Drawing Japanese Tattoo is a soft cover book with sewn binding. It is 17 centimeters wide by 24 centimeters high and 132 pages with black and white digital printing.

The cover has some texture, it is made of 220 grams laid cardboard and the inside is made of 90 grams ivory paper, that is, the weight is higher than the common one, suitable so that the pages are not transparent and the images can be better appreciated.

They are more than 200 drawingssome of them only line drawings and others with final art. The original drawings are sketches and paintings that I made in the last years in paper or digital format. As I said before, all of them are part of my artistic production: designs for tattoos, parties, etc. flash daypaints for the production of printsetc.

There are sketchbooks that are real treasures when it comes to drawing quality. I have some by tattoo artists that I admire a lot and I use them constantly as a reference guide or for inspiration.

However, many of these sketchbooks are produced without the support of qualified personnel and lack very basic elements, such as the presence of an index at the beginning of the book and page numbering. This alone would make them much easier to consult.

I wanted to add a couple of sections that I have missed in tattoo, art or illustration books that I use as reference material. These are the chapters that I have incorporated into the final pages of my sketchbook: a thematic index and comments on the figures.

In the subject index of Drawing Japanese tattoo, one can quickly locate all the pages where an element appears you are looking for. And if you happen to be unfamiliar with the characters and their names, this section of the book will also help a lot. By learning new terms in Spanish and Japanese, it is easier to research the history and aesthetics of the irezumi.

I have organized the drawings in the book by theme and this is reflected in the index at the beginning of the book (pg.5). But as some pages present different figures, in the thematic index (pg.124 to 128) I have added a small description of the elements when it seemed convenient.

At the end of the book you will find a small section dedicated to figure comments (pg.129). I felt like writing about many other designs, but in the end I decided to add only the notes that seemed indispensable.

I would have loved to write the story of each tattoo and maybe one day I will dedicate a book to stories of this kind. At the moment I'm telling some of these stories here on the web in the section Tattoo Gallery or in the Blog.

You will find in the book several custom tattoo designs for arm or full back tattoos with a wide variety of themes and different linear designs of the traditional elements of irezumi.

There is no lack of typical flora of Japanese tattooingPeonies, cherry blossoms, maple leaves and chrysanthemums. Of course there are many dragons, tigers, phoenixes, yokais and others. real and mythological beings.

There are a few fight scenes, religious figures and erotic images. Samurai, hermits, geishas, princesses, gods and demons - I confess that it fascinates me to bring all these characters together in the same work!

Someone who is more observant might realize where I live and the Galician influence in my drawings. There are some wild boar and even a vacaloura which was once part of a Santa Compaña scene in a tattoo, accompanied by a frog and a bat (pg.16).

It is known that in Galicia there is a lot of octopus and they are very fond of them. In my book you will find a giant octopus tangling with a Galician fishing boat and another tiny "pulp" drinking a cunca de viño (pg.46). It's wonderful to see how creative people are and how they connect local culture to Japanese aesthetics and themes so spontaneously.

I would have loved to write the story of each tattoo and maybe one day I will dedicate a book to stories of this kind. At the moment I'm telling some of these stories here on the web in the section Tattoo Gallery or in the Blog.

Turning the pages, a lot of memories come to my mind. Fede @silverytrainerlover and practitioner of contact sports, wears a front piece with the image of the great Japanese warrior Miyamoto Musashi (pg.59). David @coc0hunter wanted to engrave on the skin a beautiful memory of his childhood: the image of his father fishing for octopus (pg.47) and Pablo @kungfupablo has asked me to tattoo Akuma, your favorite video game character in traditional Japanese style (pg.65).

I would have loved to write the story of each tattoo and maybe one day I will dedicate a book to stories of this kind. At the moment I'm telling some of these stories here on the web in the section Tattoo Gallery or in the Blog.