Hi Tifacady

If you click on the link of Outlaw’s posts there is a forum there that will help much more on the issue of apprenticeships.

The 3 tips I can give is

1. Practice your drawing everyday in all styles.

2. Do not take in pictures of any tattoos that you have done (if any) on self or anybody else just stick to a high quality portfolio.

3. Be honest with your work – do not be tempted to pass the odd piece off as your own if you have ‘borrowed’ it. (Not saying you would or have but I admit temptation is always there).

Take Care
Matthew

I’m after an apprenticeship myself man, and I asked about it down at the shop where I get my own ink done. My artist has been doing tattoos for alot of years, and has apprenticed a number of successful artists in my hometown of Cincinnati.

The first step is to get your artwork up to code man. It’s why I’m in art school right now, despite being in my mid-twenties, when the average art student is a snotty eighteen year old over burdened with talent and Mommy and Daddy’s money. Frankly, if you can swing it, I’d recommend it. Art school is like fucking boot camp for artists–you either get good, or die trying. And, on another note, having an art degree looks good to prospective mentors. It shows that you’re serious about art, and that he’ll have to teach you less about drawing and color mixing than the average asshole off the street.

Now, an art degree is by no means required, but it does help, and has the side benefit of if tattooing falls through, you have a degree that can get you another cool job.

The second step is to build a badass portfolio. Make sure it’s heavy in drawings and paintings as those focus the most on the skills tattooing requires, but if you have other works, like costuming, sculpture, and computer art, include that too. Graphic work can be particularly useful among those “extras” as strong composition and design most commonly used in graphical work also has some bearing on tattoo design.

Make sure you portfolio is printed on heavy paper, preferably photo matte quality, never bond (the fancy name for normal computer paper). I’d advise you having it printed up at FedEx Kinkos as they usually do a good job printing and binding work and do it pretty cheap.

You can include originals in your portfolio, but it’s considered better to scan and/or photograph your work so you can size it to the proper size for your portfolio. This is true for any job wanting artwork.

InDesign is great for making portfolios, but if you ain’t got it, Photoshop does a damn good job too, it just requires more work.

The third step is the hardest. It’s getting the actual apprenticeship.

Now, what trips people most up about getting apprenticed (according to my artist) is that there is no set way to do it. There’s as many different ways to be, and to get, apprenticed as there are artists. Some hire you on as menial labor, pay you minimum wage, and teach you in exchange for you work. Others make you pay them, sometimes thousands of dollars (but this is the exception, not the rule, and usually only done by seriously famous artists).

Or anything in between.

Your best bet is that after your art is up to your standards, either through schooling or through home practice, and your portfolio is built, to start visiting the local shops you know to be reputable, and sounding them out, seeing if they have any artists willing to take you on. You’ll get told to fuck off a few times, I’m sure, but a good few of them will want to see your portfolio. Make sure you’re carrying that bad boy with you where ever you go. It goes without saying that if you have a personal relationship with an artist, like a guy who does your own work, he’s most likely the best place to start.

Also, as usual, listen to Matthew. That Mr. Perfect is right……again. (CAN’T YOU BE WRONG ONCE YOU LIMEY BASTARD?!?!!?……no disrespect 😀 )

To answer your question, yes, drawing your own “flash sheets” is helpful, but what’s better is drawing your own custom tattoo designs, things so freaking awesome that you’d get them yourself. The difference being, of course, that flash tends to be generic and simplistic, while custom work tends to being more complex and badass, the kind of stuff that qualifies as killer ink.

Besides, and this might be my own personal bias, but any fucking monkey can draw flash. Seriously, my wife’s pyromaniac (literally) ADHD son of a bitch of a brother draws flash all the time, and he’s fourteen.

He then burns it. So that’s cool.

I hope I was helpful man. Also, good job on not wanting to be a scratcher. I think we all got some seriously fucked up stories about the bad shit a scratcher’s done to our buddy, and, besides, basement dwellers make ALL of us look bad, even more so than the five hundred pound guy in the vulcan ears, federation half shirt, and a smell so strong that he can kill an Englishman at fifty yards, makes Trekkies look.

Love. Peace. Metallica.

Sherav,

I was looking in to doing a appernticeship too. I have done some internet searching and i want to know what other artist think of this place. http://www.internationalinstituteoftattoo.com

I mean this sounds more legit than the two week course where you practice on pigskin at the “tattoo-school”

I, on the other hand, am, for the following reasons:

A) From all the reputable artists I’ve spoken with on the subject, it takes a minimum of six months for an apprentice to be allowed to work on actual customers, and that’s if he works hard and attends to his studies.

B) Even if it*IS* legit, which it ain’t, 10k is far, far too much to pay for a year long course, much less one that claims you’ll be up and running in a month.

C) I know it’s been said, but any descent human being has to say it again: PRACTICING ON THE HOMELESS?!

What.

The fuck?

Seriously, even if it is possible to learn everything you need to and get going in such a short time span, you can’t exploit the homeless like that and still call yourself a good person. Anyone with a hint of decency won’t have anything to do with these sons of a bitches. Hell, no tattoo artist should either. They’re taking something precious, our shared art of tattooing, and twisting it into something exploitative and ugly.

Fuck them.

Besides, looking at them, I do believe this to be a scam in any case, so you’re better off without.

Love. Peace. Metallica.

ok i dont understand how its a scam? i mean if they asked for 10k up front? I mean i have a degree in Mechanical engineering and i paid like 5k up front each semester for multiple years. Here its a one time payment and you are in after making it through a job like interview.

Not defending them im just saying i paid for an education and it was worth it turns out it was not the life for me. I would be willing to pay for another education if it got me to where i wanted to be.

i will start a new thread about the tattoos on the homeless.

The idea of courses for apsiring tattooists which dealt with all the steriliastion techniques et al is not such a bad idea hence the not 100% bagging.

But as said 10k (upfront and non-refundable) to tattoo on homeless people is just an immoral scam.

That said it would not hurt to put money into health and safety courses as these can be applied to any job area.

Take Care
Matthew