A canvas speaks

When he applied online to be an Ink Master canvas, 23-year-old Josh Crosby just knew he didn’t want to take part in the early rounds, when nervous tattooers could mean misfortune for the tattooee.

“I’m a huge fan of the show, and I knew that I didn’t want to be on the first couple of episodes,” he says. “I did mention that in my application. I also put that I was very open, because if you have a specific idea they might put you on a specific episode.”

Designs of finale tattoos, he knew, were up to the artists, so letting producers know that he didn’t have a preference was also a way to increase his chances to get into the finale.

It worked. Crosby was one of four people whose back was elaborately tattooed in the Season Nine finale on Ink Masters: Shop

Wars that saw Matt O’Baugh and Katie McGowan of Black Cobra Tattoo Studio in Sherwood taking second place for their tattooing mastery.

“I was familiar with their work,” Crosby says. “When I saw them walk through the door I was relieved. I was really excited seeing them.”

Crosby was the color canvas for O’Baugh and McGowan. The design they created from their birds of prey theme took an intense 35 hours to ink over several weeks. For each session — five in all of seven hours each — Crosby commuted from his Oklahoma City home to be filmed at Black Cobra getting his tattoo.

He’s not sure what he would have had to pay for it were he not an Ink Master canvas, although he’s quick to confirm that he probably couldn’t afford it. Good tattoo artists can charge at least $100 an hour, he says.

Not surprisingly, Crosby is thrilled with what McGowan and O’Baugh inked onto his back.

“It’s just a bad-a**, neo-traditional tattoo. I love it. It’s a big, bold tattoo. As soon as I saw it, I was stoked.”

He also had to show it off while wearing next to nothing in front of the judges, a studio audience and a television audience at home.

“I’ll tell you, walking out onstage in G-string, disrobing and having people cheer for you, that was a dream come true,” Crosby says. “It was cold, though.”

This color tattoo by Black Cobra artists is on the back of “canvas” Josh Crosby of Oklahoma City. The finale required the artists to collaborate on one color tattoo and one blackand-gray tattoo for judging. Each took 35 hours to ink.