Styles of Tattoos

Styles of Tattoos

Stock and Custom Tattoos

Tattoo designs fall in two categories: stock (sometimes called flash) tattoos or custom tattoos.

Stock or flash tattoos are the pictures that you see lining the walls of tattoo parlors. Usually these images consist of perennial favorites such as anchors, hearts, skulls, dragons, butterflies, crucifixes and other common images. These are the images that the tattoo artist is willing to do for a flat rate.

Custom tattoos are usually more expensive. In this case you commission the artist to draw what you want by bringing in an image or combination of images that you would like reproduced on your flesh.

Bigger is Better

Although any image can be tattooed onto your body, some of them might look better on paper than they do on your skin. In general a big, bold simple image is clearer than a tiny, detailed image. Bigger images simply have more impact.

American tattooist Walt Dailey sums up the "bigger is better" issue by saying "A beautiful, big, fierce bear head design just looks like an angry hamster's face when you shrink it down."

When it comes to tattoos "bigger is better." If you find yourself looking at an array of complex designs full of curlicues, landscapes and portraits you might also want to recall the KISS rule used by American astronauts "KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID." Remember you can always add elaborations to your tattoo later if you are not satisfied with a simple design. 

The Science of Tattoos

Early tattooing techniques seem quite barbaric by today's standards. South American tribes scratched or pricked at the skin and then smeared it with dye or dirt. The Inuit punctured the skin and passed a needle covered in soot through the open wounds. The Maoris pierced the skin with a tool used for cutting bone and then smeared ash and other dyes over the cuts. Today traditional Japanese tattoos are still created by manually puncturing the skin and wiping the wounds with dye.

Fortunately, tattooing techniques have become much more sophisticated thanks to O'Reilly's electrically powered tattoo machine.

The Tattoo Gun

This modern tattooing machine has a base that looks a bit like the handle of a gun so it is sometimes also called a tattoo gun. The tattoo machine is a three-part device; the gun-shaped base, the motor housed within the base and a tube that holds the ink and needles.

The machine pulsates vertically and needles puncture the first two layers of the skin. The ink from the tube is forced through the epidermis by the impact of the needle hitting the skin

Varying the number of needles used in the machine makes the different lines that are used to build up the tattoo. Solid lines are created by a group of needles arranged in a circular pattern. Needles used for shading are usually lined up in vertical or horizontal slots.

Tattoo Ink

Tattoo ink isn't really ink. It's a combination of pigments suspended in a carrier solution. Unfortunately there is no real way to know what is in tattoo ink, as manufacturers of the stuff are not required to label the ingredients. Also, recipes for certain colored inks are secrets that are as closely guarded as the recipe for Kentucky Fried Chicken.

It is known that most tattoo inks are created from metal salts, although some may consist of vegetable-based pigments. Given that the ingredients in most tattoo inks are unknown even to the tattooist, it's difficult to predict if you could have an allergic reaction to the ink. Reactions are rare but it is something to consider if you have especially sensitive skin. The most common reaction is an itchy raised appearance to skin that can take as long as a week to show itself.

Basic Inking Styles

Just like any art form, tattoos can be expressed as line drawings, paintings, cartoons, caricatures or even as airbrushed creations. Tattoos may be classified into distinct styles, much as painting may be classified into the styles of impressionism, realism, cubism, etc. Each style incorporates specific artistic elements which many are not familiar with. So here’s a look at tattoos, not as a form of rebellion, a health hazard, or a display of “coolness,” but as an art form.