JazzyMac

That’s a very nice tattoo!

Sometimes "balm" reacts differently to healing. Might do you well to stop using it if you already haven't. It may have also slowed or affected the healing. I wouldn't worry though.

Funny story: As I'm generously tipping my artist after my last session, he casually mentions he'll be in my city during a specific week, but "he's already booked up". While he's still counting, "You're welcome to book your next session back in my city though". Most artists are assholes. However if I constantly reacted based on how I was treated, the world would just be filled with tons of assholes. He enjoyed his extra and I have a cheeky tale to tell.

Yes, tiger is what I meant. And by bad I meant "good". Like "bad-ass"

The tattoo itself is very nice, however the first thing I notice was how the rabbit's body was "out of sorts". I would bring it up with the artist, but at the same time, research excellent, professional artists to correct this job. Yes, it's definitely fixable, and a great artist can work wonders with this piece. Don't rush it, however. Most people won't even notice the ears unless you point it out. Take your time and find a GREAT artist worthy of fixing the job.

Very nice! Yes, I follow both Horis on IG, so I'm a fan of his work. Welcome to the forums!

Let the skin doc settle the debate. 😉

It's such a grey area when it comes to this. I'm inclined to tip because...I'm a tipper. But that doesn't mean I don't notice the actions of artists. After spending so many hours with an artist and he "kind of" hits the nail in the head, but meh maybe, he'll still get a tip and then thank me and have a nice day. I'm not expecting a red carpet, but in the art industry, people just aren't thankful. I sought you out, I came on time, I sat well, I kept my mouth shut, I filled out your silly "what kinda tatto do you want" paper (that you didn't even care to read), and you still get a percentage on top of your outrageous charge. Someone's winning I suppose. 😏

Keep in mind that photo of the owl is highly photoshopped to be saturated so the eyes pop out more and the blacks contrast. I like your lion. It's bad.

Helloz

It's a keloid scar. It's how how some people with melanin in their skin react to scars. Unfortunately, your doctor was probably not used to seeing it. You need to see a skin doctor and see if you can get any meds for it. Sometimes before you start healing, you can take meds (during pain medication), so keloids won't pop up, as a prevention method. Sometimes it's inevitable. However, you may be lucky and it will heal and eventually disappear, but it will take months...maybe even a year. The needle went deeper than it should have, that's a fact.

Sew "thug life" across the sleeve of your shirt, so the lion looks like he's pimping for the ladies.

When you take off the wrapping, you will see how it looks. Right now it looks weird because all the plasma and ink is swimming around underneath the wrap. It looks fine.

Looks great!

I think american traditional would definitely be different and a challenge, but doable!

Nvm

It's not wrong to expect a reply, but you're probably not going to get a response at all. Most don't show you the design until the day before or until you actually walk in, and some actually draw the design free hand on you! But if your artist is flexible, you should be able to change up a couple of things and talk it through.

One pro tip I've learned when traveling is to try and take at least one "rest day" after your last tattoo session. If not a rest day, at least 12-18 hours of downtime before getting on any sort of transportation. You don't want to be leaking all over the place!

Thou shalt not give advice on tattoos if thou is constantly getting "tattoo divorces" . (Tattoo laser removal)

That said, it is kind of a weird US culture that we live in; tip 15-20% for doing the regular job...not going above and beyond, not doing anything miraculous, and there are still empty homes and homeless that we'll look down upon with scorn and say, "well you should have worked harder!" I digress. My artist does nothing out of the ordinary except tattoo, and yet gets all my dough.

This is old, but since the thread has been revived, (and not much else going on), I thought it worth to mention the very weird logic in this post. Someone said that since the artist charged $180/hour, and he or she as the customer only made $35/hour, no tipping would be involved...which as an Australian living in Australia is probably par for the course. And then, that post happened (above). "Let's add on all these extra charges to make it look like the artist makes pennies". Um, no. If an artist is charged a shop fee of 30%, that's fine. If it costs $40 to set up, that's also fine. But it doesn't cost $40 PER HOUR to set up does it? "Listening to what you want"...yes, yes, that takes a whole lot of money. As someone who's done a plethora of different jobs, plus dabbles in the artistic field, *I get it*, but let's not start pulling charges out of the sky to justify an artist's pricing. I know I can pay $5K for art that would cost $1K somewhere else, and it's not because *he listened more*. Eh?

Looks gruesome. Soooo glad you went to get medical care! So many folks here will suggest going back to the tattoo artist--even though they can't help unless, um, they are medically trained. It sucks your tattoo got infected; perhaps it was "luck" of the draw? I hope you're feeling better soon.

Hi hi!

Hello and welcome!

I always wonder why people don't freak out BEFORE the tattoo. Where are all the posts about the remorse and the second thoughts before getting the tattoo? Just asking.