I'm working on a tribute tattoo for my friend Jeff, of his dog Emma. She's a sweet lady, and a huge part of Jeff's life. We decided to have a playful image of her in an environment, instead of just a simple portrait. The main issue we faced was that he wanted it half-sleeve size, but it needed to cover an old cross he had on his shoulder. He first came in for a session of just white ink, over his old tattoo to try and reduce the ink out a little before the big piece went over it. The other issue was how to cover the cross, but still keep the portrait of Emma in the spotlight without sacrificing the composition. We found the perfect solution, and are currently 2 sessions, and 7 hours into a full sleeve design of Emma in a field, with her favorite ball, and a dramatic sunrise coming up over the trees. I've got about an hour left on the outside, cleaning up lines, softening gradients, and final zip-zaps... Then it's on to the inside with another design! Here's the progress pics so far:
My solution. The approved sketch design. To help break up the composition, and create some visual flow with that accentuated Jeff's arm, I ran some wind though the piece, pulling his skin tone through the design to help integrate the color into his skin.
Jeff's first session - 4 hours. Main details on the grass and ball, and dark shading on Emma's face. The purple at the top is the remaining carbon stencil that was committed in gray lines, and finished over the second session.
Jeff's second session - 3 hours. Fine details, and a lot of 15 Mag work on the upper arm. The cross will need a little more covering in the grassy field area of the design, but it's almost completely disappeared now.
A detail of the upper arm. Can you see the old cross? An on-the-fly addition of the light yellow line over the dark treetops really helped them pop out!
Jeff's arm before, with his old cross that needed covering up:
