Deciding to get a tattoo is a huge choice and choosing a tattoo design is an even larger one. Reckon about it. It’s not like hanging art in the living room for a few years and then switching it up when you get bored of looking at it. This is a lifelong commitment of art that is with you 24 hours a day, wherever you go, so you better be like it.

So, where to you start on the quest to find the perfect tattoo design?

Well, the best place to start is by looking at tattoo designs for inspiration. Sounds simple, right? But, you have to narrow down your process, otherwise you can get burnt out and frustrated quickly if you don’t find anything that interests you.

There a several ways that you can find the perfect tattoo for yourself quicker.

First, here’s a few tips that can help you find a tattoo design that suits you when you are searching online:

1. Use specific search terms in Google Images
Go to Google Images so that your results are images only. Do you know what part of the body that you want tattooed? Then, make sure you add that to the search. For example, you could search “lower back tattoos”.

Another tips is to search large images (Google lets you select the size). Smaller images are nearly always lower quality, plus you will see more detail if you are looking at intricate designs.

2. Free tattoo design galleries
If you aren’t having any luck with Google Images, you can do a regular web search for “free tattoo galleries”.  There are a plethora of free tattoo galleries that list tattoos by category and body type.

You will still need to weed through some of the low quality sites, but typically, you can come across some excellent ones in a small amount of time.

3. Paid tattoo design galleries
There are also tattoo design galleries like ChopperTattoo.com that charge a few to get access to thousands of high quality tattoo designs to choose from. This obviously is the quick route and if you can spare a few bucks to save yourself the time searching, then it might be worth your while to go that route.

Straight From The Artist

Another thought is to go the ancient school route and simply go visit a few tattoo studios. Flip through their design portfolios and chat with one of the artists about what type of tattoo you’re thinking about getting. This is what they do for a living so they’ll likely be able to give you some thoughts.

In fact, depending on your tattoo design budget, you can even pay extra to have your tattoo artist turn your thought into a custom tattoo design that he makes from scratch.

This is often the preferred action to take, but can be quite expensive. You can cut down on costs by having a really excellent thought of what you want before asking the artist to make the design.