First week of January

Fun tattoo on Out of Town Eric. 

Thanks for bring so trusting and for having great ideas and having an open mind. 

Eric asked for a Panther and dagger. Then he asked for a skull to go next to it and he mentioned he still wanted a bowling pin eagle. 

Drew it on with a couple of stencil pieces and...

Voila. 

Thanks for reading. 

Jeremy R. 

Polybetanmath

These photos were taken after session 2. This is the customers first tattoo. He wanted it to be different. I tried. We have a good layout, but a lot of this wasn't planed out. There was a lot of improvised drawing on the skin. Thankfully my customer was trusting and we collaborated on the concept and the Drawings that came out of. 

It's been fun designing this. 

There are many influences that led to the details you see. The background is very similar in look to Polynesian designs, yet the layout I went with a Japanese form. (It is the strongest). The flowers started from lotus pieces in Tibetan designs all the way to the round flower that you see so often in traditional style tattooing. The basic round math flower has evolved. 

I will post again when there is more progress. Thanks for reading. 

Process: Coleman Painting

Thought I post how I do one of those tribute sheets. 

I start with penciling out the outlines on a light table. I used to just use tracing paper and flip it over and then trace out the same drawing. Leaving a graphite residue, or transfer on the paper.
Only problem is I had a tendency to press too hard.

 
Same reason I don't use too hard a pencil, because it leaves grooves, and you know what happens when you change your mind in the inking part? You get grooves where you want your fades.
Looks bad. You end up just blacking out the grooves. From what I've found there is a lot of black in these paintings, but it's very important where it is.

Then I get my lining on. Start by dropping all pens. No sharpie in my humble opinion.

 

 I find Speedball to be a very good product for lining.

(Feel free to send me some free bottles anytime)

I learned to use a nib that doesn't waver too much.
Pointy tips = Calligraphy. I want the lines to be even. 

I screwed up when I erased it and got a smudge. I'll see if I can fix it with shading.

Use good brushes. It's a lot harder to paint with crappy brushes.
I use the Windsor & Newton Series 7.

So sometimes I do the black first, and other times I do it last.

Here I will do it first to show the process.

 

Sometimes at the end I go clean up the lines due to thick colors covering over,

but I usuallly leave them.

Now if I repeat every week, in ten years my stuff might be alright.

Got to hand it to you.

I don't do hands too much anymore. It's not that people aren't asking, it's just I'm having a hard time justifying people with no, or very little tattoos getting very visible ones. I'm not here to judge if people are ready for that, I can only warn them or straight refuse. That's all I can do. I know society is changing, it's just a big decision. Think about it.

That has nothing to do with this tattoo. Just a mini-rant.

This person was finishing a solid sleeve. That makes sense. He's also a Tattoo Artist.
In a few days we are going to add more blue to the right.

Average Tuesday.

Here's what this Tuesday looked like here at Tattoo Union.

Cohen outlined an arm all day.

You can see more of his work on his website: cohenfloch.com

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And this is the piece I was working on. (2nd session)

Just another average Tuesday.

cutest damn thing ever.

At least I think so.

Bender, Eben.

These are a couple of really fun tattoos. Eben Bender is a multi-talented man, and this all started with the idea of doing a "Tug Life" tattoo. In the end, we left out the lettering, and we opted for the straight design. He got a train to fill out the stomach shortly after.
Thanks Eben, that ruled.
Even if it doesn't say it, these tattoos ARE tug life. That is one Gangsta stomach.

Belmont Barbershop featured in Vancouver Magazine.

Our neighbor and friend has been getting press for his store, and rightly so,
his Barbershop and Haberdashery are pretty amazing.

Vancouver Magazine Article
Issue on newstands now.

The Belmont Barbershop
Mr.Lee's General Store


We would like to say thanks for all the support to the boys at Belmont and Mr.Lee's,
and to Dustin himself.

Here's a couple of tattoos done on Dustin:

Two weeks and Five years later.

 

These photos are a bit better.
Two weeks, huh?

This customer of mine showed up out of the blue with an outline I had done almost six years ago. He wanted to finish it in two weeks. Only problem was it was his entire front of his torso, and I think I outlined it with a 7 mag. (what was i thinking???) It was a struggle to get it completed, and in two hour sessions, it made it even harder. Thanks to my patient customers who didn't mind the musical chairs, (I'm still working that out), and the feeling of completion feels good in this job, which sometimes I never feel satisfied.
That being said, there's another three hours minimum I would have liked to have done, but see ya in five years I told him. You might also notice the varying levels of healing. That wasn't ideal, but I wait on him to e-mail me some photos later.