When the original Dragon Ball manga series was released by Akira Toriyama in 1984, even its most ardent supporter couldn’t foresee it becoming one of the most popular Anime franchises in the world.
Dragon Ball now spans 20 animated feature films, animated television series, spin offs such as Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball GT, games across all platforms including Ios and Android, and billions in other merchandise worldwide.
Dragon Ball – Along with the world of Pokemon – has arguably been the most influential and popular Anime crossover franchise spanning both Japanese and Western markets.
Dragon Ball tattoos are the latest wave in the signature franchise’s amazing mythology. Read on for awesome tattoo design and possible inspiration for your body art. You don;t even need to be an anime fan to dig this tattoo idea.
1. Anime Style DBZ Design
A cool thing about Dragon Ball tattoos is that you don’t need to be a watcher of the television series or anime fan to enjoy the art, technical skill and color in each vivid design.
The Dragon Ball itself is a funky image, while meme culture and the internet has introduced us to Super Saiyan powering up, or Goku looking freaked out prior to battle. The pert breasted version of Bulma is a sadboi’s dream tattoo, but from a technical ink perspective it’s drawn with tremendous clarity and use of brilliant color.
2. Black and Gray Dragon Ball Design
On the flips side, the absence of color in Dragon Ball Z tattoo allows each tattoo artist to explore the original manga style thick black ink art on skin. I really dig the various visages of the characters, like a split screen prior to a fight, while the cute image Goku and Saiyan finger fighting tattoo features great shading and cleanly executed fine lines.
3. Chinese Dragon Ball Shenron Tattoo
Shenron is the magical dragon who can be summoned by individuals that collecting all seven of the Dragon Balls. As an Eastern Dragon, kind are benevolent and sacred in Asian mythology, making for a perfect Chinese Dragon tattoo idea.
He’s naturally a vivid green in color, but these Shenron tattoo examples are etched with black line ink or black and gray so that the dragon balls can be emphasized using color to contrast against his body and face.
4. Framed Shape Anime Dragon Ball Tattoo
The key to this great character selection lies in framing each tattoo with a border shape to give the art depth and perspective. The Vegeta tattoo and other ideas are allowed a different look by putting elements outside the frame.
The colorful Master Roshi ink is my favorite of these framed DBZ tattoo ideas – the old bloke looks like he’d be fun at parties – and the technical work using almost dotwork fuzz shade in creating the rising sun behind him is an epic tattoo idea.
5. Heavy Black and Line Ink Dragon Ball
Source: @jackwhitetattoo via Instagram
These Dragon Ball series designs show off the variation of heavy black ink tattoos. The first one, featuring Piccolo and Krillin, looks excellent balancing negative space and single needle lines. Others, such as Piccolo and Goku, or the Super Saiyan framed fight look for manga style realistic texture.
My favorite piece is the framed linework man in beautiful black line opposed by bright red splashes of blood. I think the artist giving the man angry red eyes and the blood trickle against his mouth – with droplets outside the frame – works brilliantly to give a technical piece even more character.
6. Large Z Tattoo Pieces
These bigger dragon ball tattoos go hard. Love the use of Japanese tattoo fundamentals – great balanced images, single panel color, framing shapes – all work to bring these characters into their element.
The sleeve Goku tattoo is particularly masterful work, it looks like a freshly printed brochure. Being able to show off the wicked green hair of Broly – amongst traditional black linework – is a killer feature, while interlinking the small pieces of the main Dragon Ball Z characters – Goku, Vegeta, Yamcha, Beerus, Frieza, Krillin, Shenron, Gotenks – done in a style different to anime tradition stands out.
I’m not as big a fan of the Majin tattoo, but that’s purely because of his rough head more than anything the tattoo artist is responsible for.
7. New Wave Color DBZ Anime Fan Tattoo
Source: @jackwhitetattoo via Instagram
If you’re an fan of the anime series looking to go brazen when choosing your Dragon Ball GT tattoo, and really want to make it stand out, then new wave inspiration like these examples will stand you in good stead.
They go beyond just vivid color into wildly disparate types of theming and outlandish use of character – I mean Cell is already weird, so leopard printing his helmet is rad. They take a simple forearm tattoo idea then create a rampant Goku image, levitating Beerus, or Master Roshi on a bender to completely change up a DBZ design.
Dragon Ball Tattoo FAQs
What does Goku’s symbol mean?
The Dragon Ball symbol Goku wears is a combination of separate kanji characters. The first is Kai, which means “World”. The second is Oh, which means “King.” When mixed into vertical Kanji they become the personal emblem of Kaio, who is known as the King of Worlds.
What does the Z in Dragon Ball Z Stand For?
The Z in Dragon Ball Z stands for “zenkai”. In Japanese, Zenkai roughly translates to mean “the last time”. Originally, Dragon Ball Z was supposed to be the finale for the Dragon Ball franchise, but then the Dragon Ball GT series was created due to the overwhelming popularity of Z, and the increase in interest from Western culture.
Did you enjoy these Dragon Ball Tattoo Ideas? Click on the links below for badass Japanese anime inspiration: