The Japanese Tattoo

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Summary: The Japanese Tattoo
Review: are you interested in japanese tattoos? yes? then this book is definitely for you! the photographs are great. and the tattoos on display are all done by some of the greatest japanese tattoo masters. the introduction i found rather bad; very artsy fartsy. but it's only a bit more than a page long. so don't worry. the complementary text sandi fellman has written i haven't even read yet - i've been way too busy looking over and over again at the tattoos. again: if you're into tattoos and/or japanese tattoos you simply have to buy this book!

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Summary: low standard tattoos in a below average book
Review: How disappointed I was by this book. It contains absolutely no news. The tattoo masters in this book do not meet in any way the high standard of irezumi that I am used to. For all you buyers who really want to learn about Japanese tattoos, read the book by Richie and Buruma, very informative. For photo's who are less blurry than in this book, just check the net or invest many dollars more for a proper book. ... . This book is a nice introduction for some common knowledge about Japanese tattoo art, but does not provide any new insights or ideas.

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Summary: The Japanese Tattoo
Review: I was disappointed with how the illustrations were presented. The explanations were done clearly, but not a book for those who are looking for ideas for new ink.

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Summary: You never saw Polaroids like this!
Review: Imagine life-size Polaroid photographs. Imagine traditional, Japanese, full-body tattooing. Imagine a book of life-size Polaroids taken of traditional, full-body, Japanese tattoos.... this IS that book! Sandi Fellman got the proper introductions and a great toy (a Polaroid that really takes life-size plates) when she went to Japan and set out to document the hidden world of the irezumi, the tattoo underground. This collection is almost all traditional hand-executed tattooing. The details are unparallelled, and you get to see all kinds of shading you might not notice at a distance. This type of body modification still is a secret, private practice in Japan and to view images of this quality is rare.