Tattoo Flash

Tattoo Flash

Even if, like most artists, your tattoo parlor is covered from wall to wall with tattoo flash art, you’re probably always on the lookout for new and interesting flash.  After all, the flash is the first thing customers see when they peer in the window—the designs that will inspire them for their first or second or twentieth tattoo. When it comes to displaying, organizing and adding to your collection, there are some things to keep in mind.

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Organizing Your Tattoo Flash

While tattoo parlors tend to feature eclectic design choices, they are, after all, businesses, and need to be user-friendly. That means they need to be organized. Obviously, you want the focus to be on your original designs, but if you’ve been tattooing for a while, you’ll have so much that you’ll need a good system in place. It’s a question that has plagued artists for years: how best to organize your flash. Should you organize by topic? By design style? By level of intricacy? Remember: your main focus should be on the customer.

That means having the most unique tattoo flash displayed prominently so as to inspire your customers. If you do have a practical number of different design styles, then you’ll want to make sure representatives from each are also featured. As for the rest, most customers come in having some idea of what they want, whether it’s some form of lion tattoo or some kind of tribal ink. Making sure that your books and display stands are clearly organized by theme and design will make it easier for your customers to find what they’re looking for.

Tattoo Flash Display Stands and Display Racks

 

Specially designed flash stands and racks are key for tattoo artists, especially those in small spaces. Wall-mounted racks are perfect for those looking to maximize space, while those with a little more room to burn might benefit from free standing ones. Try to keep a little bit of space in between each type of tattoo so that you have room to add to your racks and stands without having to reorganize everything.

Adding to Your Tattoo Flash

While trading flash is a time-honored tradition for artists, more and more commercial flash artists have arrived on the scene, offering copyrighted designs, complete with line drawings. While some of these flash artists have never inked an arm in their lives, many of them are tattooist themselves looking to supplement their incomes.

Obviously, the quality of the design speaks for itself, but there’s often no substitute for seeing the design yourself. Conventions are a great way to check out different reputable flash art, and some commercial flash art websites will send you samples. There are also a number of websites offering free flash art; as you’ve no doubt suspected, a lot of these websites rip off artists, either pulling copyrighted or otherwise original designs from images posted online. In general, it’s simply not worth it to try and add to your tattoo flash from free online websites.