my first on skin (freehand)

i would like to comment, but the pic quality is just too bad. is the tattoo really that muddied up or is the pic just really out of focus? hard to tell, get a better pic if you want people to critique.

suggestion: when i first started on human skin, i made sure to choose designs that would be easily covered-up later if i screwed up. just a thought.

not bad for your first. i think the only thing i would have to say about it is the lines from the strings of the balloons in the middle whee the banner raps around throws it off just a little.

Ok , honest opinion..may sound harsh but trust me it’s nothin personal.
it’s pretty rough, freehand is not the best choice for your first work on skin. your linework is all over the place, thick where it should be thin and thin where it should be thick, some of the letters look like they were gone over a few times which is really traumatic to the skin with a liner. the shading is blotchy and doesnt have a smooth transition at all.

get on the pigskin and practice making smooth lines and curves as well as whip shading

first of all, freehand doesn’t mean tattooing directly on the skin with no stencil. people always get the assumption that this is how freehand is done. it’s not. “freehand” is drawing the stencil on the skin, rather then creating a stencil on paper and transfering it. second, this is a very poorly done piece due to the fact that you had nothing to go off of. a stencil is there for a purpose whether it’s transfered or freehand. its a guide for you to go by. you cant draw a picture on paper and have it look complete in one shot. you do a rough drawing then tighten everything up.

@Troub1edSou1z wrote:

first of all, freehand doesn’t mean tattooing directly on the skin with no stencil. people always get the assumption that this is how freehand is done.

A Short Excerpt from CR Jordan’s Book:
“This May Sting A Bit: Everything your tattoo artist forgot to tell you, and you were probably too afraid to ask (2012)”

“…CHAPTER 4: FINDING THE RIGHT SHOP…
…Freehand is a myth
Freehand is another concept that tattoo shops use fairly loosely and usually improperly. When a tattoo artist draws on a client with a marker or pen without looking at a reference, this can be considered freehand to some. Others will say that when the tattoo artist completes a tattoo without making a single pen or marker drawing, just jumping right in with the needle and ink, that this is the proper way to freehand. Some will argue that if the stencil applied to the client’s body was drawn by hand, then this is also freehand. Just like the custom piece argument, every tattoo is done by someone’s hand, so you can just as easily say that every tattoo is freehand.
Terms like “custom” and “freehand” are just a few ways that tattoo artists have tried to up-sell their service to potential clients. There are very few tattoo artists that will do a truly custom freehand tattoo, discussing the idea with the client and then just tattooing it without a drawing, sketch, stencil, or reference. This is actually not a very good way to work in the tattoo industry, and I don’t know of many professionals who can pull this off with any level of complexity….”

@canvasyou wrote:

@Troub1edSou1z wrote:

first of all, freehand doesn’t mean tattooing directly on the skin with no stencil. people always get the assumption that this is how freehand is done.

A Short Excerpt from CR Jordan’s Book:
“This May Sting A Bit: Everything your tattoo artist forgot to tell you, and you were probably too afraid to ask (2012)”

“…CHAPTER 4: FINDING THE RIGHT SHOP…
…Freehand is a myth
Freehand is another concept that tattoo shops use fairly loosely and usually improperly. When a tattoo artist draws on a client with a marker or pen without looking at a reference, this can be considered freehand to some. Others will say that when the tattoo artist completes a tattoo without making a single pen or marker drawing, just jumping right in with the needle and ink, that this is the proper way to freehand. Some will argue that if the stencil applied to the client’s body was drawn by hand, then this is also freehand. Just like the custom piece argument, every tattoo is done by someone’s hand, so you can just as easily say that every tattoo is freehand.
Terms like “custom” and “freehand” are just a few ways that tattoo artists have tried to up-sell their service to potential clients. There are very few tattoo artists that will do a truly custom freehand tattoo, discussing the idea with the client and then just tattooing it without a drawing, sketch, stencil, or reference. This is actually not a very good way to work in the tattoo industry, and I don’t know of many professionals who can pull this off with any level of complexity….”

definitely makes sense……..