tattoo safety Archives - Stick and Poke Tattoo Kit®

Tattooing with ashes: Q and A
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Tattooing with ashes: Q and A

science of tattoo, stick and poke, stick and poke technique, tattoo art, tattoo artist, tattoo ink, tattoo safety

Tattooing with ashes: Q and A

Known as a "commemorative tattoo," using the cremation ashes of a loved one to be physically integrated as part of your tattoo has always intrigued me. I decided to share what I had found out - and then we can consider how this could be applied to hand poking at home.

A Commemorative Stick and Poke tattoo...

AW! What a sweet way to remind yourself of a beloved person or pet...by carrying them with you, always! Become ONE with the being you loved. When I think of my kitty passing, I would jump at the chance to keep her with me in this special way. Maybe the most mini paw print outline?

How do you make the ink?

From what I gather on the internets, making this highly custom ink is a booming business. Strangely connecting two unlikely bedfellows - funeral homes and tattoo [...]

SnP Team2023-01-04T12:57:52-08:00

How to stick and poke tattoo in 5 steps

At home hand poke tattooing is at once really easy AND really hard. It's both very safe AND can be dangerous! The Complexity! No wonder people want to know how to stick and poke tattoo.

Stick & Poke Tattoo Kit® provides the most detailed, up to date information on how to tattoo in a little 42 page booklet - that has been updated yearly since 2015! We also have a bunch of helpful videos. Our photo gallery and Instagram feed (below) showcase the wide variety of art that can be accomplished with needle and ink in 30-60 minutes.

40,000ish successful tattoos have been created with our kits!

Sometimes you just need to read the whole process in a few steps, so here are the basic instructions on how to give yourself a stick and poke tattoo at home.

HOW TO STICK AND POKE TATTOO in FIVE STEPS

Step 1. Create the [...]

SnP Team2022-09-12T22:36:44-07:00

Toxic Inks No More! The EU ban may create safer inks
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Toxic Inks No More! The EU ban may create safer inks

Stick n poke, tattoo ink, tattoo safety

Toxic Inks No More! The EU ban may create safer inks

The EU is known for strict consumer protection, and coming from the US, honestly, it's refreshing. They just laid the law down to protect 1/4 of their citizens - the portion of Europeans likely to get a tattoo. In the US, we seem to be going the other way, allowing corporations to pollute and poison and sell consumer products that kill us and our animal friends. Take Glyphosate, AKA RoundUp. Monstanto/Bayer makes billions on this chemical because it's just so easy to kill weeds. They spend Billions making sure we continue to spray it all over the place and give ourselves and our neighbors cancer in the process....Ah, unchecked capitalism at it's best. My point is that if a growing tattoo industry has anything to say about it (or "pay about it" to congress), cadmium red pigment is [...]

SnP Team2022-08-18T13:41:58-07:00

LA Times 2021 Gift Guide

Thank you Los Angeles Times for choosing us as a great gift for gen z this year. <3 The practice kit is an excellent choice for people to practice with before doing a permanent design on themselves ;-)

SnP Team2021-11-26T10:39:22-08:00

Are stick and pokes dangerous?

We’ve written here before about the “sterility” and physical safety of do-it-yourself stick and poke tattoos. I wanted to tackle a different topic today… a topic I love… the topic of emotional safety.

woman with tattoos Photo by Timothy Paul Smith on Unsplash

Of course, emotional safety is far more subjective and contextual than physical safety - you can tell whether you have an infection pretty easily, but it can be much more difficult, and far more personal, to gauge your level of emotional safety. It depends on a lot of factors - how you define emotional safety for yourself, to what degree you see your physical & mental safety as intertwined with your emotional safety, and how much risk you feel good to undergo for some result that will bring you emotional fulfillment in the future.

So what’s the deal with stick and [...]

SnP Team2018-12-12T14:26:50-08:00

How to stick and poke
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How to stick and poke

stick and poke, stick and poke technique, Stick n poke, stick n poke video, tattoo aftercare, tattoo safety

How to stick and poke

Here are detailed step by step instructions for a beginner to do a first DIY stick and poke tattoo safely.

This article contains links to other posts on our blog. Click on the links for more detailed explanations of each step. Also see our 5-step article.

OBTAIN SUPPLIES AND PREPARE YOUR BODY

Gather your stick and poke tattoo, or "hand poke" supplies. Tattoos needles and ink are obvious. You'll need several medical supplies to safely handle the minor injury inherent in all tattooing. Finally, you will need after care supplies that are specific to the tattoo industry. Here is a detailed list of what is in our beginner kits that you can use as a shopping list. Many of these supplies must be purchased individually online, as they are not available [...]

SnP Team2022-10-12T09:00:29-07:00

Are stick and poke tattoos safe?
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Are stick and poke tattoos safe?

tattoo safety

Are stick and poke tattoos safe?

After 5 years in business, I think I have enough data to say that “yes” if done safely, stick and poke tattoos are safe.

My first year selling these kits, I was honestly not sure. I knew only that people needed access to the supplies to do stick and pokes at least “safer” than they were currently doing them. A sewing needle and india ink doesn’t seem safe. Even so, I hadn’t heard any horror stories of infection using these primitive means. Now, after years of experience interacting with thousands of first time tattooers and talking to to health professionals and tattoo artists – both professional artist and casual/DIY artists, I can say confidently that anyone can do a tattoo at home that will avoid infection and spread of blood borne pathogens. And – it’s not that scary. It is certainly not surgery. It's no wonder the ancient civilizations on every [...]

SnP Team2018-08-06T12:23:05-07:00

Which stick n poke tattoo inks are safe to use?
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Which stick n poke tattoo inks are safe to use?

tattoo ink, tattoo safety

Which stick n poke tattoo inks are safe to use?

Good news: old school, DIY, homemade tattoos no longer need to be done with pen ink or india ink! You can easily get professional tattoo ink for use for your sticknpoke online! The question is: which tattoo inks are the best and safest to buy? There are many options and it is an important decision. This is a substance that you will be putting into your body. They don't make it to your bloodstream, but into the many alive layers of your skin - and a lot of what you poke into there will be absorbed by your body.

tattoo ink dark color

The Problem

Up until the 1980's, tattoo ink used by professionals contained heavy metals that are hazardous to your health. Yellows, reds, blues contained Cadmium, Molybdenum, Nickel, Beryllium, and 'salts' that are not just carcinogenic, but actually toxic. Bad reactions to tattoos were more [...]

SnP Team2019-12-18T13:07:35-08:00

how to use a stencil

Want a clear and clean tattoo? Stencil it.

Now in every kit:

1 small packet of Stencil Transfer Gel *
One 5.5 x 4 inch piece of Free-draw (not-thermal) Stencil Transfer Paper *

*These products are made for Professional Tattoo Artists & they are Vegan friendly, non-toxic & made in the USA!

We provide a rare stencil paper that shows up on all skin tones (most have purple tones and don't show up on richer tones). More on tattooing dark tones here.

Learn about or order a Tattoo Kit here