FallenAngel

Ok a little background here... a little long but hang in there if you can lol.

Something unfortunate happened to me this past August, and as a result I developed Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. After I had lost my job at the 911 center (which was BS... the reason I lost my job that is), I got a job at an alarm monitoring company. It got to the point after a while where for almost a month straight I was having panic and anxiety attacks constantly, with no warning sometimes... for that time period every day all day my chest felt really tight, and breathing felt like I was smashed in a vice. If the phone rang I'd jump like 30 feet, even someone whispering my name would cause me to jump and panic. I finally decided to go talk to a counselor because I thought I was losing my mind... which is when I got my diagnosis. She looked at me and said "hun, this is classic Post Traumatic Stress Disorder".

I've been going to counseling and getting better, but there's still things I can't handle. PA has a program set up that helps people that have been a victim of a violent crime and can't work deal with their lost income so they can get better and get back to work.

Now... for a while the break was nice and MUCH needed. I needed to take time out for myself and work on getting myself more able to function again. However, it's getting really old now. I'm fairly independant, and absolutely HATE relying on others or accepting handouts... and it drives me nuts. I don't like not being able to work and such.

So, the problem lies here. I can't handle any type of job where there's high volumes of things going on, or can get overly stressing... which is pretty much anything I'm qualified to do.

I had gone up to this tattoo place with a friend, and I'd asked the tattoo guy:

Me: "I have a question, I'm an artist... I mean I can draw anything using almost any medium, but how much harder is it to 'draw' with a tattoo gun?"
Tattoo guy: "it's not that it's harder, basically to an artist it's just learning a new medium to use in order to do art. My wife is thinking about opening up another shop, and I know we're swamped here with work coming in that we can't handle. How about I take your number down and have her give you a call... maybe bring in your portfolio if you have one?"

Sounded great to me. She called the next day I think, and I brought up my portfolio and she seemed really impressed. She kept running back to her husband and showing him some of my work. We stood around and BS'd for a few hours, talked about what the apprenticeship would consist of, etc. The people (husband and wife) that own and work in the shop are cool as s**t... and I find art work to be quite relaxing and theraputic.

Here's how it would work out. In the beginning of course, it's a lot of watching and learning. The more I'm in the shop, the quicker I learn about the different things that go into doing tattoos, the quicker I get into tattooing myself. Once I first start tattooing, it's just for tips. i.e. someone comes in and wants... let's say a butterfly. They don't get charged for the tattoo itself... the cost of the tattoo is my tip, which I get. The theory behind this is in order to get really good you need practice, but since you're not REALLY good yet, you don't charge someone for a tattoo which might not turn out as well as someone who's got a lot of experience. So they tip you for your time instead of being charged full price. At this point, the tattoo artist is sitting in the room with you, keeping an eye on you as you're learning. Tattoo shop is not making any money from you at this point... they're actually losing money because while the guy is keeping an eye on you as you're learning, say someone comes in and wants a $400 portrait of their child... he has to turn them away and turn that money away since he's sitting in on me learning. (there is a reason I'm explaining this, hang in there)

After I've got it all down and am doing well enough to work on my own, I'm done my apprenticeship. This can take weeks to months, or even up to a year if I just can't get it down right. I'm not so worried about the time frame for myself, because I tend to pick up on things quite quickly when it comes to art, and anything I really put my mind into. When I'm working on my own, I get my own room to tattoo in, plus I'll be getting $50 for any custom drawing I do, plus 50%. So, if I'd only do one $150 tattoo a day for the week, that's $375. This shop in particular is the best in the area... I mean this guy does freaking awesome work... and everytime I've been in there they're always booked... so odds are I'd be making much more than that. The new shop the wife wants to open (there's a gimick to it, but since it's not open yet I'm not going to say exactly what it is... but there's a theme to it)... she needs someone over at the new shop who can draw and do art. She wants me (if I can manage this) to basically run the show over at the other shop, and not only would I be getting $50 for each custom drawing, but 70% of anything I do.

Now here's my problem. Many places around here charge for apprenticeships. The average cost from my research is $8,000 - $10,000. She only wants to charge me $5,000... plus my equipment would run another $1,000 roughly. The reason they charge is because they lose money while they're training you... which makes sense to me. Many apprenticeships have people doing "grunt work"... just cleaning and stuff before they even start to learn tattooing. Their theory is the faster they can train you to do tattoos, the quicker not only I'd be making money, but the quicker I'd be making them money. Here's some of my artwork (well the ones that can fit on my scanner)

Rose in oil pastel



Portrait of a woman in charcoal



Freehand drawing done in a ballpoint pen



Kittens in a basket done with Prismacolor Colored Pencils on frosted acetate



They look much better in person, but you get the idea.

I'm not worried about my ability to do this, I'm having a hard time trying to find the financing to go through with it. This is something I know I could handle with my PTSD, it's a very relaxing work environment, and I get to do artwork all day... which is like a form of therapy to me in of itself. I've put a lot of thought into this, and know I can do it.

The problem is, in Pennsylvania, there are no state regulations for tattoo shops or training to do such... therefore, there are no "accredited training institutions" or "guidelines" to do such as far as career type loans go. I'm going through a Vocational Rehabilitation place to try to help find financing, but as far as other things... there's not much out there. There has to be SOMETHING... it's just finding it that's the problem. If I could find a co-signer I could take out a personal loan, but the minimum I can take through my bank is $8,000... and I don't need that much, and arn't sure I can come up with a credit worthy co-signer.

I called this one number, who the lady said there might be a way to put it through to get a loan for it, but when I called back after I found a fax machine, the other lady told me that unless they have a teaching license, it's not going to happen. (There is no such thing for this type of work in Pennsylvania)... but she said if the tattoo place wanted to see if there was anything they could do, they could call. So the tattoo lady said "well hell girl, give me the number! If there's anything we can do to help you be able to get in here, I'll call as many numbers as I have to. Plus, wouldn't hurt if there IS something to have an extra certificate or diploma on the wall". So they really want me there... otherwise they wouldn't be going through all that trouble.

So... does anyone know of anywhere else I could look, or know of anything that may be able to help me out? I don't mind having to pay a loan back for something like this... it's like going to college but it's through a busines really. the OVR (Office of Vocational Rehabilitation) office is going to try to help me out, but I'm not sure what exactly is out there and available, and if there's anything really that can be done.

So the point in all of this is just that... if anyone knows of anywhere to look that might yeild some better results than I've come up with so far. I've searched for tons of things in many different ways on google, including "Career advancement loans", "career loans", "alternative education loans", etc... etc... and everything I've come up with, even if it doesn't mention on the site "accredited learning/teaching institution", when I go to call them it has to be just that. The shop will work with me as far as the money goes... i.e. I don't need it all up front and they're looking into what they can do to be qualified for me to get out a loan or something... but I'd rather get it over with and have the money up front (even though I'll prolly only give them half to start with, and the other half once I get going.)

Thanks for any help and for taking the time to read this mininovel lol.

seattledave

that money to teach is also there because once you learn their trade, you can go off on your own, and if you did it's probably going to be close enough to their shop that they feel it'll be competion.

any kind of school loans require that school to be accredited, it's the reason you are able to get lower rates. Have these people help you anyway they think they can, because normal on-the-job training you can simply be a volunteer. they charge for on the job training which is tough nuts.

But if you MUST get money. Go get a car loan, sell the car, there's your money.
I can start listing illegal ways. Unless you got someone to do a home refi, or co-sign your loan, getting that kind of money from a legal source for a non-accredited school means you'd have to ge t a personal loan, and unless you got actual collateral it's not going to be from a bank.

FallenAngel

heh I'm not going to do anything illegal lol. There has to be SOMETHING out there, I just don't know where to look. I was told a small business loan MIGHT be able to work so I'm going to look into that... I was just wondering if anyone knew of anything that might be of help

XxTamTxX

you can get an equity line with various amounts.. or get that 8k loan and put the extra amount towards the fist payment. will build up your credit real quick when making large payments on that kind of loans. bankrate.com

seattledave

I think that 8k loan is a hypothetical.

& equity line?!? do you mean against a home? Hopefully she's smart enough and not even needing to ask how to get a loan if she was buying a house.

XxTamTxX

bank i use to work at called it an equity line.. i think most other banks calls it line or credit.. it's a personal loan like credit.com type of thing. not tied in with owning a home.

seattledave

I tried to get something myself like that when i was 19 to buy some stock options.
they want 15% down, a co-signer that would put up a car or something as collateral.

I've not heard of a bank loan you can get without having collateral. Please inform us.

If anyone could get a large sum from the bank and if they defaulted the bank would just totally lose out, you'd have that problem 1000x fold.

XxTamTxX

Well.. he has a tC, he can refinance with extra back is another option. reply back on later.. meeting.

OriOri

It's great that you're an artist specifically, because I've been wanting to talk to someone from a creative background about AI technology for a long time. Speaking of tattoos, there are now starting to be generators like https://tattoon.ai/ where even I without talent or skills can create cool tattoo designs in 5 seconds. What do you think about this? Will it affect your work in any way if you are selling tattoo designs?