Octo-phant

Sooo stoked to do this! A guy came to me, who was from Arizona and wanted something with an all seeing eye, and the rest was up to me. So I decided to have some fun and tattoo two of my most favourite animals as one. The Octo-phant. Most notorious for its third eye power, and gnarly dripping tentacles. Enjoy!

So heres a few tattoos I havent had time to uplaod either. The gun was a fun walk-in from Calgary. whipped the drawing up in 30 minutes, tattooed it on her in about 3 hours. was super fun and bright. The seahorse was on a frined of mine, We still gotta put in some background...

And the Bird cage is also on another friend. Covering up a bird ironically haha. Keep checking back for more! gots lots and lots to post, just no time, or bad photos, of unfinished things. but soon there wil be lots of things to see.

thanks!

Massive Lioness to start.

So, my friend Braeden who was a friend of a friend, came to the shop and tells me he wants me to do his first tattoo ever. So im stoked already, then he tells me he wants a Giant lioness on his ribs. And hes a big dude, so this thing would be a backpiece on most people haha. It weas really fun to do something differnent like this. We might go back into it after the summer and add some mose background or something. For now this is how she looks. By the way, he sat like a champ, especially for the spot and the fact that its his first. Good job dude!

The Crow and the Wolf

Another addition to my bro Kevin. Did a huge shin smash of a calm and relaxed crow ontop of a wolf's head. went for a really dark look for this one. might add a few more small splashes of colour once it heals, bu pretty stoked on it thus far!

Crabby crab crab.

pretty stoked on the moon and crab i did on this guy named Rasmus. He is from sweden or switzerland. i cant remeber, but rad dude, and super fun tattoo. I love crabs. Plus another one I banged out in two hours and a bit later that night. Now im off to bed to sleep of my days dental work, and start a full day of drawing tomorrow. Stoked!

Beastie Boys and Star beads.

For my bro Garret Egles who is a rad as heck designer/card wizard whom makes my cards look fancy and gets me clients all the time ;)

It was his turn to get ill. He had a bunch of start on his arm that got in the way of his pocket watch tattoo. so when i doubt, recycle! So instead of just going under or behing or around the star. we turned it into a bead with the rest of his chain on the pocket watch! a purple glass one to be exact. also, we did this hand there too over a year ago! my first full hand piece ever!

Octo-geisha v.s Horned Owl in boy briefs.

So I met this person on the skytrain one day while I was talking about tattoos to a friend (cuz thats all I have to talk about, that and my lovely Amanda) and this girl named Yu jumped in and said how she wanted a Octopus lday and a owl with horn, little did she know im HUGE on both of those. So i jumped at the oppourtunity to give her a card. 6 months later, Yu come in to the new shop and lays out her ideas. Octo-lady with Horned owl person wearing boy briefs. I threw in the acorns and oak leaves and rope and giesha part. You know, just so it all made sense.

But it theres one thing i love about art, is it really dosent have to make any sense what so ever.
I normally try to not post unfinished tattoos, but i was soo stoked on this one that i just couldnt help it. the rest will be purples and seafoams for the octo-lady and burgundys and ochres and blues for the horned owl. Stay tuned, i got lots more to post, and one more sitting on this. We did 3 hours just on this part, and she sat like a champ, but her budget could only go so far that day, so more to come very soon! thanks!

Red Rose

This lady traveled all the way from Auckland to Vancouver and thought it wold be fun to get tattooed while she was here. Somehow found me on www.myspace.com/archaictattoo and messaged me, then sure enough she came in a few day later and we whipped this rose up to cover a pink flamingo. had a blast with the placement and size. I love doing roses!

Sugar skulls and Canopic jars

A few months ago, I did a small little skull inside this guys ear, and we were both stoked on how it turned out. then a few days ago he tells me he wants a sugar skull on his hand, and to do whatever, just something different but still classic. So a couple days after that this is what I came up with. I really had fun doing this, I love tattooing hands, and even more so, tattooing hands on every nook and cranny, filling in every little spot. So stoked! Thanks Steven.

Also, today I had a consultation for a super rad tattoo. Im so excited to get working on it right away, but its definatly gonna take some planning. I don't wanna spoil to much right now, but its a mssive phoenix sleeve, but everything is egyptian themed. So instead of Hanya masks, peonies and traditional wind swirls, theres the Anubis god (the jackal) Canopic jars with a heart in one, and a swarm of scarabs in sandy wind swirls. So I geuss I did just spoil it, but I'm too excited. Stay classy!

Violet Rose

So a friend of mine got a rose on the back of her arm sometime ago, and just today we added a violet on the same spot of the other arm. The rose is fully healed in the photo and the violet is super fresh. I had a blast doing both of these, tried out some highlight styles and such, and just had dun all around. Took me about an hour and a half for each one I think, so dont let the photos fool you. they look pretty huge in this, but they are about palm sized overall. Just above the e,bow on the back of the arm. Anywho, im off to the island to get tattooed by Ryan Gagne!!! pretty stoked. getting a snail-octopus on my head. should be rad!

"There's a dirty wind blowing, There's a storm front comin in"

The octopus in the stormy clouds, and the umbrelli-fish sleeve! finally got to work on this again! did the outlining of this a couple months ago, and he came back last week to get 3 more hours done on it. Im pretty happy with what we got done so far, but i cannot wait until we get the umbrelli-fish coloured. gonna be rad! the story behind this is the octopus in the clouds is like a storm, and it comes and scoops up water with its umbrella, then those umbrellas turn into giant flying umbrell jellyfish (umbrelli-fish) and wreak havoc amongst the world!

I will post more progress when were done, but right now i gotta go get ready to watch Enter The Dragon with my amazing awesome Amanda.

The Mysterious Madame

Had no appointments booked for a Saturday which was super wierd, but figured I would have
time to do some painting or something. Thankfully my good pal Kevin; who got the Hand and Compass piece, aswell as the Jackalope, came in to fill up some of my time and we wernt sure what to do at first. Ponderd about doing a wolf with a cut off hand wearing a cloak, but after some more thought we decied that would make a much cooler rib piece, hopefully to be done in the future.

I had this painting lying around, unfinished but close enough. I hadn't had the time latley to finish some art, but the second he saw it a week ago he was really into it.

So it was an obvious choice to add on to the rest of his arm. Matched up perfectly with the rest of his work we had done, so all around I'm very pleased with how it turned out, and now we have a much more epic piece to be done in the future!

The Great 'Horned' Owl ranked superior.

There was once a place where creatures ruled the land. And in this place there was both a Crow and a Great Horned Owl that wore monocles. This ofcoarse meant competition, and competition ofcoarse means someone has to win. After an epic battle between the two, the Owl came out as the winner. He was as wise as he was strong. Wisdom grows much like a tree, but for the Great Horned Owl it has another source. The End. enjoy!

Oh darn. forgot to add in the last post. Here is a fun rose I done a week or two ago and meant to post. Was really fun to do just this on its own. She is getting a Violet i believe on the same spot, but other arm. Her Grandmas name is Violet Rose i think. cool idea!!!

Rise or Die aka The Collect.

Seriously have been picking away at this since 2008 when i worked in Gastown at Irezumi Tattoo with Jamie. got the original idea back then, sketched it. lt it sit for a long time. Looked at it and revised small things at another shop i worked at after that. The started at Eastside Tattoo Parlour, and finally did a final outline on watercolour paper. sat on it for oh say about 6 months now. Painted about half of it a few weeks ago, and finished it today!!! Been to busy to give it the tim eit needed. But had a slow week so i took advantage of it. Now im right back at it, so i hope i can still squeeze in time to do more things like this. I got a cool owl in the works. same size. Im doing it for an art show im hopeing to get into. Called "The Cheaper Show". Its pretty awesome, lots of amazing artists sell there art for one basic equal price. So fingers crossed for now, but may aswell get an early start considering how long it took me to do this.

p.s. more tattoos soon, got lots on the go. so make sure to check back!

Finally! got to colour this thing! His original plan was black and grey only but after some convincing he decided to get colour! We outlined it a couple weeks ago, and did the colour today. All together it took about 3 and a half hours of fun time. Sat like a champ the whole way through. I should have some healed photos in a couple weeks aswell. Also on a side side note i started the Final Fantasy half sleeve. Pretty stoked so far. ill post photos when we make more progress, and the same goes for the octopus and umbrelli-fish hal sleeve. Can not wait to get that done! until next time....

It seems when I do one thing, it always comes in waves of it. Like there was a time were I did a lot of girl faces, and now it seems to be hearts, and i think the next wave will be full of sugar skulls! wich im really looking forward to.....

I think its a good thing that happens, because I get in the habit of drawing that particular piece so many times by the end of the wave it becomes so natural. But this one in particular was really different, and easy to play around with. Thanks!

This was probably one of the most fun little tattoos I have done in awhile, I dont know what it is about it, but I love it! Maybe its my passion for tennage mutant ninja turles, and this is like there baby version or something. either way, had tons of fun. would like to do more sea creatures!

This is a sleeve I have been working on for the past few months, and still have a bit more to go on it, but he moved to the east coast for school for awhile, so we have to put it on hold :( but here are some photos of it until then!

Done with tattoo ink and pen on regular lame paper. ran out of water colour paper, but worked out okay I suppose.

Year 2010 is officaly the year of the Jackalope! I came to this conclusion after doing my first tattoo of the year, wich was ofcoarse the jackalope. I also did a really awesome sugar skull with a candle and some roses, wich i should be finishing soon! On top of that I have a bunch of really fun pieces in the work about to be finished, such as Godzilla v.s. Gamera half sleeve, Ocotopus in the clouds spilling out ink rain from his umbrella turning into crazy waves with stuff strewn about, and maybe another cool octopus. Also, I've found a bit of spare time to paint latley, so keep your eyes peeled and check back on the regular for all the new things I have to share this year! I'm absolutley stoked on how this year has started and the anticipation for all the things on the way is killing me. So stay tuned!

Some stuff I've been working on latley. Did the pigeons awhile ago as an outline, then coloured them last week. He took good care, and it pretty much healed up in less than a week! Some more colour to go on the tape and what not, so I'm looking forward to that!

As for the hand, we outlined and shaded a few weeks ago and just put this colour in today. When the time comes were gonna finish off the back of his arm, and maybe put bluey cloudy stuff in the background to pop out the hand. stay tuned!

Started this a couple months ago, and finished it aswell a few weeks ago, but this is the only good photo I have of it. So here it is. Just staying black and grey with this pice, colour would be fun, but the change was nice!

Been working on this bit by bit for the past month or so. Got my friend Garret to scan it in and do the lettering cuz he's a wiz on the photoshop deely. Super stoked on how it turned out. It should be available as a t-shirt very soon. Email me if you would like to maybe order one if you can't make it into our shop. Thanks!!!

Really happy with how this one turned out in the end. Done in two sessions, and we will be adding more stuff around it eventually, but this is a good start!


Super rad guy named Kevin from Ireland came to me with this idea, and many others to come. But for now we'll stick with this. Still need to put colour into it, ill leave it as a surprise.....

Once upon a time, a few months ago, a young fellow came to me asking for a tattoo. In his explaination to me, of what he wanted, I was told it would be palm sized all together, and the ship was only 2 inches tall and 1 inch wide. And it was to go were this rose is roughly.

But, after a bit of talking he soon realized that its better to do it right the first time. and by right i mean s big as you can at the moment. so we went for this colourful idea instead. still had the elements he wanted with the ship and the sun and the clouds, but heres a prime example of hows sometimes its good to just let the chips fall were they may. He was most definatly a good client to work on, he was pretty down for any ideas i had, and sat like a champ for hours. Look forward to mixing up a heart and octopus on his lower arm in the near future. stay tuned!

Did this one about 3 weeks ago now, should be doing the colour on it soon! just so happy with it so far so i wanted to post it up. Im trying to convince her to either get the back side of that camera on the inner forearm with an all seeing eye in the spot you look through and some more roses, or what i think would be even cooler.... a bunch of scatterd polariods with mini traditional flash on em, or whatever really. We shall see how it goes I suppose.

On a recent trip to seattle amanda and I went to the science fiction museum, and i took this photo with a fish eye lense. it was like looking into another planet.

Painting I am currently working on. "The Collect"

Aliens and name dropping

ALIEN!!! Yay, so rad. The story to this one is that this big grey is face-palming himself in dismay. Notice in the background, Earth is focused on North America, did we fuck it up or what?

The art was originaly designed by our good pal and fellow artist Garret Egles. Check his stuff out at www.emptees.com/people/9210-garret and commision him to do a t-shirt or poster or myspace layout for your band or something. Super rad.

The piece is still in progress, we added such fun things like a ying-yang crater on the ditch of his arm, and NASA space helmet on the elbow, a nebula that's on the front of the bicep, and a wicked blackhole on the back of his arm. More photos to come when we're closer to finishing it!

Did this one early this year, around april or so. My old boss at a shop i used to work at called Irezumi. Jamie is super into circuit bending, its when you take old music toys, or toys that make sound (like a speak and spell) and you mess with the circuits, bend' them if you will. and add on oscillators and other things that a sythesizer might have on it. then it becomes an instrument of crazy awesome noise. so, since it was so rad we decided to tattoo it on him as a going away present to him, since i was soon to leave his shop for another. This was initially something out of my element with doing only black and grey for it, but it wasnt a struggle at anytime, it was an enjoyable piece to do since it was kinda different in a way.

This is a new style im sorta working on, amongst many other things. Its a four horned goat with a few random red orb things. i just sketched it up, and i owed a friend some tattoo work, for a trade i did for some of his art. (google mike shantz) he didnt really care what he got, but this was up his alley for sure, so it all worked out pretty rad, had a ton of fun doing this one, especially the little red bits. we were gonna do some zombie looking greens in the face, but left it how it is since he had to leave town before the second session. but it looks done to me.

My name is Mitch Kirilo and I have been tattooing for a couple years now. I work at EastSide Tattoo Parlour in Vancouver, Canada. I gots the myspace and a website, but this blog deely seems pretty cool, so im gonna try it out. ill post tattoos and there stories as often as i can, so keep checking back i suppose?