If ink is your thing, The Tattoo List ($1.99) draws up quite a list of artists all over the country for you to admire. Although the price tag might seem steep for what is essentially just a database of artists, this is a database that wasn’t just slapped together without rhyme or reason.

Rather than list every single shop that’ll gladly tattoo some terrible Ed Hardy design on your bicep, The Tattoo List was compiled by a collection of other artists. That means that if you’re in a smaller town, unless you’re hiding some great talent, this app may not have an artist in your area. It is thus far a collection of only 300 artists in North America. 

That said, even if you weren’t going to grab a new tattoo, The Tattoo List is interesting, if only as a compilation of art. Each artist listed has a photo of a design or two, which makes for some fascinating browsing. There are times when the app fails to load a picture, but the errors are few and far between. My only frustration came in wanting to see more of an artist’s work on the app, rather than travelling to their MySpace page to check it out.

Yes, most pertinent artist info, like official Web pages, MySpace/Facebook pages, or tattoo parlor pages or phone numbers are listed in the iPhone app, along with an address for their place of business and usually a note about their area of expertise. If you want to make sure the artist you select is specialized in Japanese tattoo art, you can do that.

The rest of the search works well, at least for someone like myself in a major city. The “Near Me” search button brought up plenty of nearby results, and the global search also seemed to bring up a plethora of results. You can even create a list of your favorite artists so you’ll have them on file if you ever decide to take the leap.

If you are planning on getting a tattoo or just an admirer of the craft, The Tattoo List is a no-brainer app purchase.