Hey all, so I am new to this forum (you can see my introduction post I just did) and I recently had a terrible experience with a tattoo. I believe I have been pretty smart in making my decisions as far as what tattoos I get, making sure to do my research on the artist, actually paying the right price as to get the quality of work I expect etc…I also give myself a 3 month rule, once I decide I want the piece I set my date to get it 3 months from that day, and if I still feel the same way about it, I go ahead. I am a sporadic person, but definitely not when it comes to tattoos, I think because my grandfather got a tattoo in the Navy in is youth on a whim and he hated it his entire life and would talk about it frequently…anyways, back to the main point. So I just came to my three month date of my newest tattoo and went in to get it done. The artist checked out, the shop was legitimate, the price for the time/size was just about right…everything seemed great right? We start on the piece which is another 8 bit video game tribute 9see my gallery if you want to see some of my other pieces) So while I am getting the tattoo from the artist (I will not name the shop or artist as I think it is wrong to bash an artist and or shop unless they purposely screwed you over, plus artists have to start somewhere, not everyone is going to be the best artist in the world overnight), his girlfriend/booty call/baby’s momma/whatever comes screeching off the street in her car and plowed through the front of the shop!! It happened so abruptly that the artist jumped and his hand slipped drawing this scattered, crooked line due to the movement of his hand. So now I am sitting here with a tattoo that is maybe 25-30% done and 8-bit so the lines have to be perfectly straight in order for it to look good, and there is this botched “line” if you want to call it that, where the artist’s hand slipped while the motor was running so it looks like Morse code cause the needled traveled across my arm and botched it. So to get even better, the artist completely turned his attention to this crazy girl that had just driven her car through the front of the shop!!! She gets out of the car and starts screaming bloody murder and of course the artist begins to yell back! They were yelling your baby this and cheating on me that etc…so I am sitting her like “uuuhhh hey man, are you going to at least say something about that line that completely just ruined the tattoo!?” This is when everything got really out of hand! She straight up linebacker tackled the artist and they began to get into a scuffle. I am sitting there in complete awe of what I am seeing all while looking at this tattoo that looks pretty good thus far on one side, then the other side is clean, up until the giant line due to the car crashing through the shop. I was so confused and flustered I did not know what to do and I did not want to wait around but also I did not want to not pay the guy (I feel that would go against my integrity, because hey, it wasn’t really his fault, well not directly at least) so I left $75 on the counter and got out of there. We were the only ones in the shop so it’s not like I could really resolve the situation with someone else. I have called the guy multiple times since and no answer and he is no longer working at the shop (I really hope this chick didn’t go postal on him!) So the situation I am in now is that many artists do not want to finish the work because a decent amount of the outline is done, but this line is horrendous! It completely ruins the original idea because now I have to have someone use that existing line and work it into the piece. I know it is not that big of a deal, but to me I wanted it to be a complete reproduction of the piece, now I know I am going to have to slightly modify it. On top of the, with the 8-bit work, having the lines be perfectly straight is what makes the tattoo…I have no idea how someone could fix this to make it straight (although I am not a coverup artist so I am sure there are many geniuses out there that could do it…I just need to find one…I live in the Los Angeles area, any suggestions would be soooo appreciated! It sucks because all my pieces, as I said earlier, are perfect in my eyes…this tattoo kills me to look at as I feel it takes away from the others… Does anyone else have any crazy mess up stories that are like this or…if possible…crazier!? I will post pictures later tonight or tom morning of this craziness. BTW, can’t wait to start really being a part of this community, hopefully I have found a new home 😀