Miami Ink

Miami Ink is a documentary/reality show which revolves around the lives of 6 tattoo artists and their work. Miami Ink isn't solely about the tattooing, but also the artists themselves and their lives. The documentary proves that tattoos are not solely about appearance, but often have memorial value to a person, and this theme continues from episode to episode. Each of the artists has a different style, for example, Ami (who owns the shop) specialises in cartoon style tattoos including a large amount of vivid colour, whereas Kat Von D works better with black and white tones and working into portraits, with particular attention to detail.

This documentary is very different to others featured today, because of how controversial the topic of tattoos are; they are either loved or hated, and this is reflected in what Ami and Chris named their shop in Miami, 'Love Hate Tattoos'. The concept of tattoos can be considered in many ways; some people see tattooing as scarring someone's body, whereas others see it as the perfect means of self expression. The intention of the documentary is to expose the importance of tattoos to individuals and also the lives of the tattooists - the viewer gets an insight in what tattoos mean to them, and why they decided to get involved in the tattooing industry.

Secondary Idea: Tattooing

We decided against the idea of subliminal messaging, as when we did a survey for our year group to find out about their opinions on subliminal messaging, many people did not understand what it was, or couldn't relate it to things in every day life. We then did some more brainstorming, and decided on a completely different idea - tattooing. We really liked the concept of doing a documentary on tattooing and tattoo artists, as we realised that it would be a topic that would be easy to get footage on as asking for filming permission would not be difficult, and we could show different extremes of tattooing (for example, people who are obsessed with tattoos and body modification, and those who simply want a memorial tattoo that means something special to that person.)

I have been looking into one extreme version of tattooism in particular. The 'Cat Man'. Dennis Avner claims that he follows the 'Huron' Traditions, one of which is turning yourself into a cat aesthetically. Therefore, Avner has had facial modifications and tattoos, along with having silicone implants in his forehead and cheeks, tattoos covering his face and body, and whiskers all on his face. This is a prime example of people who take tattooism too far, and do not use it for memorial or personal reasons.

The predominant reason behind many tattoos due to memorial reasons, where people get their body inked in memory of a person, pet or other. Other reasons behind tattoos can be simply because of an addiction to the pain, where people get tattooed simply because they find the pain enjoyable, or purely for aesthetic reasons.


Here is a link to a documentary, LA Ink, which focuses around tattooing and the lives of the tattooists in a parlour in LA:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=at148-GVvNE

Initial Idea: Subliminal Messaging In The Fashion Industry

My final group for our project consisted of myself, Ellen and Claudie. We spent a long time brainstorming and planning our initial ideas. We landed on the idea of the use of subliminal messaging in relation to the fashion industry, looking at how the models, designers, magazine editors and the public are affected by the representation of women through these subliminal messages that encourage people to be slim.

We investigated the way that billboards and magazine spreads present people and how the subliminal messages that are incorporated influence the view that the public have of themselves. We also looked into the way in which model's are edited to make them look more svelte and beautiful, therefore giving an unrealistic appearance to the public, and creating a vast number of self conscious children and young adults, as they feel the definite need to be slim and attractive.

Here is an example of the way in which Subliminal Messaging works: