Nightshades at Night

Kendra gets the special sister treatment, of course,
so I stayed late to do this eggplant tattoo on her.
We only started it after we closed,
and didn't get home till 2 am.

She sat so well, and didn't mind me singing,
and the time just went by.

The heavens are pissed.

Minnesota gets crazier storms/clouds/weather than any where I've ever lived.
Last night when I was leaving the shop,
the clouds were moving faster than I'd ever seen.
There's been tornadoes/severe thunderstorms every week this summer,
and we've had a lot of east coasters in town getting their first taste
of how violent the hot months in MN are.

All I had on me was my cell phone camera,
but it still picks up some of the intensity pretty well.
This was at 8pm.
Then came the rains,
and some sky-crossing lightning.
But it cooled things down (slightly),
and the rest of the week isn't going to get above 85º.

(and I can't believe it's almost August)

Foxy little thing

Nate co-runs Cult Status,
a newish art gallery getting a ton of attention in Uptown.
Some of us Identity Tattooers will have some work in upcoming shows, and neverquietneversoft has a huge project happening there in 2011.
So obviously, we like Nate.
When he wanted a dandy fox tattoo from me,
I even went in on my day off.

FUNHOUSE TATTOO - a little overview..

Here's Fester doing another FINE piece!! Perfectly executed Chinese letters.. complete with brush strokes. You could see all the tiny lines from the camel hair brush that it could have originaly been painted with! Don't know if that's what they use in China for brushes...

Fester tattoos with confidence and precision. Natural instinct. He has years under his belt of hardships & good times. He's had to jump some hurdles in his lifetime! All of these things can side track you from your trajectory of being a professional tattoo artists. He stuck with it and now 13 years later.... greatness.

Sasha does too! I don't think you will find another quite like her. ...This feather is so clean and well done. All this talent and ability is from YEARS of work. Working on your own legs... guinea pigging friends, working on Ryan! The amount of dedication it takes to do what she does is unbelievable. The anxiety and stress in the early years from trying to push your limits and occasionally falling on your face compares to accidentally cutting off the wrong foot of a patient with gang green in his toes... well, maybe not as bad. We have all been through it and come out the other side!!

It's as if one day, a light bulb goes on in your head and all of the sudden you're doing stuff like this:

or this shell by Sasha:

Now, because of the TV shows on tattooing, tons of people want to get into it. It's not the Outlaw art it used to be. It's great for business but it's lost it's edge. There are tons of kids who want to get an apprenticeship, or think it' s an easy job. It' s not. People think that just because you're a good artists, you can do this. Or just because you have a degree from some art school that you will be attractive to us to bring you in as an apprentice. Not true. We get tons of inquiries about an "apprenticeship program" or if we need any apprentices. Nobody ever NEEDS one... really. Maybe a helper to clean tubes... sterilize, answer phones... but to find somebody who is willing to dedicate YEARS of their life to learning this trade is a rare thing. It's even more rare to find somebody who is WORTH teaching this to.

I had an apprentice once - Jeremy Riley. He turned out GREAT. He was with me for 9 years!!! He now owns Tattoo Union on Broadway... right down the street from where he started.

For me, every aspect of tattooing is important. It's not just the art of tattooing...Here's a bit about what I do on the side... building tattoo machines.

This is the NEW steel BLACK WIDOW machine. It's coils are not only triangular in shape, the space between the protruding tops and bottoms allow for more winds of wire. It is a strong smooth running machine, yet sensitive and versatile enough to execute the finest details with the smallest needle groupings as well as subtle grey shades.

Most machine suppliers will sell a machine for the fair market price, but now that China is involved, the price does not always match the product. Most artists want to buy a machine which is ready to go. Buy one of those and if you don't know how to adjust of modify it, the price just wasn't worth it. Our machines are ready to go, tuned and set up to be able to perform whatever function you need to perform.

This is the Godoy Machines V3 machine. This piece of machinery has had year of designing and testing. It happens to be our 3rd patent in the works!! The way this machine runs doesn't compare to ANY machine out there. Every component has been dissected and re worked for function and ergonomics. From the precise machining to the tight layer winds, from the deluxe powder coated finishes to the minor details like fasteners and terminals... this is a piece of highly functional art. Because of the coils shapes, there are more layers of wire than on a standard machine. It will operate at between 6 and 7.5 on a regulated power supply. Which is a higher than on our V2 and Black Widow machines. This does not change function. You will not find a smoother feeling machine than this one. This is the Mercedes of tattoo machines.

The Godoy Machines V2... what can I say. Before our office actions with the square coil patent, we were experimenting with a V series coil. The shape of the coil, the angles of the coil... and of course the wire gauges were all things we were studying. We were also concerned with the magnetic field and how to direct it to where we wanted it to go. We slanted the coils, away from each other to re direct the magnetic field to either end of the moving armature bar, and here ya go... the V2 was born. Future modifications lead us to now, where the rear coil is straight and the front coil is angled.

BACK TO THE SHOP....

We believe in advancement. We support creativity and originality. The shop environment, though light hearted and fun, is also serious. We are serious about the service we provide and the ethics we keep

No Vacancy.

This hammerhead shark went on Matt today.
He also has the fat fish and the homicidal penguin tattoos,
and we have another planned for the MPLS Tattoo Convention in October.
He's really the nicest dude,
but his parents are even nicer.
He got a flat tire driving to Identity Tattoo,
and they came and changed it while he was getting tattooed!
And he even told them not to!
I don't even get it,
that's almost too much good karma for one family.



Speaking of family, the Louderhorn Inn is packed to the rafters.
Meryl's mom has been promoted from guest to Resident Manager,
and her sister Kendra is just beginning her stay with us.
Everyone has a key, a bike, and a map of the city.
And before the end of the week,
Randall comes and joins us all.

We're certainly not messing around this month.
And it doesn't look too much different for August.
I hope you're not planning on visiting this summer,
but if you do, bring a tent.

The Deadest Bird of All

If Dead Birds Are Sexy,
(and we know they are)
extinct birds must be the sexiest.
There's not even taxidermied dodos hanging out any more.
Thanks to Jak from Mutiny Tattoo for coming out
to get this dodo bird tattoo from me.
Always a little bit odd tattooing tattoo artists, you know?




Seward Cafe is our every Sunday morning brunch place,
and this Sunday at brunchtime
I found one of my stickers had been vandalized.
A little razor blade rewording isn't going to stop
dead birds from being so darn sexy,
and I'm certainly not going to stop stickering.
But I applaud the effort.

Full House

Almost 7 hours of some really big flower work yesterday.
There will be lots of flower and leafy background stuff someday,
but for now Katie's headed back to Iraq.
She sits like a rock, and holds color like a champ.
Nice.


It's been busy here at Louderhorn Inn.
Meryl's sister Casey had a baby last week,
making Meryl and I 'aunt' and 'uncle' for the first time ever.
And we've had Meryl's mom and stepfather staying with us for the last few days so they can visit their new grandkid.
Meryl's mom will be with us into August,
and we have other visitors coming as well.

The next few months are filling up quick.
I'll be headed to Peru in early September.
In October there's the Minneapolis Tattoo Convention,
and the New Orleans Tattoo Convention, which falls on Halloween.
How dope is that?
If you want in either of those two conventions,
please let me know.
For the MPLS one, I'm going to be REALLY picky about what i do,
but if you have an awesome idea, let me hear it.
I hope everyone is enjoying the heat,
because it'll be winter before we know it.
(at least in MN)

WE COVER SH*T AND REPAIR SCRIBBLE...

Cover ups are serious business. They are a great way to get rid of regret, wether it's the memories of that Vegas trip when you got married by Elvis and got your future ex husband's name tattooed on you or wether it's a souvenir from your f*cked up teenage years experimenting with sewing needle and india ink tattoos! Emotional regret is a different story!!

Cover ups don't have to be so complicated. Any quality artist SHOULD be able to cover a tattoo. The "normal" way to cover a tattoo is to use a color that is darker than the colors used in the tattoo to be covered. Most artists (the mediocre ones) would have chosen a design which was mostly BLACK to cover this tribal, like another tribal or a mountain gorilla or... When in reality, a color that is the same value of the tattoo to be covered will work to blend it into the new design or to cover it. The tattoo in picture is greyish... a dolphin would have easily covered this, leaving plenty of clear skin to put a rainbow coming out of it's ass and not have the colors muddied up by the grey tattoo.

If you look at photo number one, the tattoo looks dark on the skin because the only color to contrast it is her skin color, but if you took a blue ball point pen and drew a line on the tattoo, you would see that the pen is darker than the tattoo and you would know that you have more options than you think!

Tattoo colors in their bottles look thick, dark and dense... they are much like tempera paint, or poster paints, the difference is in the surface they to be applied to. On paper, the color will be opaque, that is to say "solid" because the surface is not as porous as skin is so on paper, these colors can cover spots or patches which are dark. IN the skin, the colors go in transparent so there's no way you can cover a freckle with yellow, or pink or anything lighter in value than that freckle. They will show through, some darker scars will too... birthmarks, the same... GET IT?

how bout now?

In this tattoo I (Art) used shades of battle ship grey and watered down black to do the "base coat" of the tattoo... creating a foundation which would make it easier to add lighter colors around those areas to create depth.

If you need cover up work, think of the images that you like. It's up to us to make it cover that ugliness. You should be open minded because NOT all images will cover all tattoos, for example, a bright yellow happy face would never cover this grey tribal tattoo. The only other option, if your tattoo is super dark, besides tattooing a big black patch is laser treatments... which can be used to lighten the tattoo in order to have more options for cover up designs, or to get rid of it all together.

If anyone can do it, we can. Got one to do really soon, the clown who did it originally, knows who he is. Have a few ideas in mind just in CASE Your original idea doesn't work.

Arrange whatever pieces come your way.

We finished (my wife) Meryl's chestpiece once we returned from our trip, and now it's all healed up.
"Some little language such as lovers use" is a line from Virginia Woolf's The Waves.
I think it took just under 6 hours total tattoo time.



Maybe someday literary tattoos will overtake band tattoos in popularity...?
Or maybe that's just a hopeful fantasy of mine,
and there will never be any end to bad cd cover art and logos being reproduced as tattoos.
Well, give me the dorky tattoos all day long.
Birds, books, and plant life,
creepy animals, lighthouses, and old things,
and I'm having a good time.

But not forgotten....

I found out yesterday about the death of Ryan August,
and I'm still pretty stunned.
Ryan was an artist and creator of I Want Your Skull,
the art zine and website that showcased lots of todays big name illustrators and poster artists before they got big.
I've been a contributor to his projects for a few years now,
and he was always so encouraging and positive.
He leaves behind a wife and young son,
and many, many artists who appreciate everything he did for us.
IWYS 9 came in the mail this week,
but I don't think he ever received my thank you email.
Thanks Ryan, for all your hard work, generosity,
kind words, and endless inspiration.

Not to be trusted....

Who's a big, fat liar?
Me, of course.
Big and fat and lying.
I didn't post here for 10 days,
and as soon as I do,
it's only to break my promise.
Here's the latest "dead birds are sexy" shirts
(that I made for my Off the Map Tattoo guest spot)
Thanks to Jessica for showing it off.
I have a couple left,
but not enough to sell online.
If you are at Identity Tattoo,
and I happen to have your size,
then it's meant to be.
Otherwise, you should have visited in MA.



And speaking of shirts,
Sunday was the 11th.
Never Quiet, Never Soft always has something for you,
every month, on the eleventh.
This time, it's an old favorite coming back
for all of you that missed out before.
Go check it out.

The final blog post about my trip.

I promise.
I'm back in Minneapolis,
but my Off the Map Tattoo visit is still lingering.

I took this photo with a borrowed camera,
and got it emailed to me yesterday.
Yeah, that's an elk with 192 points.
(too bad the antler war has been over for a year or so)
Tree Cutter Doug drove up from VA overnight for that tattoo,
and slept in a rest stop before his appointment.



I'll be back at Off the Map sometime in 2011,
but we haven't figured out the dates yet.
Looking forward to more fun (but with less fever) then.

JULY 9 - 11 TATTOO CONVENTION LANGLEY - WE WILL BE THERE

JULY 9 - 11 in Langley. 2 artists per day at our booth. If you want to get tattooed at the convention, please call the shop to see which ones of us will be there on what day. Should be a good event. For more info on the show, go to : http://www.westcoasttattooshow.com.

COME GET TATTOOED BY SASHA!!!!

OR BY FESTER!!!!

OR BY MARK!!!

OR BY JUAN!!!

OR BY ART!!

If we're busy, come by anyway, make an appointment to get tattooed at the shop! See you there!