Know the Needles First

 It’s good to know what type of tattoo needles you’re going to use before you start your first tattoo work.  Well, you see a tattoo needle consist of several small needles grouped attached to a needle bar.  There are many types of tattoo needles – Group, liner, single, round, flat, magnum, shader. These types of needles have their specific use and depends how the artist use it. Obviously, you can’t use a liner to shade a tattoo or use a shader to create outlines. Basically, their specific use is related to what they are called.

Anyway, let’s go discuss them one by one and get into details.  There are four common types of needle groupings.. Let’s start with 

Rounds aka Loose :

These kinds of tattoo needles can come from single to 14 round.  If you’re going to check the image you will see that the round needle looks like a perfect circle.  These are commonly used for shading tight parts of the tattoo.

Flats:

I rarely use this kind of needles when it comes to shading. But, they are good in filling a tight part of the tattoo.  This needle comes from 4 to 15 needles groupings and if you’re going to check the image, the needle grouping are all straight and placed tightly together.

Tights:

This type of needles comes from 3 to 14 needle groupings. Tights are commonly used for outlining. similar to round needles this type of needle has also a circular shape but unlike the rounds tights has needles that are grouped tightly together to make a perfect lining.

 Magnums:

I always use this kind of tattoo needle when it comes to shading. Because this one has two rows and their grouping is widely spread out it can be very good in filling in solid colour. There are two types of Magnum needles, one is regular and the other is double stacked. Double stacked means that the needles are more grouped tightly together compared to a regular Magnum needle.

Curved Magnum:

Similar to a regular Magnum, but this one is much bigger and the tip of the needles has a slight arch to it. I always use this when I’m making Japanese tattoos like Wind bars, clouds etc. This one is also commonly used in filling colors into a portrait tattoo. 

Now you know the types of needles and their uses. Next post will be about types of Inks.  Hope this one helps.