Two Dallas tattoo artists survive Ink Master season 2 premiere

Can Clint Cummings and Ron Givens survive next week's challenge?

Sparrows Tattoo Studio

Is Cummings there to make friends? No. No he is not.

DALLAS — Two Dallas-based body artists have joined the second season of Spike TV’s Ink Master. The hit competition-format reality show returned Tuesday night with Clint Cummings, owner/artist at Sparrows Tattoo Company in Mansfield; and Ron Givens, artist at Cat Tattoo’s Elite Studio in Addison among the 16 contestants vying for $100,000, a feature in Ink Magazine, and the title of Ink Master.

Dallas legend Oliver Peck – co-owner of Elm Street Tattoo, ex-husband of Kat Von D, and 2008 Guinness World Record holder for most tattoos inked in a 24-hour period – returns with Dave Navarro and Miami Ink star Chris Nunez on the judges panel. This season, the ante has been upped by allowing viewers to vote.

Spike TV

Getting a bad tattoo initially inspired Givens to give the artform a try.

The second season kicked off with 16 contestants competing in New York. The first “extreme” elimination challenge required the artists to ink “tattoo virgins," who had -- as the nickname implies -- not yet been inked. Givens, who specializes in new-school, color realism, and pieces influenced by Japanese anime, struggled when he cut his client and was forced to change needles, which judge Chris Nunez said was “preschool.”

Cummings immediately became the token “I’m not here to make friends guy.” A self-taught artist specializing in new school realist tattoos, Cummings also stumbled, though it should be noted that his client requested a chagrin-inducing “ninja riding a turtle with a snake as a leash.”

Despite initial challenges, both Dallas artists made it through the first two rounds, with Cee Jay Jones and Little Mike being the first two sent home. (A third contestant, TJ Halvorsen, left the competition for medical reasons.) You can watch Givens and Cummings each week on Spike on Tuesdays at 9 p.m., or catch up with full episodes online. Submit your vote for the "cover up" challenge here.

Shannon Sutlief contributed to this story.