I’ve narrowed my choice of first tat down to two: either this, only around my bicep instead of my wrist, like the woman in the picture; or this, only a) the code will be from something meaningful to me, b) MUCH smaller, c) Hi Opal, and d) on my bicep.
Not wanting to get scammed for being a noob, what would be a good starting point for negotiations on either of those tats?
You don’t want a cheap tattoo artist. Pay a professional rate and get a good tattoo. It’s permanent.
Yeah, really! A cheap haircut at a barber school, sure, but a cheap tat, forget it.
How frugal are you? Like, is a blowey on the table?
I’m a straight dude, so no.
Sorry, that totally threw me off.
Besides, you’re only gay if you’re receiving… or wait is it… :smack:
How much money would you pay me to wear your tattoo?
I couldn’t agree more. (Caveat, I have no tattoos (psioriasis) and (massive wuss when it comes to pain).) However, I’m odd. Most of the people I know have tattoos, and if I were going to get one, I’d ask people I know. Just in talking to people who have them, they aren’t cheap. Also, I’d imagine the prices are very location variant. (I meant where you live, not where you get the tattoo.)
On tattoos, I’d have to say it’s the old standby “The good ones aren’t cheap and the cheap ones aren’t good”

I complimented a friend on a small one that I thought was very nice and asked her how much it was and she said “$85”. And I realized that ‘I’m as cheap as fuck’ was also a reason I didn’t have a tattoo.
Hey, a bargain’s a bargain, I’m just sayin’…
Whatever shop you go to, they’re going to have a minimum. I haven’t gotten a tat in a while, but a few years ago around here, it was an hour or $120-$150.
What you’ve shown in the pictures is going to be under an hour to complete, so you’ll be just paying whatever the shop’s minimum is. If you were getting something truly original or interesting to the artist (or if you hit it off and he/she thinks you’re cool), sometimes they may quote you a flat, lesser price because it’s something fun and quick to them.
For instance, the Sea Dragon on my left arm cost $500 because my tat artist designed it himself and he really liked it. It was actually 9 hours in the chair, so could have cost me the shop hourly which was $120 back then, so I paid less than half the posted shop price.
There’s not going to be much bargaining. You’re going to go there with your idea and they’re going to tell you how long it will take and how much. You’ll probably want to go through each artist’s book (some places have a lot of art posted on their websites these days, by artist, so you can check their work out ahead of time) and look for the most precision-oriented one. Some do precision like tribal tats better, while others are better at portraits, nature, classic, Japanese, no stencil, whatever genre etc. If you already have a picture or drawing of what you want, whoever greets you at the front may call over another artist or recommend the one in the shop who’s best at what you’re looking for.
So just go. Talk to them. If someone’s between appointments you may be able to get it done right away, or if they need some drawing time to make samples for you, you may need a separate appointment to come back for chair time.
