Professional tattoo artists are concerned large numbers of 'backyarders' or amateur tattooists are operating outside strict industry regulations, buying inferior equipment online and putting people's health at risk.

Tattoo artist Bags, owner of the South East Tattooing and Body Piercing studio in Mount Gambier, said he had seen the number of such operators increase dramatically since the Tattoo Industry Control Act came into effect in South Australia last year.

"Backyarders are popping up everywhere. I can think of 20 of them just in the Mount Gambier area," he said.

"They buy a kit from eBay which are absolute rubbish and start hacking people up."

Complete tattooing kits can be bought for as little as $24 on online auction sites. ( Supplied: Ebay )

Giving tattooing a bad name

The award-winning artist said untrained operators were flouting the strict industry regulations and tattooing clients with amateur equipment, in unsanitary conditions, and giving the tattoo industry a bad name.

"Backyarders need to heed the same rules that professional studios are," Bags said.

"I'm talking about mates tattooing mates. It is completely unregulated."

He said novice tattooing could result in scars and allergies and put people at risk of blood-borne diseases such as Hepatitis C and B or even HIV, due to improperly sterilised equipment.

Bags said he was aware of one case recently where a woman had needed emergency hospital treatment after her new tattoo had become heavily infected.

"She obviously got it from an unsterile procedure. That is what you get from a backyarder," he said.

Industry laws vary

Policing the rise of backyard operators is very difficult said president of the Australian Tattooists Guild, Josh Roelink because laws and licensing varies from state to state.

"It is a very difficult thing to enforce because you literally have to have someone who has had a very dangerous infection or something go wrong medically," he said.

"And then they have to go and make a formal complaint about that particular person.

"The chances of that happening are quite rare."

Mr Roelink warned that many novice tattooists may not have been trained in cross-contamination procedures and the risk of infection from poor hygiene and unsterilised equipment was a major concern.

"I have heard stories of 14 and 15-year-old kids being bought [tattooing] equipment by their parents," he said.

He also said tattoo equipment bought online may be inferior, was potentially dangerous and gave buyers the impression that tattooing was easy.

Complete kits including ink, guns and needles can be bought for as little as $24 from Chinese sellers on eBay, Mr Roelink said.

"There are also a lot of inferior pigments from China being sold on eBay, which may have contaminants and heavy metals.

"A lot of people can get nasty reactions from those sorts of things."

Research before you ink

Many professional tattooists now have a solid line of business covering up botched tattoos from backyard operators.

The art of covering up a bad tattoo. ( Supplied: South East Tattooing and Body Piercing )

"Cover-ups are one of my specialities. I've been getting some doozies recently," Bags said.

One man with what Bags called a "horrific and disfiguring" novice tattoo had approached studios in several states to fix the work before coming to Bags, known locally as the 'cover up king'.

"Some are shockers," he said.

"It ends up costing them far more because they have to come to a shop like us to fix it."

Mr Roelink said there was a reason why professional tattoo artists did not work from their garagess.

He recommended doing your homework before getting in the chair.

"Look online, talk to other people who have been tattooed by that person and make sure they are in a registered studio," he said.

At the end of the day, Mr Roelink said you get what you pay for.

"If you pay $20 for a tattoo out of someone's house, you're probably going to pay another couple of hundred to get it lasered off," he said.

"Get it right the first time."