All Tattoos Fade

  

     All tattoos will change and fade over time, especially if you get these tattoos at a young age and have them for a large portion of your life. There are numerous reasons a tattoo may fade or become misshapen over the course of a lifetime.  Location of the tattoo, the color and the type of pigment, changes in weight, aging and sun exposure play a big role in the fading of a tattoo. 

      The sun is one of the main reasons tattoos fade over time. When you first get a tattoo, you should avoid being in the sun until it fully heals. Once the tattoo heals applying sunscreen will greatly decrease your chances of ink fading. Use a high SPF (that blocks UVA Rays) or a tattoo-specific sunscreen to protect your skin. UV rays from tanning beds are also harmful to tattoos and can cause damage to the skin. Tanning beds are more harmful than the sun because the UV is more intense and closer to your skin, causing more damage quickly. 

     The skin constantly changes due to all kinds of factors. One of the reasons tattoos fade is due to the changing of the skin. Your skin grows and changes to accommodate your body throughout life. If your body grows, due to gaining weight of some sort, your skin will change to accommodate that. If you have a tattoo on this area that changed, the tattoo will stretch with the skin. Weight gain due to unhealthy eating isn’t the only way a tattoo can be damaged by skin stretching. The stretching of skin can also occur if you have a significant increase in muscle mass in a particular area. For example, if you have a tattoo on your thigh and you start doing squats to grow your quads, the tattoo will stretch with the skin as your muscle grows. Although growth would have to be quite drastic to negatively affect a tattoo it can still happen.

      There are certain parts of the body that tend to fade quicker than others. Some body parts are more susceptible to fading, so are the tattoos on these body parts. Shoulders and ankles have tight skin, and the skin doesn't sag and become as loose over time, unlike the upper arm or abdomen. Tattoos on the palms and soles of the foot don't tend to last as long because the skin is thicker compared to other part of the body, and the tattoos tend not to go as deep.

Color Tattoos

   

     Tattoos have gone from being something associated with soldiers and sailors to becoming modern pieces of art. They now come in countless different styles, with limitless designs and a wide variety of colors. The type of color, shading and tones will vary depending on the tattoo design, tattoo artist and tattoo style. Color tattoos became more notable in the 17th century as tattooing in Japan became more comfortable. To this day, Japanese tattoos are filled with bright and bold colors. The popularity of tattoo colors is connected to the advances of tattoo ink.

    Choosing the color for your tattoo is an important part of the tattoo design process. Colors can change the whole effect of the inking, can help it come to life or to resemble the original image. Several tattoo styles gravitate towards bright color work. New school watercolor, old school, traditional, Japanese, and illustrative all heavily rely on colors to complete the work. When contemplating what colors you want in your tattoo, there are a few things you will need to consider. If you want a small tattoo, colors may visually blend and muddy into each other. Big pieces look better with color, as the shades will stand out and be clear to read. When choosing the best color for your tattoo, remember that your skin tone will impact how it looks on the skin and how long it will last. Colored tattoos will always look different once healed, so make sure you keep that in mind during the inking process.

    Vibrant and pastel colors like pink, yellow, light blue and green tend to fade faster. The shades commonly used in watercolors are short-lived as well. Despite being incredibly popular, this style of tattooing requires frequent touch-ups to keep the vibrancy and longevity of the colors. How good your color tattoo looks and for how long it will stay looking good will depend on the area you get tattooed. This is because some body parts are more susceptible to aging and weight relayed changes. Shoulders and ankles have tight skin that doesn’t become loose over time, this means your tattoo should keep its shape and color better for longer. Arms, thighs, and abdomen go through lots of changes as we age, affecting the way the tattoo looks. 

    Color tattoos are incredibly beautiful and have stemmed from an immensely vibrant history. They are used in a wide variety of different styles, from modern genres like biomechanical and new school tattoos, to traditional styles like Japanese and American traditional tattoos. Colored tattoos tend to fade quicker, especially light colored and watercolor pieces because of the technique that is utilized. White tattoos fade the quickest out of all tattoos, especially when exposed to the sun. These are some of the things to take into consideration as well as educating yourself on the longevity of color tattoos, and how the tattoo will look several years down the road. 

Tattoo Aftercare: What You Need To Know

  A tattoo is more than just a piece of art and a way to assert your personal style. Any time you open the skin, you leave yourself vulnerable to scarring and infection. Caring for your tattoo can prevent those complications and ensure that the tattoo heals properly. Both you and your tattoo artist play equal roles in this process. Along with going to a professional and reputable tattoo artist, you need to take care of your new tattoo at home. 

    Figuring out how to care for your tattoo can be tricky though. Aftercare starts as soon as your tattoo is done. The artist should apply a bandage to cover the area and help with healing. This covering prevents bacteria from getting into your skin and also protects the tattoo from rubbing onto your clothes and getting irritated.  Keep the dressing on for as long as your tattoo artist recommends as it helps to absorb any fluid or excess ink that leaks from the tattoo. After sufficient and recommended time (24 hours) has passed, you can remove the 1st bandage. Wash your hands with water and soap, then gently wash the tattoo with warm water and natural (chemical free) fragrance free soap. Pat your skin dry with a paper towel or a clean and soft cloth. Then you should apply the 2nd dressing on and wear it for 4 days. 

    While your tattoo heals, you should wear sun-protective clothing whenever you go outside or try to stay out of the sun as much as possible. Do call your tattoo shop if you experience any out of the norm complications or other problems and they can give you advice on what steps to take next. You should avoid scratching or picking at your tattoo no matter how bad the urge may be. Avoid wearing tight and restrictive clothing over the part of the body that has been tattooed to allow it to breathe and heal faster. Don't go swimming or immerse your fresh tattoo in body of water, especially hot tubs (showers are fine).

        Once your tattoo has healed, you move into maintenance mode. Though you don't have to specifically care for it after 3 to 4 months, there are things you can do to prevent ink from degrading. Wash your skin daily with a gentle and fragrance-free soap, drink plenty of water to keep your skin moisturized, wear sunscreen ( that blocks UVA Rays) so the sun won't fade your tattoo. Another thing is to avoid excess weight gain or loss as that could stretch out or distort the tattoo. 

    After getting a new tattoo, the outer layer of skin will typically appear healed within 2 to 3 weeks. However, the healing process can take upward of 6 months. Aftercare, which includes daily cleaning, ointment or moisturizer should continue for at least that long to reduce the risk of infection or other complications.

How To Tell A Good Tattoo From A Bad Tattoo

   

 

   

     

    For people outside of the tattoo industry, it may be difficult to tell if a tattoo is bad. Believe it or not, but many people out there don't know that their tattoo is poorly done. However, for those of you that want to ensure that you go to an artistically and technically qualified artist, below you will find some important aspects to look for in a tattoo. 

    A good tattoo should have fully saturated black, color and shading. When it heals, there shouldn't be gaps or shapes in the tattoo that indicate it wasn't filled in properly. The lines of a tattoo should be crisp, straight and consistent throughout the tattoo. Wonky lines are a huge indication of an inexperienced artist. How a tattoo heals is a huge indication of a good tattoo vs a bad tattoo. If a tattoo scars, blows out or straight up falls out of the skin, it's a bad tattoo. 

    It doesn't take an expert to tell if a tattoo is crooked, but many people outside of the industry may not recognize the rules surrounding placement. First off, if a tattoo is a face it should in general be facing in toward the body vs away. Second, text should appear upside down to the wearer. Third, you should never put a tiny tattoo in the middle of a large canvas. A tattoo needs a variety of tones in order for it to appear multidimensional and that its jumping off the skin. If the tattoo has bad contrast, it will appear flat and washed out. Faces and body parts can be very tricky, because one wrong move can ruin a perfectly good drawing. It takes years of practice to create a realistic portrait, so enlist the best of the best for this task.

    Details can take an average tattoo to an extraordinary tattoo very quickly. You want to feel like you can run your fingers over a tattoo and feel every single detail, whether it be the texture of the hair or the consistency of the eyes. You should be able to look at your tattoo and know exactly what it is or what it says. If you look at a tattoo and say to yourself, "what is that?" then its probably not a very good tattoo.