Pigskin is an almost ideal tattoo practicing medium. It has the same consistency as human skin. As a matter of fact, pigs and humans share 98% of their DNA, yet we look nothing alike! Pigskin is layered with a epidermis, dermis and inner layers just like human skin, this will allow you to get a feel for how deep exactly you must penetrate with the needle in order to get the desired effect in the skin.
Getting pigskin may be a bit tricky for some people. Many butcher shops or meat processing plants will have pigskin they do not want. Its a part of the animal that is not really used so it should be fairly cheap to buy. To preserve, we suggest keeping them in the refrigerator and in a air tight container. You can get pig skin in 2 forms, natural skin or fat back. You want to get the natural skin one, not the fat back. You can tell the difference between them, natural will be fairly thin, the fatback will be thicker and have a big layer of fat on the back, hence the name.
Preparation of the skin is fairly simple and we strongly urge you to check out the video in this post to get a better understanding of how this process is done. You will want to lay it out on a flat surface on top of plenty of paper towels which will absorb the moisture from the back side of the skin. Rub it down with some alcohol. If you are going to apply a stencil to it, draw out or select your stencil design, apply some Stencil Stuff onto the pigskin as you would normally on human skin to apply the stencil. Allow the Stencil Stuff to absorb in, it takes a bit longer than human skin, perhaps a minute or so. Apply the stencil and allow 15-30 minutes to pass to ensure it has had sufficient time to really dry onto the skin.