Machinegun Tattoo Magazine Issue #6.pdf

Machinegun is the only tattoo magazine completely dedicated to the mechanical aspects of tattooing. The first issue of Machinegun was published by Eikon Device in June of 2001, and was distributed free of charge to Eikon customers. The little magazines objectives were clearly stated in the editorial of the premier issue. Machinegun was going to be a magazine about tattooing and the process of tattooing, not a magazine about tattoos.

The do-it-yourself look of Machinegun has remained consistent since the first issue; zine format, comic-sized and always forty-eight black and white pages inside with an inexpensive color cover.

Amongst some tattoo artists, the name of the magazine was controversial. There had always been a very real divide in tattooing between professional artists who called the instrument we use to tattoo with a machine, and the uninitiated who almost invariably referred to it as a gun. Somehow connecting the two terms seemed to threaten that the two factions in the trade could be connected.

Most young tattooers didnt really seem to care what the machine was called, or for that matter, what any of the parts on a machine were called. One of the primary goals of Machinegun was to establish a glossary of machine parts names that most could agree upon.

Terms like air gap, machine speed and duty cycle are accepted as part of tattooing today, but a decade ago they were unknown. Those terms and many others all stemmed directly from research that was being done at Eikon. Machinegun magazine has helped to bring that information and terminology to everyone in tattooing.