Tattoo Paintings

I finally felt up to drawing some serious tattoo style painting. I felt these were some classic images. I got them from a "book of tattoos". Once again, i had a problem with the background. I did the blue first, but I tried to steer around the outlines because the color was so dark, i didn't want it to affect the color of everything else i would paint over it. I ended up messing up the picture by putting way too much blue on the blade of the sword.


I got this book called "Tattoo Bible vol. 2" and it is awesome, so many great images. I wanted to zoom in on this gypsie and just capture her head and put a flower behind her to add some depth. I also did 2 new things. One, I painted the background with old coffee which was supposed to give a cool "old" look to it, but the coffee wasn't black enough. Two, I spent alot of time layering, especially with her scarf on her head and her hair.



I tried once again to make a Koi Fish, much better attempt than my first one! I did alot of layering, no background first, I just went with light to dark. I love the colors of the water and that Japanese water came out great.


My mom always said i need to draw religious images, so this painting is dedicated to her. Our Lady of Guadalupe. I didn't put a thick outline around her, i'm not sure if that was a mistake or not, but she doesn't pop very much. The background rays came out very cool. The layering on her clothes took forever!

This painting is awesome! I poured a bunch of coffee grounds into a cup with water and heated it up. you cant see it too well in this picture, but I layered the coffee 3 times and let it dry each time. It is a great trick, you just need extreme black coffee! I think this picture really captures that old school "sailor Jerry" tattoo style, which is what i was going for.