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  Well, I get into tattooing because of an artist I know who become my hubby after that, anyway, he used to be my heroes who teach me so much about tattooing and give me many inspiration, such a good memory, u know...he is the one who bring me into this line. Q. How long have you been a tattooist? Start tattooing in year 2002, is bout 7 years now, such a long time, but I know there is still many years to go, for me, never stop from learning, willing to travel around the world, meet with any kind of artist, learn from each other...that is what I wish to do now... Q. Is the industry like you thought it would be ? What surprised you about it?  Q. How did you learn? Did you do an apprenticeship, learn on friends or pig skins etc? Pig skins? No way, dun think tat is a good idea anyway, coz is dead skin, my first apprentice is my friend, then my staff, after tat, my customer, I still remember there is a tribal sun design for me, not really good, but not bad. LOL...anyway, learn on human skin is better then anything else, even the color is fated after tat, we can always do touch up for it, so is not a big deal anyway, rite? Thanks to all my friend who support me from the start.... Q. Were you always interested in other types of art or specifically tattoo art? Well, other then tattoo art, am interesting in oil painting actually, even I never learn of it, but one day, I will turn myself into oil painting, drawing is my life, tattoo is other kind of art for me, and I love coloring, which I knew it can make me specific in my tattoo art, dun u think so??? Yes, never stop from learning.... Q. Did you start off as full-time, or did you start tattooing part-time? I start tattooing when my ex hubby open a shop and I am helping him, so yes, full time tattooist for me, so I can concentrate on my job  Well, I take a photo every time after I done my jobs, from there, I choose some which I think is the best to put as my portfolio, show it to my customer and on the network, such as frienster, facebook and myspace....etc, from there I get my appointment and from there, they know my art skill, think about 2-3 years time, I get my name known, yeah....networking is a good marketing, really. The other way, by my friends and customers helping me to spread out my art work to their friends. It took seven years for me to build up my career, some times I do free tattoo to my friend just want to get good skin and good work for my portfolio. Q. How did you get in touch with clients initially, is it different now? Normally, we will get our clients name and phone number, or email, u know, most of them do using Facebook, so from there, we keep in touch with phone or internet, tat is the easiest way, rite? Some of them become close friend also, LOL . Same thing by friends and customer's mouth spread out the words and my work will speak their truth. Recently I post my work on Facebook and the feedback not bad. People knows me more.  I don't do those customer when they are not ready for themselves. Because it will spoil my mood and effect my tattoo. Hm....sometime, we do have some difficult customers, what we can do is try our best to explain to them to make a deal. Q. Do you prefer tattooing men or women or doesn't it matter - who responds better? It doesn't matter, I just want them feel comfortable while I am tattooing them. Q. Do you normally use flash or plan custom designs or just improvise when you arrive ? have you ever planned to do one design, and then had a new idea when you met the client? For design, it depend, some of the client will go for the flash design, wat we can do is giving some advised, or suggest to have custom design from me, yes, I prefer to make design with my own idea, normally for cover up design, I will straight away get a marker and draw it on my client's skin, that we call freehand, that is the best way to show client how did the cover up work. For a big piece, it will take me 2-3 day to make a drawing to show to my client, till everything is conform, then start!! Q. What was the hardest part technically to learn? eg, lining, shading, blending colors etc, and have you developed your own style? 7 years of learning, everything start from lining, the most basic thing to do....shading, different kind of needle, ink...lots of different technical, then colouring, yes, the hardest part technically to learn, luckily I love to play with color,  Q. How important is using the right equipment, and how did you afford it initially? With the right machine, needle and ink, it will save time and make the tattoo more effectively, most of the time, my friends and my colleague will recommended what to use and what is better, is actually all about learn from the experience. Q. How important is hygiene? How did you learn about it? Talk about hygiene, in Malaysia they are 50% of the tattoo artist they don't have a proper autoclave and proper sterilization, I don't know how they do tattoo, but for me it been in my mind since I am joining this line, same thing teach by my master. Q. What advice would you give on how to find work as a tattooist? My advice, get more experience first before you find a work as tattoo artist, let people find you. Q. Is it a very competitive industry and have you worked with other tattooists? In this world, they are 60 billion peoples on earth, every profession they have their own competitor, we have to make ourself better, try to be humble and we will learn a lot from other tattoo artist.  I am proud of every tattoo job I done, and as long as my client like my job, I feel satisfaction in my heart... Q. What are the best & worst things about the industry and tattooing? The best was I learn a lot of different experience from my past 7 years tattoo life, the worst was I found the ugly side of other tattoo artist, how bad personality they are, I try not to refresh back the bad memories, I hope the younger generation try learn to be a better person in order to be better tattoo artist. Q. Do people treat you differently when they find out you're a tattooist, how did your friends and family see your choice of career? I get full supported from my family and my friend, even they dun have any tattoo...tat is my choice and they know, as I know myself, this is my life, rite? So why care of how people treat me for tattoo...now I don't see any special treatment from them now. Q. What would you like to achieve in tattooing in future?  Q. If you had one piece of advice to give people who want to become a tattooist, what would it be? Make sure yourself, learning in the right way, doing in the right way, being in the right way Visit Kelly's Facebook profile | Have a question? People are waiting to help. |
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