Shoulder blade tattoo maori samoan style

Hi,

It has been a while, but I just finished a nice tattoo piece. It's a design for the shoulderblade and back.
My customer wanted to cover quite some skin, with nice Maori Kirituhi shapes and some Samoan patterns.

First I made a template from the measurements I received, and started sketching:

I really enjoy to make the first basic koru shapes, this gives the tattoo a nice flow and "cuts" the large template into smaller pieces that can be filled with other intricate patterns, like triangles, spearheads and repetitive lines.


Once the basic layout is set, I move on to the next fase.



My client asked for some Samoan patterns, which are mainly formed by even lines filled with very detailed shapes (upper left side of the tatoo):




















In the centre of the pencil sketch I drew a row of arrowheads and triangles, but I removed it later as you can see in the completed sketch:

The final high resolution image was traced with a black felt-tip marker and scanned.

After optimizing it and creating a linedrawing I sent it to my customer.






Kind regards, Mark Storm
info@best-tatto-design.com
www.best-tatto-design.com

Maori sleeve design

Hi,

After a short break this weekend, I had multiple requests for custom tatoos. Some of it being very interesting and some less.
I picked the 3 best tattoo requests and started early this morning on one design.

It is a half/quarter sleeve in maori style, based on a custom design I have done earlier. You can find it on my custom page and look for "full sleeve maori tattooed".

The design was a bit smaller then the one on my gallery, around 20 cm wide and 23 cm high.

Here's the first basic outline of the tattoo and one with a little fill in it.




















The first design is a bit too straight on the borders, so I adjusted it to make it more playfull. My customer really loved the design and fill, so now I will finish the fill and finalize the maori design.
Will get back to you soon with an update on this design.

Regards, Mark

Forearm tatoo design seamless fit

Hi There,

This week I have been working on a large project, a maori / kirituhi forearm design.
Like other sleeves, this tattoo design had to be wrapped around the forearm completely and make a seamless fit.

Here you'll see a few pictures of the design in different stages:












The size of the design is 27 cm high and the width at the elbow is 30 cm and at the wrist it's 18 cm.

To make sure the design fit's seamless I first draw one side of the design and copy it. Then I place it against the other side and continue the design. I always try to keep the lines flowing and the fills interesting.

The customer liked the tattoo immediately, so I only had to make some minor changes to this drawing. Here are a few pictures of the process of tracing the design:















Tomorrow I will be working on an armband in maori / kirituhi design. Really enjoying this kind of projects, where I can use my own style and mix it with Maori shapes and symbols.

Regards, Mark

How to design a maori shoulder tattoo: Step four

I completely filled the tattoo sketch with maori, tribal and polynesian style shapes.
The design is finished in pencil and at this stage it's not very clean and tight.
















Here's the combined picture of both sides of the tattoo fitting perfectly and seamless:













Now I use a quality marker with a tip of 2mm, and start tracing the entire design.
After a few years of practise a got quite a steady hand for drawing straight sharp lines.

Tomorrow I post the entire Maori shoulder tattoo design.

Kind regards, Mark Storm
www.best-tatto-design.com