Back in December 2023, Kevin had the great idea of starting a blog; “keep it down the middle” he said, “we don't want to upset or offend anyone.”
Well, 3 years later and that tone has changed; “pitchfork and torches,” Kevin instructed about this particular issue.
Now I’m sure if you’ve been on the internet at all recently you’ll have heard about today's blog topic and unfortunately it has made its way into the tattooing sphere. AI is here and it's here to stay and ruin your day. Well, that's how a tattoo artist feels when you tell them you’ve run their rough sketch through ChatGPT, to save them time by having AI finish the design.
Me and Kevin have spoken about AI extensively during our many tattoo sessions and I even suggested a few months back about doing an AI blog but he didn’t think it was too much of an issue. Well as AI is getting more and more of a foothold in the technological psyche of the average man, the line between art and technology are clashing at the front desk of a tattoo studio. In this blog, I’m going to explore why AI is such a problem in the tattoo world and maybe share a few of my own personal opinions along the way. Settle in, this one's going to be a long one.
Now let's imagine and agree that the majority of people getting tattoos are not tattoo artists. So it's safe to say that the dynamics of the relationship between artist and client is the informed and the uninformed. This is an important fact that lots of people forget (especially the ‘difficult’ customer, we’ll come back to them). When you go to get a tattoo, you are not just getting a picture super-imposed onto your skin. You’re going through a long and intimate interaction, hours spent with your tattoo artist bent and twisted over while trying to get the perfect image. You’re building a relationship and getting to know the artist.
How is this relevant to AI, you might ask. Most customers come in and respect this dynamic of informed and uninformed, so when the artist says “Well, I see what you’re saying but if you want that design we’ll need to go a bit bigger, do you have any other places we could put this?” The customer respects that and either changes the design slightly or finds another position. That experience comes from knowing the body and how it interacts with tattooing.
Now, imagine a customer coming straight from the computer into a shop and asking for the Sistine Chapel on their hand. This person has come in with a pre-determined view of what they want and what their expectations are. If the computer can show it, an artist can do it, right? Actually no, the first thing the tattoo artist is going to say is say “no”, as politely or impolitely as they can muster. A tattoo like that would be physically impossible to do on human skin, using the tattooing technology we have, how the ink is inserted into the skin and given the skill of the artist. Then usually a forward and backward ensues where an artist's first interaction is challenging all the customers’ hopes and visions and explaining the limitations of AI for generating real tattoo references.
Now before it feels like I’m just going to be super negative for the whole blog, I do believe that AI can be useful in tattooing (if you forgo your morals) and especially as a customer. AI has the ability to generate whatever you want, like it can peer inside your head and create the idea that Google images search can't show you. If you are looking for reference for a weird niche idea you have, AI can help create that to show to a tattoo artist for a reference piece. But that's about it, literally not much and even then you’re using a platform that scrapes and steals other artists' work from the internet without their permission sooo…
But this is the problem with the average user of AI, it takes them totally out of the reality that we live and breathe and into a world of lies, where if my eyes see it then it must be real. That is the problem, it warps what we think is real because AI doesn't take any of this into account.
Story time now, I have a couple of tattoos I regret, no big shock. After getting married, I got a passage of my wedding speech tattooed on my calf. My wedding speech was mainly just Led Zeppelin lyrics and I chose to use the Led Zeppelin font. I was young and my tattoo artist was so negative about my idea, I remember thinking like dude, just tattoo the fucking thing. He was talking about blurring over time, and not being able to read it in the future blah blah, do it, tattoo it dude.
Damn it! He was right and now I can't read a word of it, it just looks like a big long barcode. That was the day I learned to listen to my artist and that's something that AI can't do. You could tell AI ‘Computah show me the Last Supper tattooed on someone's big toe’ and AI is like yeah no sweat here you go. A tattoo artist's job whilst you go for that first ‘I want this piece’ introduction requires them to call back on every mistake they’ve made, every lesson they’ve learnt, and every problem they’ve encountered all to allow them to best advise where and how to get the best finish for your tattoo. They also have to think about the tattoo on the day and also in 3 years time, think about how the colours will change over time. This is even more complicated when you take into account cover ups, scars and skin conditions. Tattooing is an art form by its very nature and something that cannot be replicated or understood by a ‘generative learning model’.
This is a conversation that calls upon the history of tattooing, thinking about that human nature. An art form that predates technology, electricity and modern civilisation, all the way up to the rebellious trailblazers like Norman Collins aka Sailor Jerry and Ed Hardy to name only two of the most famous. Art is human, it's rebellious, it's the ownership of your freedom to express yourself. Flash exists in the tattooing world as a portfolio of the living art, having the same eagle tattooed on hundreds or thousands of people but still an expression of that artist.
Tattoos over recent decades have become much more mainstream, the rebellious nature of the tattooing world falling quiet with the influx of new artists and customers alike. However AI’s soulless assault on art, not only in the tattoo world but in all forms of art has struck a nerve calling on that rebellious nature again (hence I’m here).
Yes, AI in the tattoo world may manifest itself in its most innocent form of customers bringing ridiculous tattoos with the expectations they are physically possible. The ethics of what AI is and how it does what it does is the more pervasive issue. Being unique, standing out, creating innovative artwork, breaking boundaries, challenging status quo, the sweat and tears of artists all over the world is being scraped and collected and fed into a generative language model so it can spit out a funny little picture. Billions of gallons of water being used to cool the data centres so they can operate at the rate needed, heating regions and causing major drought, millions of books being destroyed after being scanned, and all your information being fed into a system to train it to regurgitate more of these silly little pictures.
Yes I’m sure there's a thousand ‘good uses for AI’ but at the risk of the integrity of the very reality we live I ask, at what cost?
Now let me just place my pitchfork and torch to the side for a second whilst I finish this blog. Ultimately, it's very easy to get sidetracked on the bigger issues on AI but when it comes to the art world and more specifically the relationship with your tattoo artist, it comes down to respect. I personally find it quite offensive to come to someone and say can you replicate this AI rendered image on my flesh but I want it exactly like that, because you know if there was an AI robot that could tattoo it they sure as hell would go to it.
A good tattoo artist will have spent years collecting experience and knowledge from tattooing thousands of people over the years, they know what they are talking about. Even though they can seem negative when discussing your ideas, it's often because they are thinking about you and getting you the best piece. If you want an absolutely killer tattoo, give your artist a rough framework for your piece and then say, go crazy. See what kind of tattoo you end up with. Rely on your artists skill and talent, don't sway it away because you’ve seen it on ChatGPT and you know you want it that way. Let the artist do their thing and put the AI bot down.
At their core, artists are like hipsters, they like stuff that is new and cool and they like to say that they made it first. The ownership of artwork is important to them and that's why they adorn their shops with all their work and shiny little trinkets. They also want to share their work with you and would love you to have some but that's what makes it so awesome to say ‘This piece is from’ this guy or this girl. It's the ownership of the piece by that artist, it's also the ownership of the person who gets that tattoo. It's your badge for the sacrifice of pain and time. You feel proud to show off your tattoos and talk about them and about the experience, and then your friend goes and gets tattoos and the circle continues. This is my whole point, it's human. It's about connection, representation and expression.
AI stands as the antithesis of this; there is no ownership, there is no paper trail of ideas and thoughts or inspiration. It's the spat out amalgamation of millions of people's creativity and ingenuity, squeezed into a shiny box. Now not everyone holds the same view (though I get the feeling that a lot do) and some tattoo artists may have levelled the whole AI thing morally with themselves, but if you have ever wondered why the energy changed when you spoke so highly of AI in a room full of tattoo artists, some of what I said above may be why.
TLDR; Dont do AI M’kayyyy.
This is something that will continue to affect us in everyday life more and more as the powers at be seem to be intent on making it the next best thing. Almost like when they tried to make 3D TVs the next best technology, but almost everyone was just like ‘Nah, no thanks’ and then they stopped making 3D a thing. No matter how much we say we don't want it, they make it happen. So please, from everyone in the tattoo industry, stop using AI for tattoos. Just speak to your artist and let them do what they are good at! They do occasionally moan about drawing but they secretly really enjoy it. Anyways this has been my TED talk on AI in tattooing, thank you very much.
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