If there are any Portlanders out there - is that what people from Portland are called, Portlanders?  Is it Portlandians? - and you happen to be in the market for a new tattoo, well then do I have a deal for you.  If you’re not a Portlander or a Portlandian but you still happen to be in the market for a new tattoo, well I’m sorry, I don’t have any sort of deal for you at the moment.  I’m terribly sorry.

Anyway, Mikal Gilmore and Traci Manley own and operate Portland’s very own New Rose Tattoo.  The shop opened in the fall of 2009 and for some reason that I can only chalk up to sheer generosity and niceness, the duo are offering $80 tattoo gift certificates for New Rose at half price.  So basically, you can buy an $80 gift certificate for $40.  Nice, huh?  BUT!  If you are a Portlander/Portlandian currently in the market for a new tattoo and this New Rose Tattoo deal sounds great to you, be warned: there are only 9 - count ‘em - 9 gift certificates left at this super fantastic discount rate and the gift certificates are limited to 3 per customer.  Once they’re gone, they’re gone.  So act fast and get tattooed!

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Ahh the video store: home to countless employees who have bigger dreams and bigger skills.  Everyone knows that writer/director Quentin Tarantino used to make ends meet by working in an LA based video store before he stormed the Hollywood scene with Reservoir Dogs. In fact, I’m willing to bet that if you ask any given video store clerk what their future goals are - a great deal of them will tell you that they’re working toward some sort of goal in film or as an artist of some sort.  Video stores just seem to be a nice creative environment for those who want something more but need to make some cash while in the process of working toward that something more. Chris Labrenz of Edmonton, Canada happens to be one of those people.  Although he works in a video store, Chris happens to be a pretty decent artist.  His drawings of characters and images from everything from popular TV shows to horror films and more adorn the walls of the Edmonton based video store Movie Studio where Chris is the assistant manager.  He sold his first piece when he was 13-years-old for $1000 and hasn’t looked back since.  He’s even sold his artwork to the dark lord of metal, Ozzy Osbourne.  Hey, when Ozzy’s got some of your artwork hanging in his home, I’d say it’s safe to say that you’re a success.  Labrenz has taken this success as an artist and moved into the realm of tattoo.  He’s currently apprenticing at Edmonton based tattoo shop Capital Tattoo. Sounds pretty cool indeed.  I’m sure there will be a time in the not so distant future where Labrenz is running his own tattoo studio and transferring that demand for his art on to flesh.  Best of luck to you, Chris.

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I think that the vast majority of us can relate to wanting to purchase something in particular really badly but just not having enough cash for it.  Sometimes you have even have to sell off some of your cherished possessions in order to get the cash that you need.  It sucks, but hey, it happens.  Tattoos are no different.  Sometimes you’ve just got to have that tattoo done by that certain artist and no matter what it takes, you’re going to make it happen.

The most important thing to keep in mind when this sort of intense need for a tattoo strikes is that some things are a better way than others for getting that cash that you need.  Example: selling your bicycle, selling your guitar, selling your Xbox, etc…  These are all decent ways to quickly get the cash that you need to help get you set up with that tattoo you’ve been wishing for.

Then there’s just the really stupid way to get the money for a tattoo, like setting up an elaborate ruse through the internet in order to rob someone for cash.  That’s how Christine Lynn Damann of Coon Rapids, Minnesota went about attempting to get the cash that she needed for her tattoo:

According to the complaint, the robbery victim said he met Damann online on Livelinks and was lured to a 6424 Douglas Drive in Brooklyn Park March 3. When he arrived, he was directed to go to the Eden Park Apartments.

The man said he was then confronted by two individuals who punched him, robbed him of his pants, cell phone and other property.

Damn, they took dude’s pants?  Robbing him of his cash is one thing, but taking his pants?  Come on!  Give the poor bastard a break.  Anyway, Damann was caught and later confessed to setting up the entire thing so that she could get a tattoo.  Talk about stupid.  What happened to getting a JOB?  Oh well, at least Damann will be able to get that tattoo that she wanted so badly after all…in prison.

Among the things that I like about tattoo artist James Kern is that his portfolio has a specific section in order to showcase the hand and foot tattoos that he’s done.  Tattoos and feet are in my opinion some of the greatest spots on the human body for tattoos and the fact that Kern acknowledges this not only with his work but also with a specific spot in his portfolio is pretty refreshing.  Not to mention that the work that he does on feet and hands is pretty damn fine.  Pretty damn fine, indeed.  That’s not to say that all of Kern’s work isn’t pretty damn fine, I just thought I’d mention the feet and hands stuff first.  That okay with you?  Good.

Before James Kern started tattooing full time, he tattooed friends and made his living by colouring comic books.  A pretty cool sideline, and when you think about it, a pretty appropriate one for a tattoo artist in training.  In 1995, Kern graduated from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, then went on to begin his career as a tattoo artist at Chicago’s Milios Salon.  It was while at Milios that Kern met and learned from numerous big names in the tattoo industry, including Guy Aitchison and Kim Saigh.  Kern stayed at Milios for three years, honing his skills and making plenty of friends along the way.  After three years, Kern moved on to the No Hope No Fear tattoo studio.  Today Kern lives in Portland Oregon, still in the No Hope No Fear family, tattooing at its Portland location.

In addition to my own personal fondness for Kern’s hand and foot tattoos, his portrait work is amazing as well (I love the Woody Allen portrait).  All of the black and grey work on display here is phenomenal and when Kern does splash in some colour, things get downright three dimensional.  A superb tattoo artist who deserves all the recognition he can get and more.  So what are you waiting for?  Go check out James Kern’s stuff!

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I don’t typically pay much attention to temporary tattoos.  Why would I?  Permanent tattoos are far better, of course.  I’m also willing to bet that the majority of people who regularly visit the Tattoo Blog aren’t really interested in temporary tattoos either.  But you know what?  As it turns out, temporary tattoos are freaking huge business.  Don’t believe me?  Check this out:

Hidden away in the industrial corridor south of Aviation Highway between Palo Verde Road and Alvernon Way on the southside is a one-of-a-kind, international company that generates as much as $20 million a year by temporarily fulfilling people’s desires to adorn their bodies.

“We are the global leader in FUN” reads the sign outside Tattoo Manufacturing Incorporated where they manufacture six million temporary tattoos a day. Extrapolate that to an annual production and the numbers exceed over a billion product units per year.

KA-FRIGGING-BOOOOOM!!!!  Can you believe that?  Over a billion product units per year?  $20 million a year?  That is completely amazing to me and far beyond any of the numbers that I would have guessed that a temporary tattoo company can do.  I think that I grossly underestimated the popularity of temporary tattoos.  Which isn’t to say that I think they’re cool, but…damn, that’s a lot of temporary tattoos.  The Arizona based company is responsible for most of the temporary tattoos that flood the global marketplace each year, and they’re only getting bigger.

On the retail side, TMInternational does business with the biggies — Wal-Mart, Walgreens, Target — and other recognized retailers. They produce tattoos of Disney princesses and millions upon millions of pink ribbons for breast cancer awareness events.

“Our largest single sale was to Kellogg’s cereals a year ago when we printed 28 million temporary tattoos for a promotion in their boxes of Pop Tarts,” Tooker said. And there are other worlds yet to be conquered, he said.  “McDonald’s is on our radar for their Happy Meal. We haven’t cracked that one yet, but we’re trying.”

Apparently their demographic is between the ages of 5-18, which is cool.  I remember loving temporary tattoos when I was a kid, so it’s nice to see that still hasn’t changed.

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Billy getting PornHub on face

My adventures in tattoo advertising continue with PornHub.com. This is a really great adult website. They are advertising on my right cheek, Just below my zoozle.com tattoo ad. I now have 9 tattoo ads on my head so far! I am looking for new websites to advertise on me. I think it would be cool to advertise for tattooblog.com. I can see it now Tattooblog.com right on me face, or on my nose or somewhere else.

One of the tattoo ads I did a few months ago has really paid off well for me. I did a tattoo ad for Liberty Tax service. In the deal I advertise for them on my neck and in return I get my taxes done for free for life! I went in and they did my taxes for 2008 and for 2009. If I did not get free taxes my total for doing my taxes would have been $1,400 dollars.

I am now in search of more websites to advertise on my. In the next week I will continue to email websites and companies in the hopes of adding additional advertisements to my body billboard. I made front cover of Bizzare magazine so I am pretty excited about that. They did a feature on me thats in the latest issue. Stay tuned as I become the ultimate human billboard!

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A recent news report out of Copenhagen, Denmark tells of a new ban on tattoos in the work place for guards working for the Danish Prison and Probation Service.  The ban, effective as of now specifies that Danish prison guards are not permitted to have visible “biker gang type” tattoos.  What exactly “biker gang type” tattoos are is not clarified by the Danish Prison and Probation Service, leading to the deduction that “biker gang type” tattoos is just an archaic way of saying no tattoos allowed.

The new uniform regulations issued by the DPPS state that ‘the existence of visible tattoos could be found to damage the reputation that prison guards should have both outwardly and inwardly’.

The guidelines continue by stating that the ‘existence of large, visible “biker gang type” tattoos on the hands, arms, neck and head are in this way not desirable’

This is all very disappointing of course and not just because this new ban wallows in outdated stereotypes, either.  I’ve always thought of the majority of Europe as a continent that is constantly pushing the envelope in terms of sociological advancements and tolerance.  To be honest, Denmark was the last place that I expected to see this kind of old-school attitude toward tattoos surface.  Still, people like Kim Østerbye, who is the chairman of the prison worker’s union, is speaking up about and questioning the ridiculousness of this new ban:

‘What is a biker gang tattoo? What is an immigrant gang tattoo?’ he said. ‘Tattoos in Denmark are completely normal. Maybe 10-15 years ago, they would have been more about signalling your membership of the gang environment, but that’s absolutely not the case today.’

How true, how true.

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