I want to be a tattooist.. oh yeah?

So I've had quite a few people talk to me, either here on Steemit, at the studio, on Facebook or over email asking about apprenticing.
Getting into tattooing is difficult. With a lot of media attention, reality tv shows and the fact that it's a pretty independent job that allows for a lot of creativity you can see how it's an attractive career for many to get into. It has that sort of rock 'n roll feel to it, to many on the outside it doesn't even look like it's a real job.

Well the first thing you need to know if you're trying to get an apprenticeship is that it IS a real job and it's HARD work!

But tattooers make $$$ hand over fist

First of all most tattooists are self employed, if you fall ill, break your hand, want to go on holiday, you're not getting paid. That's ok if you're shacking up with mom and dad, but if you're living in your own place, have a family and/or kids, you've got rent and bills to pay.

Unless you own your own studio or work in a collective you're going to be paying either a weekly chair rental to the studio owner or a percentage of your earnings to them. These can be pretty steep. On the one side if you're paying a chair rental and you have a bad week (maybe there's a lot of cancellations or you're ill a few days), that chair rent still needs to be paid. On the other hand if you're paying a percentage and have a banging week, you end up giving quite a bit of it away to the studio, some studios are as high as 50% (yes that's half your earnings), others are closer to 40% and some 30% or negotiated with the studio owner.

Just because the hourly rate for tattooing is quite high, you're probably not going to be working solid 8 hours a day everyday, and you don't get paid when you don't work.

You get to do art all day, fun, fun, fun

You don't see most of the work. Most of the design work, prep work, research, bookings, advertising, social media work is all done in our own time. It's not a job where you go home and put your feet up. You're answering emails, getting designs ready, researching ideas and sometimes having to draw a design a few times before it's the way you want it. A 4 hour tattoo can easily have 4-8 hours put into it before it's even tattooed. There's only a finite amount of time and tattooing will take up a lot of it. Once you're tattooing full time it becomes difficult to find time to just draw for fun, for yourself. You've usually always got a design that needs to be done for a tattoo. You really have to love your job.

It's not without its' stress. Clients can be awkward and try micromanage the design or tattoo process. Skin is a difficult medium and everyone is different, even if your design is awesome, replicating it in skin can be difficult and on some skin even a nightmare. You have to take the stress and work through it, use your experience to make the best tattoo you can. You can over run on time and have appointments waiting for an hour which messes up your whole day, it can really wear you down mentally and physically. You're working on another human beings skin so there's a lot of responsibility which should always be taken seriously.

You just sit and have a good time while working

It may seem like we sit on our asses all day, laugh, listen to music and make pretty pictures in skin but tattooers suffer from their jobs like most trades. Our backs give us problems a few years in, trying to navigate the body to get the tattoo to work leaves you in weird contorted positions you don't even know you're in until you feel it in your back or neck later that night. There's a lot of RSI (repetitive strain injury) in hands for tattooers, some might get carpal tunnel syndrome from holding the weight of the machine and constantly stretching the skin, I know my hands take a beating from it at times. I've known some tattooers to suffer mentally, the expectations from the client are stressful. Not feeling their work is good enough and beating themselves up about it. In the media everyone is whoever they want you to see, confident and outgoing, 5000 likes on Instagram, in reality everyone has their demons. These images are just a snapshot in time, life is a lot more complicated.

We work hard, and if the bravado and posing you see on social media from some tattooers makes you think different then you're being lied too. If you're going to take pride in your work and treat the profession with respect, it's going to take hard work for all of your career.

Now I hope you don't think I'm trying to put any prospective apprentice off, I'm just being real with you and I'm sure there's loads of jobs out there that seem a blast on the surface, especially when portrayed in the media like it's all honey. Don't believe the hype, if you want to apprentice get into it for the love of art, not attention and money, those will not be the key to your happiness in any job.

Oh and if you though that sounded a bit harsh, wait until I blog about what you can expect when you're apprenticing... :)

Peace Out