The Admin Panel#

Everything about the server is managed from one window, opened with /tattoocreator (admins only — see Claiming Admin Access). Its header holds an Open studio here button, which opens the studio on your own character with the admin tools, and a refresh button.

Tab	What it is for
Shops	Every studio on the server: search, create, edit, delete, and teleport to one with the pin button.
Moderation	Tattoos waiting for review, with a badge counting them.
Players	Find any player — online or not — and remove their tattoos.
Settings	Every behaviour of the resource, in twelve searchable sections.

Almost nothing is configured in files. Every studio, price and behaviour is edited here, live, and saved in your database.

Placing a Studio#

Shops → +. The form has three sections, and every position in it is placed in the world — nothing is ever typed as a coordinate. Press Create Shops when done; an existing studio has Save and Delete instead.

The studio#

Field	What it is
Studio name	Required, 2 to 48 characters. Also the blip's name unless you give it another.
NPC model	The ped that stands at the counter. `u_m_y_tattoo_01` by default.
Is this studio trading?	Open — customers walk in and staff start sessions. Closed — the studio stays on the map but turns everyone away.
Studio area	Required. The outline of the studio, drawn corner by corner with a free camera.
Tattoo spot	Required. The one point where artist sessions happen. It takes an optional Name and an optional Prop — a tattoo chair or bench model spawned on it.
NPC position	Where the NPC stands, inside the area. Required for an NPC studio; optional for a player-run one, where an empty field puts the NPC in the middle of the area facing the tattoo spot.

Drawing the area#

Press Select beside Studio area. The window hides, your character is frozen and a free camera starts above you. Click every corner of the studio, then confirm.

Key	Does
`Mouse`	Look around.
`W` `A` `S` `D`	Fly the camera.
`E` / `Q`	Camera up / down.
`Left click`	Add a corner at the crosshair.
`Right click`	Remove the last corner.
`Z` / `X`	Raise / lower the height of the area.
`ENTER`	Done — needs at least three corners.
`BACKSPACE`	Cancel the whole drawing.

The area is the studio. The NPC, the tattoo spot, its prop, the management point and supply crates only exist while a player is standing inside it — so fifty studios cost a player nothing but the one they are in.

Placing the points#

Every other point is placed with your normal camera: walk around and aim, and a red marker shows where the point will land, up to 50 m away.

Key	Does
`Left click`	Place the point.
`Z` / `X`	Turn the preview — the NPC, the customer on the tattoo spot, or the supply crate.
`BACKSPACE`	Cancel.

Point	What it is
NPC position	Where the NPC stands. It must be inside the studio area.
Tattoo spot	Where a customer stands during an artist session. A preview character shows exactly where they will be.
Management point	Player-run studios. Where staff open the management menu; falls back to the NPC when empty.
Supply delivery	Player-run studios. Where ordered supply crates are collected.
Blip coordinates	Optional. Leave it empty and the blip sits where the NPC does.

Company#

One switch decides what kind of studio this is. Off, the studio runs itself as an NPC shop: no owner, no staff, and customers tattoo themselves at the NPC. On, a player owns it — see Player-Run Studios below — and these fields appear:

Field	What it is
Owner	Search by name; anyone who has ever joined can be picked, online or not. Leave it empty for an unowned studio.
Artist commission (%)	Share of every artist sale paid to the artist; the rest goes to the till. 30 by default, capped by the Commission ceiling setting.
Price level (%)	100 is the standard price list, 150 is half again as expensive.
Accent colour · Banner image URL	How the studio looks in its management menu.
Management point · Supply delivery	The two points above. Supply delivery only shows while supplies are enabled in Settings.

Blip Settings#

Name, sprite and colour (picked from searchable lists), scale and optional coordinates. With the section switched off, the studio uses the server-wide blip from Settings → Shop defaults.

Not sure what a studio is still missing? Run tattoo_shop in the server console: one block per studio, ending with a list of every problem — no area, no tattoo spot, no owner, nobody who may tattoo, nobody clocked in.

The Studio#

What a player sees when they get a tattoo. Walk into the studio and up to its NPC: press E at [E] Tattoo studio, or use the Tattoo studio option with a target resource. The studio opens when:

the studio is Open;
Self service is on (Settings → Shops, on by default) — otherwise players need an artist;
a player-run studio still has supplies;
the player uses a freemode character.

The camera turns to the character, the clothing over the skin comes off (Undress every part takes it off everywhere at once; off, only the body part being worked on), the player is held still and the HUD hides. Everything is put back exactly as it was the moment the studio closes — with ESC or the Exit button.

The screen#

Where	What is there
Top	The six body parts with a count of tattoos on each (a dot marks unpaid changes), undo and redo, Review & pay and Exit.
Left	The Library: everything a tattoo can be made from.
Middle	The character — the canvas. What shows on the skin is exactly what gets inked.
Right	Your body: a one-line coach saying what to do next, the tattoos on this body part (up to 8), its quick spots, the Place, Look and Layers tabs, and the texture map.
Bottom	The camera dock — angles, zoom, poses, show skin or dress — and the key hints.

The library#

Tab	What it offers
Gallery	91 flash designs in nine styles — tribal, floral, animals, skulls, geometric, symbols, old school, minimal and ornaments — plus six one-click lettering presets. Searchable, and every one can be recoloured.
Draw	A freehand pen: four pen sizes and a slider, ink colour, fill shape, guides and a mirror mode for symmetrical drawings. Every line becomes its own layer, up to 24.
Text	Your own words (up to 64 characters) previewed live in 24 fonts — script, gothic, serif, display and clean — with ink colour and curved text.
Link	Any image link — PNG, JPG, WEBP or GIF, up to 4 MB. A GIF contributes its first frame, since a tattoo is a still image. Every link a player fetched is listed for re-use.
Saved	Designs saved on the server for this character, 30 by default. Each can be turned into a share code — `TAT-xxxx-xxxx`, valid 30 days — that another player redeems into their own designs.
History	The last 80 things a player put on their body — drawings, words, gallery picks, links — paid or not, kept on their own PC. One click brings any of them back.

A pick lands on the body part being looked at. With a tattoo selected, an Add as switch decides whether it becomes a New tattoo or a Layer of selected — a word added to a rose, a frame around a skull.

Body parts and quick spots#

GTA has six tattoo zones. Pick one from the top bar or simply click that part of the character; the camera frames it. Inside each, quick spots name the places players actually ask for. With a tattoo selected, a spot sends it there and turns the camera; with nothing selected, the camera goes there and the next design lands on it.

Body part	Quick spots
Head & neck	Face, Throat, Left temple, Right temple, Back of the head, Nape
Torso	Collarbone, Chest, Left pec, Right pec, Stomach, Left ribs, Right ribs, Left hip, Right hip, Left shoulder blade, Right shoulder blade, Upper back, Full back, Lower back
Left / right arm	Shoulder, Upper arm, Inner arm, Elbow, Forearm, Inner forearm, Wrist, Hand, Sleeve
Left / right leg	Thigh, Knee, Shin, Calf, Ankle

Placing on the character#

There is nothing else to learn: the tattoo is moved on the character itself, and the live preview is the exact texture that gets inked.

Input	With a tattoo selected	With nothing selected
`Left drag`	Move it — `Shift` for big steps, `Alt` for fine ones	Orbit the camera
`Wheel`	Resize	Zoom
`Shift` + `Wheel`	Rotate	—
`Ctrl` + `Wheel`	Zoom	Zoom
`Arrows`	Nudge — `Shift` bigger, `Alt` finer	—
`+` `-` · `[` `]`	Resize · rotate	—
`Right drag`	Orbit the camera	Orbit the camera
`Q` / `E`	—	Turn the character 30°

Anywhere in the studio: Ctrl + Z undo, Ctrl + Y redo, Ctrl + D duplicate, Delete remove the selected tattoo, Ctrl + Enter review and pay, ESC leave.

Place, Look and Layers#

Tab	What it holds
Place	Size chips (S, M, L, XL) and a slider, rotation, nudge arrows, mirror, back to the default spot, and fine horizontal and vertical position.
Look	The design's name, its words and font, ink colour, finish (ink or paint), opacity and style — fresh, bold, soft, aged or faded.
Layers	The full layer editor: up to 24 layers, shapes (rectangle, circle, star, polygon, line, ring), order, lock, hide, per-layer text and outline settings, and ink filters — fade, soft edges, grain, contrast and invert.

Texture map (advanced), at the bottom of the right panel, shows the exact picture the game stretches over the body part. Dragging on it is pixel-precise, and its test-card button paints the same labelled grid on the map and on the character.

The camera dock#

Turn left and right, front, left, back and right views, zoom, Reset view, a Pose menu (stand, arms out, flex, hands up, lean) to reach the inside of an arm or the ribs, and Show skin / Dress to check the tattoo with clothes on.

Prices and Paying#

Every price is worked out by the server from what is actually in the design — the client never sends an amount. Each tattoo is priced on its own:

lua

price = (Base + Per layer × layers + Per text layer × texts + Per image layer × images)
      × body part multiplier
      × size factor          -- 20% of the body part's width = 1.0, kept between Size floor and Size ceiling
      × studio price level   -- the studio's Price level and its Equipment upgrade
      − artist discount      -- artist sessions only
rounded to the nearest Round to

Every figure is in Settings → Prices:

Setting	Default
Base price	250
Per layer · Per text layer · Per image layer	40 · 30 · 60
Size floor · Size ceiling	0.6 · 2.5
Head · Torso · each arm · each leg	160% · 100% · 90% · 90%
Round to	5
Artist discount	0%
Free for staff	Off
Default account · Let players pick	Bank · On

With the defaults, at a studio on the standard price list:

Design	Price
A gallery design, medium size, on the torso	$315
The same design on the head	$505
A word, medium size, on an arm	$260
A six-line drawing, extra large, on the torso	$1,030

Changing a tattoo that is already inked — moving it, resizing it, recolouring it — is a touch-up at half its price.

The checkout#

Review & pay (or Ctrl + Enter) lists every changed body part, each line marked new, touch-up or laser removal, with the total, a Bank / Cash switch, Save design and the Pay button.

Paying charges and inks each body part in turn. The tattoo is on the character for everyone within the Show radius (45 m) about a second later — no restart, nothing to download. If the tattoo cannot be stored after the money was taken, the money is given back automatically.

Laser removal#

Select a tattoo and press Delete (or the bin on its tile), then Review & pay. Removal costs a share of what the tattoo cost when it was inked — 50% by default — or a flat fee, and never less than Removal minimum ($150). The $315 tattoo above costs $160 to remove. Until you pay, undo brings it back.

Limits#

Limit	Value
Tattoos per body part	8
Layers or drawn lines per tattoo	24
Body parts with ink, per character	6 — Body parts per character
Saved designs per character	30 — Saved drafts per player
Share code lifetime	30 days
Linked image	4 MB — Largest image
Text	64 characters
Undo steps	60

Moderation#

Players can draw anything and link any picture, so you choose whether a new tattoo is reviewed: Settings → Moderation → Review new tattoos.

Mode	The player	Rejecting it
Off (default)	The tattoo goes live immediately.	—
After the fact	The tattoo goes live immediately and is queued for staff.	Clears that whole body part. No refund.
Before	The player pays and sees Waiting for approval; the tattoo appears once approved. Removals in the same visit apply at once.	The payment is refunded if the player is online at that moment.

Every admin online is told when something is waiting. The Moderation tab groups the queue per player and body part, with a picture that enlarges to the tattoo alone or the whole body part, an optional Reject reason, and Approve / Reject. The player is told either way. Tattoos made by an artist in a session are never queued — the artist is the moderator.

Players#

The Players tab finds anyone who has ever joined by name, identifier or #id, online or not. Each body part that has ink is listed with its tattoos and what they cost; remove takes one off and Wipe zone clears the whole body part. There is no confirmation, the player is told if they are online, and the action is logged to Discord.

Player-Run Studios#

Switch Company on and a studio becomes a business: an owner, a staff list, its own ranks, its own till, its own supplies and its own upgrades. There is no framework job and no society account anywhere in it — being a tattoo artist means being on a studio's staff with the right to tattoo, and a player can work at several studios with a different rank at each.

Feature	NPC studio	Player-run studio
Customers alone at the NPC	Yes	Yes, while Self service is on — the whole price goes to the till
Artists and sessions	No	Yes
Owner, staff, ranks, wages	No	Yes
Supplies and upgrades	No	Yes

Staff open it at the studio's management point — [E] Management, or the Management option with a target resource. A studio without a management point puts it on the NPC instead, as [Shift+E] Management, so an owner is never locked out. Each tab is gated by rank, and a tab a rank cannot see is never even sent to that player.

Tab	What it holds	Needs
Dashboard	The till, today, the week and the month, net profit and margin, 14 days of revenue, who is on shift, top artists, recent activity.	—
Staff	Hire, change rank, fire, hand over ownership; tattoos, revenue and hours per person.	See and manage staff
Ranks	Create ranks, set seniority and the wage per hour, tick the permissions.	See and manage staff · editing: Create and edit ranks
Finance	Deposit, withdraw, the month's figures and a filterable ledger.	See the finances
Supplies	Ink, needles and gloves on the shelf, orders and deliveries.	See the supplies
Upgrades	The studio's level and XP, and the four upgrades.	See the upgrades
Settings	Name, open to customers, banner, accent colour, artist commission and price level.	Change shop settings
Activity	The full history of the till, in game: tattoos, deposits, withdrawals, wages, supplies, upgrades.	See the finances

The menu's side rail shows the studio, its level, whether it is open, the till and the Clock in / Clock out button. The owner sees every tab, and so does a server admin at any studio.

Ranks and permissions#

Every rank is built from 13 permissions, ticked one by one:

Permission	Lets that rank
`canAccessBossMenu`	Open the management menu
`canAccessWorkers`	See and manage staff
`canAccessFinance`	See the finances
`canAccessSettings`	Change shop settings
`canAccessStock`	See the supplies
`canAccessUpgrades`	See and buy the upgrades
`canDeposit` · `canWithdraw`	Deposit money · withdraw money
`canHire` · `canFire`	Hire staff · fire staff
`canEditRanks`	Create and edit ranks
`canOrderSupplies`	Order supplies
`canTattoo`	Tattoo customers — what makes someone an artist

A new player-run studio starts with four ranks:

Rank	Wage per hour	Permissions
Owner	—	All of them. Cannot be edited or deleted.
Manager	$380	Everything except changing shop settings and editing ranks.
Artist	$220	Tattoo, open the menu, see the supplies, deposit.
Apprentice	$120	Tattoo.

Staff#

Hire lists every player standing within 12 m (Hire range); a new hire joins at the lowest rank unless you pick one. Each staff card shows tattoos done, revenue and hours worked, with rank chips, fire and — for the owner — Transfer ownership. A transfer hands the studio to someone already on its staff, and the previous owner leaves the staff list. An admin can also set the owner from the studio's form at any time.

Clocking in and wages#

Anyone allowed to tattoo has a Clock in button in the management menu; there is no time clock to walk to. With Clock in to tattoo on (the default), only staff on shift at this studio can tattoo there. Clocking in somewhere else clocks you out here; disconnecting, a restart, and Auto clock-out (240 minutes) end a shift too.

Every Payroll interval (30 minutes) everyone on shift is paid their rank's hourly wage for that interval, into their bank, out of the studio's till — an Artist earns $110 a cycle. A till that cannot cover a wage pays nothing and tells the worker so; Payroll cap limits any one payment.

The till#

A studio's money is its own. On an artist sale the artist receives the studio's commission (30% by default, never above Commission ceiling) straight into their account, and the rest lands in the till. A walk-in who uses the NPC alone pays the till in full. Staff with the right permissions deposit from bank or cash and withdraw to their bank; wages, supply orders and upgrades are paid from the till. Every movement is in the Activity tab.

Supplies#

Every tattoo a studio inks uses supplies, and a studio that runs out cannot work until someone orders more. A new player-run studio starts with 250 of each.

Supply	Used per tattoo	Price per unit
Tattoo ink	8	$4
Needles	3	$8
Gloves	6	$1

Order
Supplies → Order from the supplier. The order is paid from the till up front, up to the studio's storage capacity (1,000 of each, raised by the Storage upgrade).
Wait for the crate
After the Delivery time (10 seconds by default) a crate appears at the studio's supply delivery point, and staff nearby are told.
Collect it
Any member of staff presses [E] Collect the delivery at the crate, and the supplies go on the shelf.

Turn Block when empty off to make supplies cosmetic, or Supplies off to remove them entirely.

Levels and upgrades#

A studio earns 1 XP for every $10 it takes, levels up every 2,500 XP — $25,000 of revenue — and stops at level 10. Levels unlock upgrades, bought from the till:

Upgrade	Effect per step	Cost · studio level needed
Equipment	Charge 110% → 125% → 140% of the price list	$25,000 · 2 → $75,000 · 4 → $180,000 · 6
Storage	160% → 240% supply capacity	$15,000 · 2 → $45,000 · 3
Efficiency	Tattoos use 80% → 60% of the normal supplies	$20,000 · 3 → $60,000 · 5
Marketing	Walk-ins pay 115% → 130%	$18,000 · 2 → $55,000 · 5

Artist Sessions#

The heart of a player-run studio: a real artist tattooing a real customer, who watches it happen on their own character.

Clock in
From the management menu. Without it, the tattoo spot only says Clock in from the management menu before you can tattoo.
Invite the customer
With the customer standing beside you, walk onto the tattoo spot — a blue marker while free, red while in use — and press [E] Invite a customer to this spot. The closest player is invited; they must be within 4 m. /tattoo_invite does the same from anywhere inside the studio, for a keybind.
The customer accepts
They have 30 seconds. Nothing is charged until the artist finishes, and from this moment their own screen shows their own character, the running bill, and a Bank / Cash choice. They can orbit and zoom freely.
Work
The artist's studio opens on the customer's character, with the full library and every tool. Every stroke appears on the customer's screen as it is drawn, and the bill is re-priced by the server as the work changes. The artist can also remove tattoos, billed as laser removal.
Finish & charge
One press inks the tattoo, charges the customer and pays the artist's commission. There is nothing for the customer to confirm — they agreed when they accepted — and they get a recap of what they paid.

The customer can walk out with Leave the chair (unless Customer may leave is off), and a disconnect or a death on either side ends the session. Nothing unfinished is charged. By default the customer stays where they are standing; switch Move the customer on to place them on the spot.

Catalog Exports#

A catalog export turns a design into a standard GTA tattoo that other scripts can list — illenium-appearance and qs-appearance pick it up in their own tattoo menus with nothing to edit. It is an admin tool, and player tattoos never need it.

Open the studio from the panel
/tattoocreator → Open studio here. This is the only place the Tattoo catalog (admin) panel appears, in the right-hand panel.
Design it on a body part
Everything on the selected body part is exported together, at the exact position and size it has on the body.
Name it and export
Type a Tattoo name and press Export. A confirmation tells you how many players are online.

Each catalog entry can be renamed in place, or replaced with what is on the body part now — a new version under the same name, so scripts that reference it keep working — or deleted. Which appearance scripts receive the catalog is the list in server/custom/appearance.lua; see Integrations.

Placement Tuning#

Where a new design lands, and where each quick spot sits, are measured on a stock character. If one feels off on your server, /tattoo_calibrate (admins) opens the studio with a Placement tuning panel instead of the usual tools: the texture map of the body part and the list of positions on it — New designs land here first, then every quick spot.

Pick a row — say Full back.
Add any design from the library: it lands on that row.
Drag it on the character until it sits right, then press the row's crosshair, Put it where the selected tattoo is. Clicking or dragging on the map works too.
Press Save.

The panel also flips the direction a drag moves a design, per body part. Saving writes custom/placement.lua, which survives updates and is safe to delete; you have the change at once, everyone else after the next restart.

The Settings#

The Settings tab holds every behaviour in twelve sections. Every field has a description, a search box finds a setting across all of them, and a save applies to the server and to every player online at once. The few that cannot — a chat command's name, a body part's texture size — are marked needs a restart.

Section	What it holds
General	Language, debug logging, zone outlines, UI sounds, saved designs per player, share code lifetime, the currency format and symbol, IPs in Discord logs.
Interaction	Target resource on or off and its box size, the studio key, prompt distance and position.
Prices	Every figure of the price formula, the body part multipliers, removal fees, the artist discount, free for staff, and which account pays.
Commands	The admin panel, studio and invite commands. Empty switches one off.
Studio	The camera's blends, field of view, zoom and angles, the live preview's size and refresh, undress every part, freeze the player, hide the HUD and other players.
Tattoo spot	Moving the customer, floor snapping, whether they may leave, invite range, the preview character and the marker's look.
Shops	Commission and its ceiling, self service, clock in to tattoo, the live relay, payroll, supplies and the crate, levels, log length, hire range, management menu distance, owner transfer.
Ink & textures	The texture size other players see, the show radius, body parts per character, the catalog export size, each body part's texture size, and the drag feel.
Re-apply	How tattoos are kept on after clothing and skin changes — the watchdog, the nearby scan and the retry delays.
Images	Image links on or off, any site or only the allowlist, blocking private networks, the largest image.
Moderation	Review new tattoos: off, after the fact or before.
Shop defaults	The blip and NPC model a new studio starts with.

These values live in your database, one row per value you changed. An update never overwrites them, and Reset section or Reset all puts back what shipped.

The Admin Panel#

Placing a Studio#

The studio#

Drawing the area#

Placing the points#

Company#

Blip Settings#

The Studio#

The screen#

The library#

Body parts and quick spots#

Placing on the character#

Place, Look and Layers#

The camera dock#

Prices and Paying#

The checkout#

Laser removal#

Limits#

Moderation#

Players#

Player-Run Studios#

The management menu#

Ranks and permissions#

Staff#

Clocking in and wages#

The till#

Supplies#

Order

Wait for the crate

Collect it

Levels and upgrades#

Artist Sessions#

Clock in

Invite the customer

The customer accepts

Work

Finish & charge

Catalog Exports#

Open the studio from the panel

Design it on a body part

Name it and export

Placement Tuning#

The Settings#

The Admin Panel#

Placing a Studio#

The studio#

Drawing the area#

Placing the points#

Company#

Blip Settings#

The Studio#

The screen#

The library#

Body parts and quick spots#

Placing on the character#

Place, Look and Layers#

The camera dock#

Prices and Paying#

The checkout#

Laser removal#

Limits#

Moderation#

Players#

Player-Run Studios#

The management menu#

Ranks and permissions#

Staff#

Clocking in and wages#

The till#

Supplies#

Order

Wait for the crate

Collect it

Levels and upgrades#

Artist Sessions#

Clock in

Invite the customer

The customer accepts

Work

Finish & charge