Your First Tattoo - A Guide

You've made up your mind; after countless hours of staring at the design you've drawn or the picture you've become enamored with, you have decided that you truly want to go get your first tattoo. But, where do you start?

First Thing's First: Finding Your Artist

Any semi-metropolitan town is going to have at least 4-7 tattoo parlors with anywhere from 1-5 artists working in the shop. Each one is going to have their own station and their own portfolio. So where in the heck are you supposed to begin looking? It's simpler than you think.

Google it.

Sounds a little pathetic, right? Not exactly. As pretentious as it sounds, you don't want to be tattooed at some unknown shop that you found because of the guy standing on the corner with his, "Buy one, get one," sign. Google is going to have a phone number, shop websites, an address and - most importantly - reviews. Google reviews are now your best friend; find 2 or 3 tattoo parlors that have a good number of positive reviews, then check out their shop.

The first thing you want to do upon entering the shop is going to be asking to see a portfolio provided by the shop (If they don't have one to show you, leave immediately because a true professional would). When you're looking through the work of that artist pay as much attention as you can to the detail or each tattoo. Are the outlines pristine, or are they a little wobbly on the edges? Is the shading smooth or do the colors just kind of bump against each other like it was drawn on by a marker?

Every artist has a specialty, such as traditional American style or portraits, so study each portfolio character to see what their strong suits and weaknesses are. This is going to be on your body forever. It will be there during your wedding, when your first child is born, when you celebrate your retirement, when you're worm food. Getting lazy when picking your artist isn't an option - what if you just wung it and had an atrocity etched into your skin by some scratcher?

What's a scratcher? It's a derogatory term used for tattoo, "Artists," that haphazardly scratch on a tattoo and call it good. Generally they work out of their home or make house calls because they don't actually have the skill to open a shop of their own.

Anyways, another good way to find an artist is simply by asking your friends. More often than not, you're going to have a friend that has either received a tattoo themselves or know someone who does. What better way to find out if an artist does good work than by seeing it in person?

When you find someone with good and tidy work, ask to see autoclave spore test records. The autoclave is the sanitizing machine that doctors and tattoo artists use to completely rid their tools of germs. If the shop doesn't have an autoclave, instead choosing to use each tool once and then throwing it out, that's perfectly fine. Just make sure that they dispose all needles and excess ink properly and they actually are only using brand-new, still-packged items.

Getting the Tattoo

You've found your artist, you know what you want and you've set up an appointment. Now what, you ask?

Never take alcohol or pain killers before a tattoo. This will thin out your blood considerably, causing you to bleed more and will be retroactive in terms of pain management.

Bring as much reference material as you can. Nothing will make the job easier for both you and the artist than showing him exactly what you want by bringing as many detailed pictures, DVDs, game cases or books as you can produce. Even if you can't draw or sketch something up, the artist should still be able to produce something that you will want; that's half of their job, you know.

Watch the artist set up their station. They should be wrapping their machine and the chairs, pulling the needles out of sterile packages and changing their gloves to ensure a sterile environment. If they touch something other than you and the tattoo gun, they should be changing out their gloves.

Breathe! Never forget to breathe. If the tattoo starts to hurt (Which it will), holding your breath will make you tense up, which will make it hurt even worse. I myself do what I can to make a small 'O' with my lips and inhale for three seconds and exhale for another three. It considerably eases the pain.

Aftercare

Now you, hopefully, have a brand new and beautiful tattoo! It's going to sting a little for the next few days, so get used to it because, afterwards, it is going to itch like all hell.

The first thing you want to do on your way home is pick up lotion and soap specifically for the healing process of your tattoo. The lotion is because while your tattoo is healing, it will scab over and become tight. If the scabs rip, it can damage the tattoo. So always make sure that your tattoo is moisturized. I highly recommend Aquaphor or a bland and unscented cocoa butter for the lotion. You don't want a vaseline-based lotion because it can clog the pores and slow down the healing process. For the soap, unscented store brand antibacterial soap works the best. Stay away from any antibacterial ointments, as it can actually be detrimental to the healing process. You essentially just had hundreds of little surgeries and puncture wounds, and the labels of any antibacterial ointment will specifically say that it's a bad idea to apply it to a wound like that.

Did you notice how I mentioned that both the lotion and the soap should be unscented? I did it for a reason: soaps and perfumes with any sort of perfume will burn and sting, and the burning sensation will not go away after washing the lotion off because it will have already sunk into your skin. So make sure the label specifically says that there is no sort of pretty smell to it.

The cleaning process is very important for the way your tattoo will look. If you're anything like me, you love scrubbing all of the day's nastiness away with a soapy washcloth or a loofa. This is fine, as long as you keep it the hell away from your new tattoo. It can actually ruin your tattoo by pulling out the exposed and still-setting ink. While taking a shower (Only take showers. I will explain later), you're going to want to apply the soap to your hand and pat the tattoo softly but firmly until the tattoo is fully healed. Also, don't let the water directly hit the new tattoo during the healing process, because the water can get stuck into the skin, causing the scab to drop off prematurely (Which will also pull out ink).

On that note, don't ever submerge your healing tattoo. Don't go swimming, don't take a bath, don't enter steamrooms, don't get into a hot tub or a jacuzzi, and don't wear damp clothing. It's full of icky bacteria that will get into your tattoo and cause an infection as well as slow down the healing process

Now, for the first few days, spontaneous plasma-weeping and bleeding is normal. Because of this I highly suggest sleeping in a way that you aren't lying on your tattoo; my reason for this is because while the tattoo is healing, if anything bleeds or weeps while you're asleep, it will dry and cause the sheets to stick to the tattoo. If you reposition yourself after it has dried, you risk pulling out more ink.

Do not pick or scratch the tattoo. It is going to itch, and it is going to scab and it is going to be pretty uncomfortable. I can't emphasize enough on how important it is to make sure that you don't mess with the tattoo. The last thing you want to do is rip off a scab and pull out a chunk of the ink. Nothing looks worse than a speckled tattoo. Yuck. That being said, don't let others touch your still-healing tattoo. I don't care if it's your bestest friend in the whole wide world - you don't know where their nasty, germ-ridden hands have been. Do you want your tattoo to get infected because someone forgot to wash their hands last time they took a dump?

Now that you know about your hygeine, make sure that you keep your tattoo away from sunlight. The sun will make your tattoo become fuzzy and faded faster than anything I can think of. A big part of the reason back and arm tattoos fade so badly is because their owners expose them to too much direct sunlight. If you must expose the tattoo, find a sunscreen of at least SPF 40. But, for the most part, as long as you use common sense your tattoo should be perfectly fine.