hello!

well, yes, thank you. my whole right arm is covered in tattoos from one artist. i kind of recall thinking i had blue blowout a few years ago with one of those, but it must have went away, or was a bruise, etc.

anyways – after a year or more of no tattoos, i went to a new artist for something on my lower left outer forearm. it’s a beautiful, vibrant tattoo of a single rose and while the artist is young, he is gaining popularity at a fast rate and people come from all over to be tattooed by him. the tattoo was/is healing just fine… got it 9 days ago now. it is still flaking. on day 4 or 5, as it started hurting less and peeling/ getting itchy, i noticed a slight blue haze near one of the leaves. actually, someone at work mentioned that my new tattoo “looks kinda blue” and he assumed it was bruising as part of the healing. it does look like a light blue bruise, but i can’t say that area hurts any more than any other area. i am fair-skinned, but if it is ink migration, does that kind of thing usually take several days to show up? because fresh, the tattoo looked perfect until day 4 or 5.

i’ve had another fellow tattooed person say “yeah that’s totally normal, you’re fair! it will go away,” but i am worried that because i am fair and do not have super strong forearms, that i bruised there during the tattoo, and as the tattoo healed, the ink spread or something. the artist mentioned that he was going to use a smaller outline needle than he usually uses since i am so petite and he didn’t want the black to be overbearing. he definitely knows what he is doing, so i wasn’t nervous at all and thinking “oh no a small needle might mean he is not be used to it and go too deep on my fair skin.” or something.

here is a pic of it, just now. the bruise thing is around the one big leaf.

thanks in advance for your advice. should i wait it out because it looks like a bruise/how soon does bruising go away? should i mention it to my artist after 2 weeks or so, and if it’s still there, maybe figure out some stars or smaller filler we can put there, or do you think it will get even less noticeable than it already is? i wouldn’t think much of this except someone that hardly knows me and has no tattoos but is interested in the look of tattoos saw it and mentioned that it looks blue -_- so now i’m super paranoid.

sorry!

here it is closer up

i feel heartbroken. i love the tattoo minus that, and i’m going to feel self conscious of it.

what do you recommend i do besides waiting for it to heal? like i mentioned, i have a right arm filled with tattoos and i used aquaphor on those for the first 3 days, then unscented lotion. this artist said to use lotion off the bat, and do a hot paper towel method on the fresh tattoo after you remove the bandage. so the advice was a bit different, but i did follow it. i think i had some minor haze on some of the tattoos on my right, but not this noticeable. i am petite and fair-skinned. this artist mentioned he was going to use smaller needles for me…

anyways, he does free touch ups for a year but i’d be afraid of something happening again? it’s on my lower arm so it does show even popping out from 3/4 length sleeve shirts. should i message the artist? thanks.

Thanks, that’s a bit reassuring.

The artist said that it can happen when he puts black shading against his line work, which can make it settle a bit lower in the skin and cause that slight bruise appearance. It can dissipate in time for some people, others it sticks around. And it happens sometimes in females with fair skin.

So – I want to go back to this artist because I really love the work and anticipated getting more pieces on the same arm from him. But some of that includes my INNER forearm, which is even thinner skin. Should I go back to him? I guess – would he consider that it happened before and not do the same thing for other pieces? Let me know what you think. I definitely want to fill my left arm in general because I wanted to anyways, plus with it filled no one’s attention would ever go to a slight hazy bruise looking thing anyways.

Thanks for the advice!