two koi and a goldfish

this koi, rock, lotus and waves(the colored in portion) were the first installment of my back tattoo. in fact, at the time, i did not realize that eventually my entire back would be covered. such is the nature of the addiction--once you start it is hard to stop. the black rock covers up a small gecko tattoo i got when i was 18. 12 or 13 years later it was looking kind of faded and blurry and because it was so small with small details(tiny feet pads)it would have been impossible to sharpen up. the whole design of this initial koi was interesting because it had to be in a precise location with the black of the rock covering the gecko. my tattoo artist placed a piece of saran wrap over my back and traced the gecko and surrounding landscape(neckline, shoulder blade, arm, etc...) then he came up with a few rough sketches based on my request for a koi and lotus flower. after that the finished outline was done and i went in for the actual work. if i remember right the design and drawing process took about two weeks. the tattoo itself took about 3.5 hours(of pure agony).

so, the installment of the rest of the back was pretty much a rerun of the first part, tracing and then designing. this part was trickier because i started out wanting an asian style dragon. we couldn't really figure out how to incorporate it into the bigger plan so i came up with the idea of a "fish pond" instead. i think the little chinese goldfish at the bottom is my favorite part--i can't wait to see it colored in. the outline took another 3-3.5 hours, also really painful. my tolerance is about 2.5 hours and then it gets really bad. so friday night i went in and we started filling in and around with black shading which has made an astonishing difference in the appearance of the whole tattoo. i will post pictures of that in a few days--it is now starting to peel and looks kind of funky.