Updated Foo Dog Photo's

I've finally got round to getting some better photo's of my Foo Dog sleeve so here they are. They were taken by my good friend Adam Lloyd, he's an awesome photographer and is heavily tattooed himself too. Check out his work!

Session Three & Four (Numb Bum)

Friday 18th & Wednesday 30th October 2013

7 Hours

Session four

My last two sessions have happened in fairly quick succession being less than two weeks apart so I've combined them into one blog post. Diego will be moving back to Argentina in December so I want to get as much done as possible before he moves. After that he'll be visiting the UK a couple of times a year to continue ongoing work so I'm hoping to get another few sessions in before the move.

As I've written about in previous posts, the first two sessions were pretty intense pain wise! I've always found outlining more painful than shading, so the thickness of the lines involved in a back piece only amplify the pain. Fortunately the last two sessions have been much easier as we focussed on the shading which I find much less painful. We started on the back of the legs which felt surprisingly easy which helped ease my anxiety about the session. We got a good chunk of the background done, some of the Foo Dog body and the shading on the face.

The next session started with the flames around the halo. We decided on a really nice dark orange colour which looks nice and bold, I really love it! We also did the flesh highlights on the character and got some more done on the body of the Foo Dog.

Incidentally I'm still using some numbing cream, but only on the most sensitive areas such as the ass cheeks. This lead to a pretty funny scenario at one point. The cream has to be left on and wrapped in cling film for two hours for it to work so we do two hours without any numbing and spend the last hour or so doing the numbed area. Anyway, Diego had to clean the cream off before tattooing that area, and I suddenly started chuckling to myself as the reality of the situation sank in. At that point I was paying a very nice Argentinian man with a beard to wipe cream off my ass. That's not a sentence I ever thought I'd be writing, but I guess you have to look for the comedy in any situation to get you through. I guess being a tattoo artist isn't always as cool as you might imagine.

Hurt

Saturday 7th September 2013

3.5 Hours

"I focus on the pain, the only thing that's real, the needle tears a hole, the old familiar sting, try to kill it all away, but I remember everything" 
Nine Inch Nails (Hurt)

As well as this being some lyrics from a brilliant song by Nine Inch Nails it also pretty well describes what it's like getting tattooed on your back. I try to zone out and think of something else but really, all that's going through your mind is the pain.

I must admit I was a bit nervous about my second session on my back as the first session was a bit of a shock pain wise after the relative ease of the arms. I was finding the outlining particularly painful, especially as some of the lines are very thick and I knew there was still quite a lot of outlines to complete. 

Now here's the bit where I have a bit of a confession to make. I knew that I really couldn't deal with the pain from the waist down. The upper body I can just about do, but below the waist and especially on the ass cheeks was just brutal last time. So I cheated. I used some numbing cream for the first time ever. There I said it, I'm a big cheater. But you know what, I don't care because it worked. We applied the cream at the start of the session and wrapped it up in cling film as it takes a couple of hours to work so we started on the upper back and did a couple of hours before doing the lower part once it was numb. It was quite an odd sensation to be tattooed but not to be able to feel it, but at that point I wasn't complaining! I'm still going to do from the waist up the old fashioned 

Anyway, onto the actual design itself. We decided that it would be cool to add some flames around the halo to add some more interest and I'm really happy that we did. I think it looks awesome! We got quite a lot done in the session and it's really coming together nicely now. I can't wait to see how it looks after the next session.

Video Footage

Here's another video showing the progress of my second sleeve from start to finish. Hope you enjoy it and feel free to like or comment on it on YouTube.

Final Session on my Shishi Sleeve

Saturday 16th February 2013

2.5 hours

This was to be the last session I'd need on my sleeve. This was both good and bad as it's nice to finally get my arms finished but also bad as I've really grown to enjoy the sessions and I knew they were coming to an end and I'd no longer have an excuse to go and see Diego and talk tattoo's with him. But all good things must come to an end I suppose.

There wasn't much more to do on this sleeve, just finishing the remaining background up the inside of my arm. We also did a few touch ups on my koi sleeve and added some black spots to the head of the koi which look great!

The session seemed to go really quick and before I knew it, it was all over. And that's that, all done and a bit of a mile stone in my life. I'm going to have to end on a bit of a cliche here but it seems appropriate. I've come to realise that sometimes the journey is more important than the destination, and that feels very true in this case. As much as I love the end result, I wouldn't love my tattoos half as much if I hadn't enjoyed the process and the company of Diego so much. I'm grateful for the experience I've had during this process and hope to get more tattoo's in the near future. But for now, that's it. Over and out...

5th Session on my Shishi Sleeve

Tuesday 5th February 2013

2.5 hours

I knew things weren't destined to go plan this session, not because of any problems with the actual tattoo, but because when I saw the weather forecast the night before it was due for snow. I rather foolishly underestimated just how bad the driving conditions would be getting over to Leeds and with the best of intentions I left earlier than usual assuming I would still be there in plenty of time. I was wrong. The traffic was horrendous and the driving conditions downright dangerous at times! I called Diego on the way to say I'd be a little bit late due to the weather. I ended up being about half an hor late but Diego was cool and we cracked straight on with things.

We decided to finish all the colour in the flowers in this session. I knew I wanted a yellow peony on my forearm, but I left the rest up to Diego. He suggested varying shades of red and orange to tie them all together rather than having all different colours and that was fine with me so we cracked on.

As usual the session was good fun and we chatted the whole time about tattoo's which I always enjoy. Anyway, here's some pictures.

4th Session on my Shishi Sleeve

Tuesday 4th December 2012

3 hours

This session we concentrated on putting colour into the Shishi. I was pretty sure I wanted a dark blue sort of colour for the body as I'd found some really nice reference images using this colour on the animal. After talking with Diego about this we decided on a beautiful looking turquoise blue colour. I was really happy with this colour and was raring to go.

This day was a particularly cold day, and even though the heating was on full blast, due to it being a morning session the room wasn't yet very warm. This coupled with the fact I had to sit there topless meant that I was feeling a bit chilly! I soon realised that getting tattooed when the temperature is less than ideal makes you tense up more, which means it hurts more. I was very much feeling like I was paying back some tattoo karma from the previous two relatively painless sessions. Maybe it was also some of the spots Diego was hitting, especially the part near the collar bone that was making it hurt more as I know from previous experience some areas certainly hurt more than others.

Anyway, we got the colour on the animal done and a small flower too. I was really happy with the outcome and I really love the colours so far.

3rd Session on my Shishi Sleeve

Tuesday 13th November
3 Hours

Todays session was spent continuing on the background shading. This time we concentrated on the top half of the arm. I wasn't really looking forward to this area, especially the bit that goes onto the chest as I remember it being particularly painful on my other arm. Even more so as I felt I had an easy ride in terms of pain with the last session, so I thought I'd be paying back some pain karma to the tattoo God's! But yet again, the pain really wasn't too bad at all. I wouldn't say the area on the chest was pleasant, and I'm not eager to do it again, but it certainly seemed much easier to dea with than last time. Maybe I was a really nice guy in a past life and now I'm cashing in my karma credits. Who knows, but I'm not complaining! I think maybe I'm just mentally dealing with it better now than when I first started getting tattooed, plus I've learn't to relax a lot more now which certainly helps.

2nd Session on my Shishi Sleeve

Thursday 11th October 2012

3 Hours

The first part of this session was finishing the remainder of the outlines. There wasn't much to do, just one more peony and some water around it. I've realised that generally I find the outlining much more painful that shading. Outlining feels like being cut with a very fine razor blade, whereas shading is more of a dull pain. This combined with having to sit in an awkward position to finish the outlining meant that I was very happy when after about 20 minutes Diego said we were done and could move onto the shading.

I'm not sure why, but for some reason the remainder of the session seemed to go extremely quickly and the pain really wasn't bothering me at all. Even whilst having the inside of the elbow shaded which I remember being quite painful on my first sleeve. It may have been partly down to spending the whole session talking tattoos with Diego and just generally having a really great conversation to take my mind off it, or it might have just been that we were concentrating on areas that were less sensitive, who knows. I'm sure when we get the collar bone area I won't be saying that though!

I really do enjoy these moments and love listening to Diego's views on various tattoo related things. I think I'll miss that more than anything when I'm done getting tattooed. That and just generally being in the tattoo environment. I can now fully understand why people get addicted to being tattooed. It's not so much the process of being tattooed, it's everything else that goes along with it. The environment, the conversations and that one on one connection you only get with a great tattoo artist, that's what I'll miss more than anything.

Anyway, onto the pictures!

Starting my Second Sleeve

Tuesday 21st August 2012

3.5 hours

After going through the process of having my first tattoo with Diego I quickly realised two things. Firstly that I definitely wanted my other arm tattooing, and secondly that the only person I wanted to do this would be Diego.

I'd been thinking about what to have on my other arm for a while and had pretty much narrowed it down to having another koi and/or goldfish with peonies. I'd talked to Diego about this and he was happy to continue working on me so as soon as I'd finished my fist arm I booked another session to start my new piece. As the start of my new piece grew closer though I started thinking maybe I was playing it too safe by going for something very similar to what I already had. As I'd started learning a bit more about the various different animals and characters that appear in Japanese tattooing I became more and more drawn to the Shishi (sometimes referred to as a foo dog, which is odd as they're not dogs, they're actually lions). 

I'd seen some really examples online and the more I thought about it, the more I wanted more of a contrast between my arms, so after a quick phone call to Diego a few weeks before the session it was decided and I was feeling much more confident in my choice.

As I've looked deeper into the world of tattooing I've realised that in my opinion, tattooing is the purest form of art for me. You have to form a personal connection with the the artist by the very nature of the process, especially with large scale pieces that require multiple sessions. The artwork can never be sold on or bought by art dealers purely for profit and will remain with the recipient for the rest of their lives, so it forces a lasting connection between the artist and the wearer. It also has a limited life span and ultimately dies with the wearer so therefore can never fall into the hands of someone who doesn't appreciate it in the same way as the wearer. 

Anyway, enough of all this deep and meaningful stuff, let's get on with it!

On the day of my session I was feeling slightly nervous. I knew what to expect in terms of the process and the pain, but until you start to see the piece applied to your skin, you don't know exactly what it's going to look like. I knew deep down that Diego would make an excellent job of it though, and I needn't have worried. I guess it's just fear of the unknown.

Unlike my first tattoo which was all freehand, Diego decided to use a stencil for the actual Shishi and freehand the rest as usual. 

Photocopy of the original drawing used to make the stencil

Once the stencil was on and he had drawn the rest on with sharpie I felt really happy with the look of it and I knew it was going to turn out great. I was now really excited about getting this done. After I'd looked at it in mirror and taken a quick photo we got started on the outline.

Looking in the mirror before we begin the outlining

Close up of the stencil

I really love the way the hair looks on this. The swirls all look really intricate and I know that once we get to the colour stage the hair will look great.

Unfortunately we ran out of time and didn't quite get all the outline finished so I've got a bit of a gap left to fill on the back of my upper arm. Diego said he wanted to re-draw that section next time as we didn't have time to do that and outline it before his next client was due. This was fair enough as he didn't want to do a rush job just to get it done in one session.

Session done