Interview: Tattoodo – the Place for Artists & Tattoos

October 17, 2014

Tattoo and art are definitely intertwined, but it is not as easy to find a real artist available to give you a genuine personal masterpiece to adorn your skin. Website Tattoodo is offering to connect people craving for a perfect tattoo and artists from all over the world around a simple and convenient interface. With the astute advice of international tattoo artist Ami James, Tattoodo is a solution to all the shy tattoo lovers who got lost in the maze of internet and expansive offers of tattoos and art. But it also a great way for young artists to showcase their art, connect with potential customers and fans and gain self-confidence. Tattoodo is overflowing with talented people, waiting for you to brief them for your next piece of body art!

“We created Tattoodo for that purpose : to open the doors to better art. We help people to come up with the perfect design for them. We are also opening the possibilities to the artists who are not always making a great living with their local business. Now, they can work globally and sell their art through Tattoodo. No more starving artists, we want to change that, really!” – Ami James, tattoo artist, painter and designer.

Interview with co-founder Johan Plenge.

How did you come up with the concept of Tattoodo ?

I wanted to get a tattoo. But it being my fist tattoo I didn’t know where to go or look. I had an idea of what I wanted, but couldn’t visualize the design. So I did what a lot of people do. Search Google for inspiration. But all I found was crappy stock designs. I wanted someone to sketch up my ideas, so I could see if it would look good as a tattoo. I talked to my boss at that time, Mik, who is an experienced IT entrepreneur, and we started looking into the market and the numbers. We quickly discovered that I wasn’t the only one searching for tattoos online. There are actually more than 147M tattoo related searches on Google each month to be exact! The only challenge was that Mik and I didn’t know anything about tattoos. So we reached out to Ami James and after a few calls we met in Copenhagen. Ami turned out to be the coolest guy and had a lot of ideas. After that meeting we started building a platform for custom tattoo designs, which later became Tattoodo.

What do you think Tattoodo is bringing to tattoo and art?

First of all Tattoodo makes it easier for first timers to get started. You will learn a lot about your idea when you start working on the design with our artists. About the style you like and the amount of details and elements it can include. So Tattoodo will send on clients to the tattoo shops that are better prepared and the chances of getting a tattoo you love are much higher.

Tattoodo is giving new artists the opportunity to design tattoos and explore the tattoo art. You don’t have to be a tattoo artist to join Tattoodo. Of course there are some basic guidelines that you need to know. Not all designs will work for a tattoo. We try to guide our artists and the result has been amazing. There are so many creative and different designs submitted on the site all the time, because we have all types of artists participating from around the world.

How does Tattoodo work? Could you explain how to get a unique tattoo design?

It works like this. You briefly describe your idea and choose how much you want to pay. Our artists will then start to sketch up designs based on your idea, competing to win the money in what we call a design contest. At the end of the contest you pick the design you dig the most and the artist gets the prize money. You can see Ami James explaining how Tattoodo is working in this video.

How can an artist become a Tattoodo designer?

You just have to apply on the website and submit some of your artwork. Then someone from Tattoodo will review your application and get back to you within a day. Once you have been approved you can start joining the design contests. As an artist you also get your own artist page where you can showcase your portfolio to all the Tattoodo users.

What happens when you’ve finally chosen your design?

You just print it out and take it to your local tattoo shop. The tattoo artist might have to re-work the design a bit before they can begin the session.

What else does Tattoodo offer?

We also have a design store where we offer exclusive art prints and iphone cases from some of the best tattoo artists in the world including Mike Rubendall, Tim Hendricks, Henning Jorgensen & Claudia De Sabe. And the list of artists is growing every day. We also have a very popular blog where we showcase great tattoo art and news from the industry.

Do you plan to develop Tattoodo with new functionality/products?

Yes all the time! Among other things we are working on a ‘Hire me’ feature, so you can work one-to-one with your favorite Tattoodo designer. We are also going to launch a shop section, where you will be able to browse tattoo shops, view their work, read reviews etc.

How do you see the future of Tattoodo, of tattoo and of art?

I think Tattoodo will become a community for tattoo and art collectors, artists and shops. A place where artists can show off their work, collectors can browse inspiration, buy tattoo designs and locate a good tattoo shop. Tattoos will keep developing in new directions. Social media does that everybody share their work now. So as soon as someone has done something completely new, it doesn’t take long for the whole industry to see it. This inspires other artist to take it to new levels and new styles emerge.