Tattoo Session

Most answers to this question give you a size chart. Small tattoo — one hour. Sleeve — 20 hours. Those numbers are real but they obscure the more interesting variables — why the same sleeve takes eight sessions with one artist and four with another, why fine line often takes longer than bold traditional of the same size, and why some collectors can sit for eight hours while others need to stop at three regardless of how much they want to continue. Here is the honest breakdown of every variable that actually determines how long a tattoo session should be.

Most collectors show up to a long session with no real plan for what they ate, when they ate it, or whether they are hydrated. The adrenaline masks the problem until hour three when the crash hits and the session gets hard fast. Here is the physiology behind what actually happens to your body in the chair — and the pre-session nutrition protocol that keeps you performing from the first hour through the last.