I’ve never wanted a tattoo in my life. I’ve admired others, my wife has 2 (small) ones, but it’s never been something I’ve wanted. Something’s changed. Now I do. What’s a good process here? I kind of know what I want but I’m not an artist. Find a reputable tattoo artist and see what they come up with? I don’t even really know where I want it. I dunno if any of the crowd left here on RC is in the tattoo club but figured I’d throw it out here.
I have 2. Obviously I chose something I will always be passionate about. On my left arm is a Celtic knot. On my right arm is the fire department Maltese cross with a Canadian flag imbedded and the gaelic words fir na tine. (Men of fire). Choose something you love, something that will age well (nothing overly fine or something that will turn into a blob of ink as you age. (ie the 90s tribal tattoos.). Colour is good but fades with age. Make sure the artist has a consistent portfolio and "gets" what you want to get. Otherwise the work may be inconsistent if they don't get it or care.
I have two. One a tree, career choice forestry, on my back shoulder. The other is a griffin, guardian of the divine I am thinking about getting another one. My nephew and God Son passed away in Dec 2019 and I want to get a simple one about a spot on the highway that we drove together and I get tears in my eyes every time I think about this spot.
Find a good artist, position on body will have a big effect on design, things fit better in certain places, don't cheap out, you really get what you pay for
Just be sure the artist didn't copy it off a takeout menu. I like telling people that their tattoo probably means "chicken balls"
I’m not looking for lettering. I mostly know what I want and could hand an artist a couple of different photos and say, “combine these”. My question is more - do people usually do that directly with the tattoo artist or work with someone else first and take the final design to the tattoo artist?
unless you know the artist personally its hard to have the tattoo artist collaborate on your ideas. that's been my experience.
Ive done both. For my calf I had someone I knew who was an excellent drawer sketch up a few things, which I presented to my artist, we tweaked it from there. For my forearm I gave my artist a bunch of photos of styles, things I wanted, what I liked, didnt like. Went back and forth and came up with an awesome piece. So I would decide on what you want first, roughly at least, then find and artist who does that type of work.
Thanks Scott, for actually answering the question. I have a couple of recommendations on tattoo artists here in Seattle - I'm going to go with the photos of things I want to incorporate and work directly with the tattoo artist.
I follow this guy on Instagram and he is amazing, he is Korean but he comes to Canada and the US and you can make appointments with him. https://www.instagram.com/memento_tattooist/
