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Posts by theremonster

I like tattoos, sculpture, video games, motorcycles, camping, and cooking (not always in that order and in any combination you can think of).

Twenty Two

Here are pictures from last night’s appointment.  Horizakura covered a good amount during this two hour period.  I suspect the reason for that is that it was mostly solid black.  I think the gray shading of the waves is more time consuming because of the mixing and blending he has to do.  That’s just a guess though.

The most exciting part about this appointment was that he has finally traveled north of my waistline. Typically when people ask about my tattoo, I have to just tell them about it because wherever we are at the time isn’t the best place to drop my pants.  Now, I can just lift my shirt a little.  It’s a small thing, but it’s a win in my book.

BEHOLD!

My Tattoo Can Drink!

Ok I guess it’s 21 appointments old… not 21 years.  Shut up.  Also maybe you aren’t in the US and the legal drinking age is lower by you. You can also shut up.  It’s just a title.

This hour and a half was spent on the waves on my right leg.  You can see it’s still healing (as is the previous session), but I had another appointment tonight and wanted to get these pictures before that happened.

In fact, I’m so stoked about how much got done tonight that I’m going to break my habit and take pictures of this tomorrow morning after I take off the wrap.

Without further I do…

(Yes I know that’s wrong, but I don’t speak French.)

Nineteen.

My nineteenth session spanned from my left thigh to my fleshy love-handles.  There was some really odd gastro business happening while he was railing away on my side.  It felt really strange… like he was pulling my skin away from my guts and making pockets of air. It’s difficult to explain the feeling.  When I left the studio I let fly with a pretty enormous burp so something was definitely happening to my guts.  Wacky and wild stuff, folks.

So far, this has been the absolute worst area for healing.  Having jeans tight-ish around my hips and waist made the process absolutely brutal.  Without exaggeration, for two weeks after this appointment I would be limping by the end of the day.  Even after the tattoo was no longer raw, the scabbing was much worse because of the contact from my clothes.  My clothes then would rub on those scabs creating a fairly vicious cycle.  When the opposing area is tattooed on my right side, I’m going to be investing is a few pairs of sweatpants in an effort to mitigate my suffering.  The healing was so much worse than getting the tattoo.

If anybody has tips on how to wear sweatpants in public without looking like a hobo, please let me know.

Turn the other cheek.

Here are a couple quick snaps after my 17th appointment.  This was done in the same compromising body position of the 16th appointment.  I would say I’m glad to be done with that, but if you’ll notice, there is a small area half finished near my crevasse. Almost there though!  This appointment was entirely on my right ass cheek, south of the wave.  It was unpleasant.

Session 18 is healing right now, very excited to post photos of that work!  This thing is really coming together.

Interesting Vice Piece with Horiyoshi III

This is a pretty well shot and very interesting 15 minute doc with Horiyoshi III.  I really enjoyed it and I hope you will too!  I had my 18th appointment today.  An update with the results of the 17th will be up soon.  In the mean time, watch this!

“Cherish each stroke of the needle and each second of life.” -Horiyoshi III

Awkward 16

My 16th appointment just about finished the background on my left leg.  Very happy to have one leg down.  This appointment finished off the left butt cheek and also a bit on the hip? kidney? region.  I cannot begin to tell you the awkward position one must be in for this to happen.  It was unpleasant to say the least.  I once again forgot to take pictures before the appointment, so these were on my phone hastily done before work (mind you, not at work.  I’m not one of those…).

Session 14 and 15

So much for it not becoming a trend!  I forgot to take pictures after session 14.  14 and 15 were only a week apart, plus I had was super busy at work and also got married.  Cut me some slack.  During my 14th appointment, Horizakura filled in the wave under my left butt cheek.  It’s pretty difficult to see without me pulling my butt cheek up, but I’ll spare you that image.  He also shaded the wave to the right of the koi’s face and finished the background to the right of the koi.

My 15th appointment really demonstrated what Horizakura was saying about stretchy parts of the body being slower to tattoo.  The skin on my thigh is pretty tight so Horizakura was able to cover a lot of area in the usual two hour time frame.  Good stuff!  As you can see, he shaded the background to the left of the koi and the wave on the top.  I learned something interesting about the process after this session as well.  The scalloped edges of the background are drawn on by hand with marker before we start each time.  However, I always noticed that he would poke me a few times on each marker line before he would get started.  It always felt a little bit different than when he’s shading and I was never sure why.  Turns out, he’s stabbing me without any ink on the needles!  He basically gives me a cut where the scalloped edges will be so that when the marker wipes away, he still has a guideline!  You can see evidence of one of these cuts on the left edge of the tattoo on my thigh, just above the topmost shaded background.

Session 15 put me at about 28 hours on my back so far.  Not too bad!  It did occur to me recently that it’s a pretty good thing I’m not a taller person… that would just be more space to fill in.

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Lucky Number 13

Below are the results of my 13th appointment.  I found the results to be pretty inspiring.  Appointments 12 and 13 were only a week apart (instead of my usual 2-3 weeks) and as a result, he had to begin work on a completely different part of my body because the previous week was still healing.  He began to shade my left thigh.  After taking the pictures, I really can start to see the background of this thing come together.  It’s really exciting!

As a technical note, Horizakura explained that his plan was to get through all of the background shading on my butt first.  He said the rest of it would be fast.  I’m assuming fast is relative in this case, but nonetheless it was exciting to hear my back might progress more quickly than the current pace.  Not that I’m getting impatient.  But(t) seriously. I’m getting impatient.  When I asked why he wanted to finish this area first, why it was slower, Horizakura explained that because the skin stretches so much in fatty areas (news flash: I have a fat ass) it takes more time to fill with ink.  He said the position is also awkward.  He didn’t clarify, but it’s fair to say it’s awkward for him to have to touch my butt and for me to have my butt touched.  Overall, I feel like it’s a good policy.  Let’s just get this nonsense finished so we can move on.  Also, it’s by far the most uncomfortable place I’ve been tattooed.  I look forward to having this part BEHIND me.  I would like to dedicate that pun to Mike Leonard.