Thinking of getting a Chinese tattoo? Then arm yourself with this information before inking. It may be the difference between being cool and national humiliation. What? National humiliation? Well OK, national humiliation is an unlikely outcome, but an article in the March 1st, 2005 Washington Post Express shows that the possibility is there. "Lost in Translation" looked at the real dangers facing the unwary consumers who get kanji tattoos. I am not joking when I say “real dangers”. But neither am I referring to unhygenic tattooing practices. What I am talking about is toe-curlingly appalling linguistic blunders. Specifically, I mean kanji combinations like these:
* Extremely Military Affairs Stopping
* Crazy Diarrhea
* Weird (tattooed on B. Spears)
Yes, these are phrases that real people (yes, Britney Spears is a real person) actually have had tattooed into their skin. To be honest, I am not entirely surprised at these and other errors. After all, I have seen many reversed images of Chinese Symbols being offered for tattoos, and kanji tattoos that simply did not mean anything like it was supposed to.
Getting A Awesome Chinese Tattoo
People sometimes ask: "I got the tattoo, can you tell me what this means?" Why didn't you ask before you got that tattoo? Yes, you would think that would be the obvious thing to do – especially if you are getting something permanent like a Chinese tattoo.
So how can you make sure you don’t end up a national laughingstock?
* Find a pro to do the translation, instead of anyone who speaks Chinese. The Chinese characters, has a time span of 4000 years and a geography span across countries like China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan. It simply takes knowledge and expertise to do the translation well.
* Custom Design Your Chinese Tattoos By writting them into Chinese Calligraphy. Chinese calligraphy can make beautiful tattoos because of its simplicity and elegance, and the foreign nature of the script adds a nice exotic look to your body art. Chinese Symbol written In Chinese Calligraphy can create stunning visual effect.
Custom Chinese tattoo design and stencil Outline prevent your tattooist from making chinese tattoo mistakes while inking and make you chinese tattoo looks awesome. put it another way, without Custom design and outline, your tattooist would ink the Chinese tattoo which make you beome a clown.
Here are the advice when planning to get a Chinese Symbol tattoo:
1. Getting a right tattoo at the first time
Your tattoo will be with you for the rest of your life, please make sure you get a right symbol tattoo at the first time. Otherwise, Laser therapy is the only way of removing tattoos that offers generally satisfactory results and minimal scarring. It is extremely painful and very, very expensive. A $100 tattoo “mistake” can cost several thousand dollars to remove -- and not all inks respond well to laser treatments.
2. Do not Pick up Kanji From Tattoo Parlors
Many people have gotten what they thought were Chinese tattoos only to find later that the characters were drawn wrong, or in one case, the mirror image of the character was tattooed. You would make the mistakes mentioned above if Choosing them from tattoo parlors.
3. Do You Own Research
Before you run off to the tattoo parlor to get one done you should do your own research. Selecting Chinese Symbols deserve careful study and attention.
4. Consulting With a Chinese
Many words in English can be translated in several different Chinese symbols. Each of these may have a slightly different meaning in Chinese. Consulting with a native Chinese to get a a exactly CORRECT characters for your intended meaning.
5.Choosing Meaningful Words
Tattoos are forever. If you're planning to get a Chinese Symbol tattoo soon, be sure to choose the right and meaningful symbols. It is important to choose something of lasting appeal not something faddish, and it also needs to be a cool design you'll love tomorrow just as much as you love it today.
6.Getting Them Look Right
Western tattoo artists always add their own artistic flair, which is fine with English letters, but their script would deface Chinese Characters and make them meaningless. Again, take the time to do some research and find someone good at Chinese calligraphy to write out your design. Chinese calligraphy is a classic ancient art. The brush strokes must have a certain shape. Each part of a symbol must be in precise relation to the others. Chinese Symbols can be written in a wide variety of calligraphy styles as below.
7. Getting a stencil Outline of the Proposed Design.
Every tattoo design has a matching “stencil”. It is an exact copy of the tattoo design, but without any color or shading -- just the black line work that makes up the design. Your tattooist will transfer stencil directly to your skin prior to beginning the tattoo process, thus the tattooist will ink the tattoo which is exactly the same as the proposed design. You will need to print out both your tattoo design and the stencil outline and then take them to your tattooist.
8. Using professional Chinese tattoos translation and Design service
The only way to find the RIGHT Chinese symbol for you is to consult with a Chinese translator to translate and design the Chinese tattoos for you. Because of the complexity of Chinese Characters and also the fact the one word can mean two completely different things it is important that the Chinese translator understands the word you want translated.
To find out more click below.
