DIY Tattoo ink

Question for all the tattoo artists out there-

Is it possible to make custom tattoo ink? Is it like making paint?

I mean, if I wanted my own version of International Klein Blue, could it be done, or do you have to mix existing colors?

f I wanted to use lapis lazuli as a pigment, what kind of hoops do I jump through?

To that end, is ink sterilized? By the co. you bought it from, or in your shop?

thanks much.

Considering the massive amounts of colors available now, you can probably buy the colors you're looking for.

I was reading about a new tattoo show on A&E, and the artist they were talking about has done things like mix a woman's ashes into the ink for her husband's tattoo, or somehow make a blacklight tattoo that was invisible most of the time.

So, maybe there is something you can do . . . I just don't know what.

They get the internet in prison?

The blacklight inks have been on the market for years now.

Example.

Funniest use of "invisible" UV-reactive ink I've ever seen: A guy had a pin-up girl in a bikini tattooed on his arm in regular ink, and then had it gone over with the "invisible" ink without the bikini. So she "took her clothes off when the lights went out." It was kinda silly.

That is fucking genius.

Yeah, you really don't want to do that. Tattoo inks are solutions and suspensions, usually using metal oxides and sulfides. They are woefully under-regulated, but have been developed by trial and error over hundreds of years. Chances are, if no one has found it, it's either dangerous or unsuitable. You can't simply grind up a stone, add water and make it into tattoo ink, any more than you could make an oil paint out of it. Raw stone isn't going to make a pigment.

What could go wrong?

What he said.

so you mean... i can't make my own glitter ink and do a glitter unicorn on my forearm?

So how about using paint as a base? There is a lovely avocado (21) and sunflower (36) colors that would be perfect for a 1970s kitchen theme tattoo

Yeah, I have a friend who has a very large wolf pawprint that is tatooed on the side of his neck in the same ink. Apparently he had it for years before I finally saw it at a party with the right lighting.

P.S: the pawprint tattoo isn't as douchey as it may sound, his family actually raises protected wolves for a living and he interacts with them enough that he is accepted as part of the wolf pack.