Ink Master

Cafe Society
41

Something that might be really interesting one year is to have a panel of blind (to the artists) impartial judges to supplement all the other judging going on. This would be panel of judges that see only tattoos. After each session they get to look at the canvases, either in person or pictures and that pick best and worst (or rank them, whatever) and that’s it. They don’t know who did them, they never meet or even see the artists, they have no idea what kind of drama is going on in the studio…they just judge the artwork.

I’m sure Oliver and Chris would still decide on their own, but it might be nice to hear from someone that isn’t making a decision just based on what else is going on.

Speaking of Oliver and Chris as much as I like them, it might be time to replace them.

42

Because of this thread I watched the season 4 first ep on Youtube. It was entertaining as far as these types of shows go, but I don’t understand why people would volunteer to have tattooists fuck up tattoos on them.

43

A)These are established tattoo artists. It’s not like having Round 1 American Idol contestant singing at your birthday and you might get someone that’s never sung before. These are all people that have been tattooing for years. I think the ‘greenest’ person on the show (Melissa IIRC) had been working for 5 years. Scott/Sausage/Matti had been at it for like 20.

B)It’s a free tattoo and their 15 minutes.

44

When he said that, I had myself a good long laugh.

I wasn’t at all surprised by the winner.

The finale for this show has always been choppy as hell because, for whatever reason, none of the hosts/judges/contestants are able to speak fluidly in front of a live audience.

45

Well, in Matti’s defense, he DID say it was hidden. :dubious:

It was so well hidden, NO ONE could see it.

That was one of the goofiest things said all season. I honestly doubt he has any idea what a fibonacci sequence is.

One of the things i found humorous is when Scott was discovered to have copied that horse/knight piece, and when questioned about the layout by the critics, he was trying to explain why he placed the horse and rider like he did. No, you numbskull… You placed it there the way you did because the guy who originally drew it put it that way.

What a bonehead.

I doubt the judges will leave on their own. My guess is this show has made them more money than tattooing ever had on its own, and Nunez and Peck know a good thing. The show has also increased the rate they can charge for their own tattoos.

Peck in particular sounds very dim. His explanations on his critics are always weak, as are his descriptions on the “theme” of each week’s challenge. I know they have to come up with something, but what tattoo doesn’t have “contrast” in it? Or strong line work, or saturation, or any other art “buzzword” they used? And my favorite, “adaptability”. But the biggest thing that annoys me about Peck is his toothpick. That’s pretty minor in the scheme of things. I can live with him.

Nunez, I like just because he is much blunter than most judges, which is always a good thing. Navarro is also likable, but I can’t figure why he hosts the show. He HAS tattoos, but he doesn’t draw them, does he?

I do like the idea of having an independent group of judges looking at the tattoos and judging them as a standalone piece, and not something tied to the drama and personal biases that the judges obviously have. The person that comes back the following year seems to alway be judged more harshly than the others.

With the format announced, I don’t think they will have just one person coming back next year. My guess is Halo is coming back, because he seemed very calm about getting bounced at the end. And i can’t remember who his nemesis was, but i am guessing whoever that was (and it can 't be one of the final 3) will also be back.

A bit off-topic, but I have watched a few episodes of tattoo nightmares, the cover up show that follows ink master, and Lorenzo Lamas came into the shop. I didn’t recognize him until he opened his mouth.

46

Actually I’ll disagree a bit on this one. I was watching an earlier show idly for 20 minutes ( it was the geometric pattern contest ) and they showed pretty clearly where folks had screwed up the above items. Lines that wandered or were uneven, fades that looked choppy, colors that looked uneven in application, too much dark, not enough dark, lack of consistent three-dimensionality.

I think all of those are items worthy of criticism and I’ve seen almost all of those artists screw up here and there.

But this one is pretty damn stupid - here I’ll agree. Because you know how often are you and your identical twin going to demand simultaneously applied, perfectly matching tattoos done by 18 different artists at once. With a time limit.

Once, maybe :D.

47

I was also displeased with the finale. I felt like they gave the most favorable critique to Sausage. The two complaints I remember was one they admitted was very nitpicky, in the bird, and that his color wasn’t saturated enough, even they didn’t do anything to justify that comment because it looked fine to me. They made several legitimate negative critiques for Scott, including a few anatomical issues and how the tattoo ended. And if they really were as close as they said they were, then why didn’t the tattoo that got the better critique win the guy the show?

I feel like the judges did a lot of moving of the goal posts this season, at one point sending two people home without announcing it, at another sending no one home. At points sending people home for the worst tattoo of the day, at another point sending people home for not having the body of work. As someone else said upthread, Scott did some jacked up tattoos in the last few episodes, his was definitely the worst Japanese one, but they moved the goalposts to keep him and get rid of Melissa, whose wasn’t the best, but was better than at least two of them. I agree that the butterflies was weak, not because it was poorly done, I don’t think it was, but for someone fighting to stay, he should have shown more effort. And, his cover-up failed as a cover up. It’s not like it was just peaking through, it was straight up there.

As it was, Sausage was more consistent and turned in the better Master Canvas tattoo; he should have won. I would have liked to have seen Halo in the finals, probably in place of Scott. Scott just plain didn’t deserve it. I still don’t think Halo would have won, as much as I liked him, I felt like he was a little inconsistent, but he probably would have turned in one better than Matti or Scott.

I’m more disappointed because, even if I didn’t always agree with their decisions, I always felt that the person who won in the end was the person who had not only performed the best in the season buy turned in the best Master Canvas.
And as for the viewer votes, in the past, the one with the least votes got eliminated. I’m wondering if they changed it prior to the live finale precisely because they knew if they didn’t Scott would have gotten eliminated, since he clearly was the least favored by the fans.

And, I’m also not really sure about the whole rivals idea either. I watch the show because I want to see awesome art, not because of the drama. If they’re going in the direction of pumping up the drama even more, I may not keep following.