This episode is about promises.

The kind that say you can be fully booked in 90 days.
That you can skip the apprenticeship.
That you can build a six-figure tattoo career if you just “optimize your content.”

I’m joined by Jeff Zalesak — tattooer of 20 years and owner of Camp Hill Collective in Pennsylvania — and we go deep into the rise of marketing gurus in tattooing.

We talk about the $5,000 sales calls and the predatory tactics behind them. About cold-messaging clients and why that quietly destroys respect. About online tattoo education versus real apprenticeships. About why technical foundations still matter. Why so many artists burn out. And about a question almost nobody stops to ask: why do you tattoo what you tattoo?

This isn’t an anti-marketing rant.

Learning how to communicate your work matters. Understanding social media matters. But selling shortcuts to mastery is something else entirely.

Tattooing was never built on hacks. It was built on repetition, humility, mentorship, and respect for the craft.

And if we lose that, we lose more than bookings.

We lose the culture.

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Follow Jeff on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube: @imatattooer

Follow the podcast on Instagram: @under_the_skin_podcast
Watch full episodes on YouTube: Under the Skin – The Tattoo Podcast

If this one resonates, share it with another tattooer.

See you next week — under the skin.

Tattoo Culture Is Fake — with Yiwu Duan

In this episode of Under The Skin, I sit down with Yiwu Duan — a tattooer who still tattoos, but no longer identifies with the tattoo industry as it exists today.

We talk about why tattoo culture feels fake, ego-driven, and transactional — and what that does to artists who actually care. Yiwu opens up about burnout, shop ownership as a prison, the instability of tattooing, and the emotional cost of creating with “no skin” in an industry that often rewards noise over responsibility.

This conversation goes deep into the things rarely talked about:
the gap between skill and self-doubt, why artists feel worse as they get better, and how ego becomes a defense mechanism instead of a tool for growth.

We also explore what tattooing should be about: care, respect, and responsibility. Yiwu breaks down his philosophy on consultations, why placement matters more than imagery, how tattoos shape identity, and how a tattoo — even a beautiful one — can permanently harm someone if it ignores who they are.

This episode is not about trends, social media hacks, or how to get famous as a tattooer.
It’s about craft, honesty, emotional labor, and why being underrated and real might be the only sustainable path left.

If you tattoo, this one’s for you.

🎙 Under The Skin – The Tattoo Podcast
📍 Follow the podcast on Instagram & YouTube: @under_the_skin_podcast
📍 Yiwu Duan on Instagram: @yiwuduan

This week’s episode is out in video format, and I’m joined by Ron Smith — tattooer from Vancouver, Canada, known online as @crybabyron.

We start with the reality of the last couple years: tattooing feels oversaturated, especially in big cities like Berlin, London, Paris, LA, and Vancouver. But Ron makes a point that matters: it’s not oversaturated with good tattooers — because quality still stands out when the fundamentals are there.

From there we go deep into the stuff that actually makes a tattoo work long-term: drawing, composition, and flow with the body. Ron’s been tattooing for 15+ years, specializes in large-scale Japanese work, and recently started posting drawing breakdowns that exploded online — not “how to tattoo” tutorials, but the foundation behind strong tattooing.

We also talk about gatekeeping vs responsibility, client experiences, fast track learning and why simplicity is so hard.

This episode explains why the best tattoos always come back to the same truth: Tattooing follows the art.

Ron Smith on the socials:IG: @crybabyronSkool: Crybaby Ron Drawing Studio

Under the Skin — The Tattoo PodcastInstagram / Youtube: @under_the_skin_podcast