Trouble Shooting Pen?

My sister and I learning to tattoo together. We use a rotary pen and an okey style coil machine. Well the pen for some reason won’t tattoo on the softer tissues of our skin. It’ll only tattoo on the more boney surfaces. We were putting a rose on my shoulder and it worked well until we got to the front part where it wasn’t as boney. It’s just not depositing ink into the skin on those softer parts. Anyone else have this problem? Any ideas what it could be or why it’s doing that?

The probable cause of the problem is poor stretch, you cant underestimate how important this aspect of tattooing is.

The issue could also be compounded with an ‘under-powered’ (if terms of hit) motor and or stroke length. I bought a cheap pen from AliExpress some years ago and other than reelskin fake sheets, it was completely useless. It slowed me down so much and was virtually impossible to use on certain parts of the body.

This is not to say all AliExpress machines ar useless, some are ok, but go off recommendations if you think this could be the problem.

I know beginners are often on budgets, but sometimes to know if tattooing is for you, you need to get some pro level tools in your hands. There’s a reason most tattooers (mostly) don’t buy cheap copy machines.

Do you know what brand your rotary machine is and what motor (watts) and stroke length it has?

I’ll ask my sister what brand it is. We tried repositioning and stretching the skin more to get a tighter and more firm surface but the only way it would deposit the ink is if she pressed really hard which was obviously way too painful and deep. We’re planning on putting our money together and buying a better machine this weekend on pay day. Any recommendations on an inexpensive but still decent machine for beginners?

The two cheap pen machines I’ve gounght myself and used (regularly) were both xnet machines from AliExpress. They are the ones that look a bit like Bishop Wands but specifically they have a 4mm stroke and provide plenty of punch. I should add that I have only used them for lining. I have a Mast Flip but never used it on skin, though the advantage of that machine is that is has an adjustable stroke length, meaning you can vary between soft and hard hit of the machine. This is totally different to voltage settings.

At pro levels the Axys Valhalla has the same adjustable stroke length (I can personally recommend) and the Stgma-Rotary Thorn 2, recommended by a very experienced tattooing friend of mine. I tend to recommend these two machines as if your budget only stretches to one pro machine, they both give stroke length options to suit different types of work.

Of course, more experienced tattooers can often do all things with one machine, but it’s a way to get there.

Maybe others here have different recommendations for you.

Thank you for your recommendations! I’ll talk with my sister and see what kind of budget we have.