, you can just come in because all the planning is done. Oh and your tattoo will look WAY AWESOMER when it is done! PATIENCE GRASSHOPPER!

Cover ups are a great option for people with old or faded tattoos, especially where the initial tattoo was ugly or undesirable  to begin with, where simply touching up or going over the same design wouldn’t make it look much better. How you should get started is to brainstorm some ideas of things you’d like to cover it with. You’ll want to come into the shop and talk with someone in person about things that will work well to cover your particular design. This is where you’ll have to have an open mind about your new tattoo and be flexible about all the options you’re given. The biggest problem I have with Cover ups is when someone comes in for a consult and tells me right off the bat they only have one specific design they want to put over it, it can only be this big, they don’t want color, etc. News Flash: you already screwed up your chance to get the tattoo you wanted the first time. Now’s our chance to save some semblance of class on your skin. I want to do a good job on it. You’re going to have to have a little trust that I want you to leave with a good tattoo. Maybe you made a big no-no and got your boyfriend’s name on you or something and then you broke up. You already compromised your gorgeous body by putting that asshole’s name on it. Don’t compromise it again by putting a lame, rushed half-assed cover up on it. This is your last chance in that spot to get a gorgeous, awesome flattering tattoo, so don’t screw it up! You already have a tattoo you hate, so here’s your chance to go balls-to-the-wall and do it right.  Help me help you!

So here are some basic rules to keep in mind when thinking about cover up options. The main object of the new tattoo is not to completely blacken over and just simply cover the old tattoo, the object is to camouflage and distract the eye from detecting where the old tattoo was. One trick we often use is starting a brighter, elaborate tattoo next to the old tattoo, and hiding the old one in darker background elements. You want your new design to be busy. Lots of detail, texture and patterns will help to distract from the old work . A big mistake many people make is thinking they can only cover a tattoo that contains black with another all-black tattoo. This is a big myth and actually the opposite is true. A fully color tattoo with lots of different shades also helps distract from the old tattoo, while a solid black tattoo emphasizes the old tattoo underneath, because it is plain and adds no new focal point to disguise the shape of the old work. Also keep in mind these things: 1. your old tattoo isn’t truly black anymore, it faded to some shade of charcoal, gray, blue, etc. a fresh coat of strong color and fresh black shading will blend right over your old softened work (almost any color can cover faded black, with the only exceptions being yellow, bright orange, light pink and white.) 2. When your skin was first tattooed it very slightly changed the texture of your skin where the tattoo is. so going over it in a solid, flat shape will show the change in texture from the old tattoo, and a design with texture and pattern will disguise the change more successfully. This should be obvious: your new tattoo has to be larger than the old one. the larger the better. The section directly over the old tattoo needs to be a little dark, so the more area over fresh skin, the more bright colors and depth, and therefore cohesion and beauty we can get into the new tattoo. Getting a tiny cover up will not make it like there’s not a tattoo there. You already have one so you might as well go for it size-wise. One more thing: you can not cover writing with other writing. I’m not sure why people come asking for this so often, but they do! Again: help me help you!

So what can you cover it with? My main suggestion is look to nature for inspiration. Flowers with many petals, leaves or insect wings with many sections, bird wings with many feathers, dark animals with textured fur or hair, fish or dragons with lots of scales, you get the idea. what your looking for is lots of little sections in the tattoo where we can add individual shades and variations to mask whats underneath. What you want to avoid are things with stiff, geometric shapes, like crosses, lettering, stars or anything that depends on very specific shading to define it’s shape, like a face or a body. Also keep in mind that you aren’t limited to only getting organic shapes in the whole tattoo, only in the part that’s directly covering the old one. You could get a cross with roses around it, using the rose part as the cover up. Or say you want some writing, you could do a flower or bird and then do the writing in a banner above or below it. Or a woman’s face with the cover up in dark, detailed hair. If you cross your arms and say there’s nothing you can think of in the entire natural world you’d like a tattoo of, but still want a cover up, I’m sorry I can’t help you. Think of something and we’ll have something to work with. Help me help you!

One last thing: you CAN cover up tribal. If you have tribal that you’re not crazy about and feel like all you can do is re-do it or add on more tribal, STOP! I mean, if you love your tribal by all means carry on, but if you got it on impulse in the 90′s tribal craze and now feel trapped, or  like it’s too severe to change now think it over. Come in for a consultation, you’d be surprised with what can be done with it!

If you’re interested in a cover up (which you probably are if you’ve read this far) take a look at my cover up gallery and you’ll see lots of examples of what I’m talking about, and get some ideas rolling. feel free to contact me with any more questions. Thanks!

-Elize

It’s spring again, and once more everyone ignored me over the winter about how I have all this free time in the winter to do big custom tattoos. And once again I have a lovely spring rush of crazy pieces. Not that I’m complaining! I’m really looking forward to some great custom pieces in the next few weeks, starting a day of the dead sleeve on lovely Carolyn from Diesel Cafe in Somerville, doing a Starship Enterprise this Friday, working on some critters for an ocean sleeve on Jen from Toscanini’s in Cambridge… BY THE WAY, since I tattoo so many cafe workers, you guys should know I’ve always wanted to do an ornate espresso tamper tattoo. Think about it… ladies. So enough blogging right now, I should be off to get working on those drawings haha, if any of you are looking to get your own piece started get in touch before summer gets into full swing!