Stop Motion is Back in Motion in the Tattoo World

(15/08/2017)

The stop motion animation technique has been beautifully re-introduced into the 21st century through the medium of tattoos. This once lost art creates the illusion of movement by playing a series of images in a fast sequence and is traditionally associated with flip book art - an artistic form most of us will admit to experimenting with at some point during our childhood, probably with the help of a stick man! Flip books have been considered one of the earliest forms of interactive media and they are a technique that has been brought back to life by a number of modern day animators including The Flippist, for example. Stop motion art is now beginning to capture attention in the tattoo world.

A Future for Flip Books: The Stop Motion Tattoo

29-year old Canadian tattoo artist, or tattoo animator, Phil Berge has attracted a mass of media coverage in the tattoo world over the recent months. He integrates his appreciation of the traditional stop-motion technique into his tattoo creations to recreate the traditional flipbook art in a futuristic and visually enticing way. Berge creates extremely similar looking tattoos multiple times on different people. Each tattoo is part of a larger picture and brought to life in a short story animation when presented in unity. The individual tattoos represent a single frame in the video and are designed on a story board beforehand, which is then posted to Berge’s Instagram account to attract prospective participators in the piece.

Berge’s work often brings to life cartoon characters from various time eras including Bart Simpson and Mickey Mouse - he is even referred to as the Walt Disney of tattooists. One of his most complex pieces, named ‘The Skeleton Dance,’ was inspired by Walt Disney’s 1929 namesake short film and has created a 21st-century example of Medieval European danse macabre imagery. In total, this intricate piece features 28 skeleton tattoo designs in slightly different positions inked on the bodies of 28 strangers and took a staggering three months to complete. As such, Berge’s tattoos have what he describes as a “unifying vibe” and bring together different people from different walks of life into a single piece of art to be enjoyed globally by the public - his Instagram account is in itself a virtual art museum displaying short bursts of fun entertainment.

Berge’s obvious love of the world of body art is something that is also highly valued here at Body Shock. Like Berge, Body Shock actively seek to stay ahead of the game in the tattoo world by regularly attending exhibitions and conventions in order to become aware of its latest developments. If you feel inspired by Berge’s work and are eager to get started on creating high-quality stop motion tattoos, Body Shock have the high-quality supplies to make this a reality today.