Third Annual Samurai Fiction Contest

The entry phase of the third annual Samurai Fiction contest is now underway. Between now the entry fee is only $7, and will increase incrementally as the entry deadline approaches in 2007. Details can be found on the information page for the contest, however this year for every five entries, the Samurai Archives will add an additional $50 to the total winnings. Winnings will be split 80/20 between the winner and the runner up, with possible prizes for honorable mention. Encourage anyone who may be interested to join - the more people who join, the more stories - and the larger the potential winnings.

Dragon Tattoo - Part 3

Session 5 is now finished, and all of the scales are now complete. All that remains is coloring for the fire, teeth, tongue, claws, horns, and spikes.

Here is the portion of the dragon on my arm, after session 4:



And here is the same area after session 5:



The scales are for the most part three shades of blue - purple blue, light blue, and a blue-white combination. Darker colors were used in the shaded areas for depth, and the previous black and white shading adds to the effect.

This is a picture of the coloring that was done this session:



This session was 2.5 hours, no breaks. The next session should finish it off.

Everything you ever wanted to know about Haniwa...

...But were afraid to ask.

Prof. Nagaeyari has started to post pics from his trip to Japan, and has an extensive blog post on the Japanese clay Haniwa:
Ancient Japan: Haniwa 埴輪

Best Samurai Film Decapitation

There has been an ongoing discussion on the forum about the best decapitation in a Samurai film. A few that were mentioned were the decapitation of Bijomaru in "Azumi", the deleted scene in "The Last Samurai" where Ujio lops the head off of an offending villager. My personal favorite is a scene near the start of Mibu Gishiden (When the Last Sword is Drawn), in which the main character kills a Samurai who doens't have the "guts" to commit seppuku. I happen to have a clip right here:

Japanese Dragon Tattoo - Part 2

I thought I'd show some specific detail in the process.

The first image shows the initial outline. The section in red highlights the approximate area where the second image shows. Sort of a "Before" and "After".


The highlighted area above indicates the approximate area of the image below.


Highlighted area after the 3rd session. As a side note, every scale was done freehand with the tattoo gun - no tracing there.

As I continue, I'll post updates.

Japanese Dragon Tattoo

In sticking with "traditional" Japanese images, tattoo number six is a Japanese dragon. So far, nothing for hanzismatter.com. (inside joke)

So far for the dragon, the breakdown goes like this:

Session 1: 3.5 hours. Full outline.
Session 2: 2.5 hours. Scales and detail.
Session 3: 2.5 hours. Shading.
Session 4: 3 hours. base coloring.

Total: 11.5 hours - and it's not done yet...! (The 11.5 hours doesn't count the time taken to decide what colors to use, the freehand drawings, or the Jaeger or Bushmills breaks - that would put it at around 16 hours).

I'm probably looking at three more sessions. Unfortunately I only thought to take pictures after session 1 and session 4, and just a small slice of session 3, so some of the development is missed. Regardless, here is the original outline after the first session. Everything is custom. Basically, Mike (the guy who drew and tattooed it) drew the head freehand on paper, and transfered it to my chest. Then with a sharpie and some highlighters, he drew the body, arms, legs, fire, etc. freehand:


Session 1

Basically, everything behind the ears and horns were drawn freehand right on my shoulder and arm. You'll notice the lack of scales, shading, etc. This is just what is unofficially known as the "battle outline".


Session 3

This is an image of the tattoo after session 3 - since I didn't take a full pic of it, I had to grab this from the lower corner of the picture I took after session 4. At this point, this section still hasn't been touched since session 3. You'll see the scales (added during the 2nd session) and the shading, which was done during session 3. You can compare this to the same section (just below the claws) in the above pic of the first session.


Session 4

This is after session 4. It is hard to see because of the flash, but three different shades of blue are used on the head, and every scale is colored seperately, the base is a bluish-purple, and the outer edge is a lighter blue, with a sliver of negative space (skin) left at the outside edge of each. This is right after it was done, so the ink is very thick and dark. In a few weeks all the excess ink will come out, and it will look more uniform.

So far maybe 1/5th is colored. The next session will continue the scales, most likely the other details will wait until after that. The current plan is for the underbelly to be pink, the horns along the back will probably be red, as well as the tongue. The fire will of course be orange-yellow, and the eyes will stay as is, but will have some white added. The horns on the head, which are based on deer antlers, will be brown. Still not sure about the claws. Might go with white.

Even though this was the 4th session, I didn't know until I sat in the chair which color we were going to do the dragon. Originally, the plan was to do a dark pine-green, but we eventually decided to match the colors of the two hannya on my back - one is red with blue eyes and a blue tongue, and the other is blue with red eyes and a red tongue. I'm not the artist, so I leave the details to Mike. So I think the assumption here is that I'll be getting a similar dragon on the other arm, with the colors reversed. But that would put at least another 20 hours ahead of me with what I need to finish on this one, and the next one, and those needles are not particularly fun. Sort of like a Japanese "gaman taikai" type TV show.

For the heck of it, I played around with photoshop, and this is what I came up with. I thought it was interesting: