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Hey everyone, i'm a be tattooed man and so far my ink is meaningful to me, I have a japanese koi tattoo and water dragon symbolising my journey through life and reaching a certain goal at the end (hence the dragon) and now I'm looking to get two smallish symbols or pics one on the front of my shoulders near my collarbone to symbalise honesty and happiness or protection and good fortune, I have been browsing the web but thought i'd ask on dakka as there seems to be some very educated people on here, I was originally looking to get two swallows but the symbolism for them is more used if you're away from home (military) and you'll always return or to symbolise your loyalty to your partner as the birds mate for life. so can anyone help me out? the size i'm after is about no bigger than 10cm by 10cm i'm not looking to go all over my chest yet!


Thanks Dakkaites


Nerdfest09

I was going to make a joke about getting two swallows but I'm too mature for that, so I'd do something original and get something in Australian that means something in chinese...Unique and Ironic!

Get a tattoo of this.

Do et... DO ETT NOW.

Needs more bats...

How about this?

Cheesecat wrote:
How about this?

That just made me spit out my water!

OT: I would probably find a quote that really strikes home with you and get that as a tattoo, or a lotus flower to represent perseverance. They are beautiful flowers that grow out of the muck.

You were drinking water!

That just made me spit out my vodka!

xxBlazinGhostxx wrote:

Cheesecat wrote:
How about this?

That just made me spit out my water!

OT: I would probably find a quote that really strikes home with you and get that as a tattoo, or a lotus flower to represent perseverance. They are beautiful flowers that grow out of the muck.

I'm glad I made your day.

Do these little tatoos need to match?

How about using the mudras for inspiration. You could have a gesturing hand on each side.

You can see that this lady had a very large one done:

have a tattoo in chinese/korean/japanese (damn letters look alike imo) saying " this is really original"

on the serious side tho im with the monster thing crepping out of the chest.

I hope I can help here (I am an apprenticing Tattoo Artist after all and it's part of my job to know symbolism ). If you want to represent luck and protection you could stick with the asian theme you have going with your koi and do asian items.

For instance the Foo Dog represents protection as they where the guardians of temples and important people in chinese mythology but traditionally they are represented in pairs. A male with a glass orb in its paws and its mouth open and a female with her mout
closed and a Foo Dog cub, but you could just get one.

For luck the chinese believed thatthe frog was lucky, that's why you'll see frog statues in fountains where you put coins because it is supposed to bring you good luck. If you didn't want to do asian you could do the sailor theme as their is alot of symbolism there as well. You already said you where looking into 2 swallows and their major symbolism in nautical terms is guidance.

Sailors at sea knew that they where close to land if they saw a Swallow so it was seen as a good omen. Sailors would often get tattoos of a rooster and a pig 1 on each foot (but you could get them anywhere). This was for good luck because whenever there was a ship wreck usually the only things that would survive where the chickens and pigs because the crates carrying them would float.

Now if you really want something meaningfull all you have to do is think of something important to you that represents what you want. For instance 3 things that are very important to me are my mother, the sea and history. So my first tattoo was a sailor jerry style ship flanked by 2 sailor mermaids and underneath is a heart and banner that says MOM in old lettering.

In the end people can make all sorts of suggestions and there are alot of symbols out there that could represent what your looking for (angel, a shield, 4 leaf clover etc.). But if you want something that really represents you then it shoulden't be just some symbolic item. It should be something that if someone else saw it they would have no clue why you got it. But to you it would have meaning and that's all that matters. Does that make sense?

nerdfest09 wrote:I'm looking to get two smallish symbols or pics one on the front of my shoulders near my collarbone to symbalise honesty and happiness or protection and good fortune,

Protection/Good Fortune

A Four Lead Clover inside the U of a Horseshoe is a classic tattoo design symbolizing good fortune and good luck. Place a Four Leaf Clover inside a Horseshoe as the herald on a Shield and you'd have a great design . This is another classic design if you want something in a more traditional tattoo motif:




Honesty/Happiness

This is a lot harder. A happy face, a cloud with a rainbow, a smiling sun, all of those are symbols of happiness. But I'd totally laugh at a guy who had anything like that as a tattoo. I can't even think of any symbols of honest, except maybe Abe Lincoln. Maybe a shining penny with Abe's portrait? But then that's almost a symbol of good luck (the Lucky Penny).

If you already have some Japanese style designs, maybe just go with the kanji for honesty and fortune?

How about a Buseytroll?


BUSEYTROLLS DEPLOYED!!

Sooo creepy.

How meaningful can it be if you have to ask total strangers for idea's?

Djones, i'm after ideas, I shall put my own slant on the design when I figure it out to completion, all i am asking the people of Dakka what they know are the traditional designs to represent the imagery i'm looking for, if someone said a gutted cat means happiness then I wouldn't get that done but if they said a swallow means death and I was thinking of that then I wouldn't go ahead with it, so i'm just trying to make sure my ideas match up with what I want so I don't get anything unintentionally offensive or something that most people associate with a completely different slant on what i want it to mean, that's all, i'm not trying to get total strangers to do my tatt, and I trust the people on here to give me good honest ideas and critisism, as you've done, lets hope I can figure it out soon with all of your help, including you Djones! :-)

For protection you could do a shield, for good fortune there's the four leaf clover, for honesty how about a balanced scale and for happiness I don't know. All I know about what makes you happy is dogs, transformers, 80's nostalgia, chicks, friends

and warhammer 40k.

How about a tatt of chicks and friends all dressed as transformers, each holding a shield shaped like a clover and balancing on scales whilst riding my dogs?? now that's cool! :-)

nerdfest09 wrote:How about a tatt of chicks and friends all dressed as transformers, each holding a shield shaped like a clover and balancing on scales whilst riding my dogs?? now that's cool! :-)

I think you just won in your own thread man.

nerdfest09 wrote:How about a tatt of chicks and friends all dressed as transformers, each holding a shield shaped like a clover and balancing on scales whilst riding my dogs?? now that's cool! :-)

AWWW shucks, thanks guys....maybe you two could be riding my dogs ?

nerdfest09 wrote: AWWW shucks, thanks guys....maybe you two could be riding my dogs ?

lol this is awesome, you know, I may have to get that actually inked on me now just to do this thread justice! I still don't know where all you awesome people get those pics!

Girls as 80's transformers...



Or you could expand it for awesome +1

Oh my god, I just realised I wasn't born with enough skin to get everything I want done now! and probably not enough pain threshold either! :-) although 6 1/2 hours wasn't too bad?...hmmm let's see, if i'm 5 foot 10 and weigh 70 kilo's... divide skin elasticity by weight.....multiply by height x free skin.... = Yep, have to get more now!

What about getting a tattoo that says

"To ruin ones self for poetry is an honour"

ghosty wrote:What about getting a tattoo that says

"To ruin ones self for poetry is an honour"

OH I like that one *stolen*

Get a Jack Russell on your ass and the words "small cock, fast arse" next to it.

"such is life" is on of the best Australian quotes. Unfortunately so many bogan's and douche's i know have gotten that tattoo and has lost all meaning for me. Perhaps connect your tattoo with your family background (for e.g. if you had aboriginal background you would use aboriginal background/symbols incorporated into your design or for e.g. i have a Saxon heritage so i would use their language for the text)

I don't get why you would want a tattoo. All it takes is the slightest bit of regret about it (Be it about what the tattoo is, where it is etc.) and it will annoy the feth out of you for the rest of your life. Why don't you learn to express yourself in a different way? Instead of in the form of an irreversible cliche.