At A Glance Author Aron Contact Aron@bme.anon When A year ago Artist Nathan Robataille Studio Unlimited Inkorporated Location London, Ontario, Canada Being in the light body mod industry for about ten years has exposed me to a lot of different forms of adornment, and I really just started adding to my collection of tattoos and piercings. I`m originally from Windsor, Ontario. This particular city is great for tattoos and general body piercing services, but as far as everything else goes, there`s not enough people interested in implants, scarring, etc..(at least not when I lived there)
Now I`ve been living in London , Ontario for almost 31/2 years. I opened a tattoo/body piercing studio with 2 friends, and when I mentioned that I would like to start looking into offering other services, they were all for it.
A good friend of mine named Tank (not a jock!)told me about his brother Nathan, who had finished a course in San Francisco the year before learning to brand. It imediatley peaked my intrest. I told Tank about my wanting to see some of Nate`s work, and he told me should definitley come back around the same time next week, because he was designing a fairly large piece for his arm.
When I saw the branding the following week, I was impressed. It had nice clean lines, and Tank said it didn`t hurt as bad as he thought.
I said to myself, "this is my chance", and asked Tank to bring his brother around my shop sometime.
So, about a week later, Tank brought Nathan in, and we hit it off pretty quickly. He explained the procedure to me, and sounded very knowledgable, which put me at ease right away. When I gave him a breif idea of what I wanted and asked about a price, he smiled and told me about a tattoo that he's been thinking on for a while, a black chaos wheel around his elbow, and was wondering if we could work out a trade. Now, as anyone in this business knows, bartering is a wonderful thing!
So we scheduled an appointment for the tattoo, and planned on doing the branding the same day. I took the next couple days and drew up a couple of designs. I had an idea of what I wanted, and finally came up with the right one. It was going to go on my left calf,(one of the few spaces I have left!).
The day came, and I have to admit, I was nervous. Not whining, shaking all over nervous, but nervous none the less. The tattoo turned out great, we made it all chipped and cracked looking, giving it a cool contrast to the solid black design. Nathan proceeded to check over the drawing I did for my leg, checking to see that the lines weren't to close together, and had me make the stencil for it.
As he started prepping for the branding, I started to realize how nervous I really was, the closest thing to a branding I've had was a burn from a lighter!
Nathan doesn't use the traditional striking method for all his work, on mine he used a cautery pen. He said it would be a slight burning feeling at first, and then turn into a dragging kind of pressure. I was totally surprised when he did the first line, and caught the first whif of burnt skin,(although it smelled more like burnt hair!?) It wasn't half as bad as I had expected, I just kept taking slow, deep breaths, and before i knew it, it was finished. The whole piece took about 30-35 minutes, a lot less time than if it was a tattoo that size.
Looking back on it, I think the worst part of it was getting the smell out of the shop!
Now, the healing. That was the worst part of the process. Not only do you have to peel the scabs after a week,(when it's really tender) but it is important to irritate it in order for it to heal properly. I would soak it in the bath for about 30 min; then my girlfriend would take out her hostility towards me by peeling the scabs out VERY slowly. Then came the fun part; I would scrub it down with anti-bacterial soap and a clean toothbrush.
I had to repeat this process every 3-4 days or so, and it got more and more painful each time. After about 11/2 months later, it was finally healed(you can see the finished brand on this site under Nathan@Unlimited.
Since then I've gotten 2 more brands, I have seven circles down my left shin, and an abstract eye branded on the left side of my chest, which, by the way, was the one most painful experience I have been through involving modification.
Next, I'm working on covering my whole right arm with a solid black tattoo, then I'm going to get a scarring design from my wrist to my elbow over top of the black ink, totally removing it from the skin. And that's only the beginning...