Japanese
Pain level
7/10 — High
Pain varies significantly by placement — ribs and hands hurt more than upper arms and calves, regardless of style.
History & technique
Japanese tattooing (irezumi) has a documented history stretching back to the Edo period (1603–1868), when woodblock print aesthetics began influencing full-body tattooing traditions. What started as criminal marking evolved into an elaborate art form associated with the yakuza and, eventually, celebrated globally.
The canonical imagery draws from Japanese mythology and folklore: koi fish ascending waterfalls, dragons coiling through clouds, cherry blossoms falling, tigers and phoenixes locked in symbolic opposition. Negative space and the interplay between the subject and its background — wind bars, waves, flames — are as important as the central motif.
Large-scale Japanese pieces are often designed to flow with the body's musculature, making them among the most compositionally complex tattoos to plan and execute.