Help! Can anything be done to salvage these tattoos?? PICS attached.

[tattooproblems]

Hi everyone. I had a series of butterfly tattoos about 4 years ago, they go all up my leg. At first they looked good, but now it's like all the detail has gone and they look more like blobs. Also an arm tattoo, which I think could look better if touched up. I will try to attach pics. Can anything be done to sharpen these up? And if so, how on earth do I pick someone trustworthy? For obvious reasons there's no way I want to go back to the original guy who did these. I'm near Dunfermline in Scotland.

Hello.

They are very dark and have bled out a bit. Laser, especially on the butterfly is your best bet.

Crikey. I see what you mean.
They're very dark and would be a bit of a bugger to cover. As pp said, maybe laser removal might be best.

We have family in Dunfermline (several of whom moved up from Edinburgh.) Whilst staying with them recently my daughter had her ears pierced at Studio XIII in Edinburgh, they have a great local reputation for tattoos as well as piercings. Our Dunf family who’ve had both there recommended them to us & they were excellent. There were people going in to discuss tattoos whilst we were there & the knowledge of the staff sounded high calibre to me. The place has been there for decades. Might be worth popping in & getting a very professional opinion. They’re just up from Waverley on Jeffery St.

Thanks I will look at Studio XIII

CosyNavyLeader do you mean a laser tattoo or lasering to remove?

Laser tattoo removal :)

I really don't want to try to laser them off. Can nothing be done?

The problem is you can't take away any of the ink that's already there, covering up will mean going for something heavier, you can't really 'sharpen' the lines that have spead. A good cover up artist should be able to come up with a design to disguise what you have now, but I'm not sure you could do much to 'fix' the lines of what you have currently, (certainly on the butterflies as they're heavier) you'd be changing the design somehow.

Laser is an option, either to remove completely (would take time and £) or you can sometimes use it to just lighten a tattoo, making a coverup easier.

I always like instagram for finding artists - can see a lot of their work, and also find people who've tagged the artist so can see healed examples as well as fresh pics. You could search for local artists, or if you have a particular style of tattoo you like, but I'd probably start looking specifically at 'cover up tattoos'. Some artists will specialise more in them. The difference between someone capable of taking what you already have and working with it to create something new, and someone who can just slap something on top will be noticeable.

You could get them covered, but the design will need to be alot bigger to enable full coverage. And it's very dark, so you'll need another tattoo with alot of dark heavy coverage in order to cover it.

You could have some bright colours added to it instead. This may help.

Gah, I really don't want to go any bigger. I was hoping they could be sharpened up, maybe using some white ink?

Your best bet is to go into a few decent tattoo places and have a chat with them. They’ll be able to have a proper look and advise you.

Best go along to see a professional. You could always get 1 or 2 sessions of laser removal to lighten them in order to expand cover up options

Yes, would be good to actually see someone, the only problem is that they are not near home and I work most days. I didn't want to make a huge trip if nothing can be done.

Hello.

I am married to a tattooist.

The main issue is that they are on your arm, and you don't want to to bigger.

White ink isn't going to help.

A decent local tattooist will advise you to have some laser. Even one or two sessions will help massively

It's either that, or go bigger.

Or, add some colour and it will improve it, but not make it perfect.

Thank you for this. Sounds like I am stuck then. I've seen pics on line where tattoos have been sharpened up, I really hoped I could have the same.

You can sharpen them up if the ink is falling out/fading by adding more ink, but you have the opposite problem where there is lots of black ink and it has spread and blurred.

White highlights won't do much and white ink doesn't last long anyway. The only option if you don't want to cover it with something bigger is to get a bit of laser (to fade it - not necessarily remove it entirely) and then have it redone. Or live with it as is I suppose.

Is it something like this you've seen?

vm.tiktok.com/ZNdXTcHWK/

It does look very impressive. I'd be very surprised if it healed looking just as good.

There's reasons you rarely see artists do this, if it was easy & successful they'd all do it. Ideally if you wanted to try it out you'd find someone who's done it before (this girl's in Arizona unfortunately!) and you'd go in with the mindset that it's an experiment. It might improve it, it might make little difference, or it might just throw weird discoloration into the mix. If you absolutely hate what you have currently, and would try anything to change it, it could be worth a shot, but if you're just wanting to improve somewhat, it's a gamble.

Also I'd be very careful of anyone willing to try this. You might find a good artist who's willing to do their best at giving you a good outcome, but there's plenty of hacks who would be willing to take your money without caring what the results look like. Overall, this feels like it might be an 'Instagram Vs reality' solution...

I have a butterfly on my inner arm that went smudgy over time. I went back to the same tattooist and she brightened up the colours.
it’s still smudgy but I can live with it!