Cover-Up & Scar Tattoos: Fixing or Covering Old Ink

Have you ever had a regrettable tattoo? It's possible that it's a loved one's name which is a reminder that you no longer love them, the tribal design you got ten years ago which you didn't appreciate in your teens or even a surgical scar you need to conceal and cannot afford to explain. Cover ups are probably the hardest type of tattoo for artists. They are very demanding as you have to think in multiple layers, like the color theory, negative space and old tattoos. The outcome, though, is a piece of work that is worth it. Cover-up experts are able to turn almost anything into something you'd be proud to show.

This entire book explains that process. It describes how cover-ups really work under the surface, whether laser bleaching is the right choice for you, how scars affect tattoo ink, and how to track down an artist who can actually pull off your vision instead of one who just guarantees you can cover up anything. Walk into your consultation with questions, but also know what to expect.

How Cover-Up Tattoos Work: The Art of Concealment

Here is the general rule in physics. Dark colors are on top of lighter ones. You cannot tattoo white over black. Ink does not work like paint. So, most of the time a cover-up design is heavy with blacks, blues, reds, or dark shading. There's an old tattoo still on you in your dermis, so that is going to be part of the design. Every color that your tattoo artist places onto you has to deal with that underlying design.

There are three main ways a cover-up can work. One: dark tones are put in the same space as the darkest of the original lines, hiding them in the dark. Two: lots of details are used. Flowers, mandalas, biomechanical, etc. These patterns break the original shapes into smaller bits so that your eye is unable to reassemble the original tattoo. Three: plenty of negative space. This diverts attention from any faint lines that are showing through in the tattoo.

The new design will always be bigger, 30 to 50% bigger. It's not an upsell, it's science. Your tattoo artist needs to have space to work. A pro will create a stencil to match that tattoo, mapping out a new design to fit your current ink perfectly and with the right positioning for all the elements.

Scar Camouflage Tattoos: Turning Scars Into Art

Scar tissue is another story. Different scars, raised scars (hypertrophic), pitted scars (atrophic), or overgrown scars (keloid), will accept ink in different ways. A tattoo artist performing this type of tattoo adjusts everything, the speed of the tattooing device, depth of the needle penetration, amount of ink in the skin, to minimize the risk of poor ink retention or scarring. One golden rule is to wait until a scar has fully healed: at least 12 to 18 months old.

The first is the more obvious method of making the scar part of a decorative tattoo, with flowers springing from the line, birds trailing along a surgical cut, abstract shapes that take on a 3D quality from the scar's ridges. The second approach is called medical camouflage. Here, the aim is to minimize the scar by tattooing over it with skin-tone ink and then blending it into the patient's surrounding skin tissue. The techniques are applicable to any kind of scar: mastectomy, burns, striae gravidarum (stretch marks). People sometimes employ a combination of both tattooing styles, with some of the scar still visible and incorporated into the tattoo (center) and medical camouflage applied to the ends of the scar (where it meets intact skin tissue).

Laser Removal as Cover-Up Preparation

Full removal takes a long time, a minimum of 10 or so sessions, thousands of euros and several months of downtime. You probably don’t need all that for your design idea, in many cases you don’t even want it. You just want to lighten the design so you have more space to add to the design in a second go. A laser lightening, a minimum of 2 to 4 sessions, removes the heaviest density of the ink (usually the outlines and some shading) and allows the remaining tattoo to be a medium gray. This opens up many more opportunities for covering up tattoos. Now the coverup artist is not restricted to very black, bold designs. Color is now possible, fine detail is possible.

Do yourself a favor before you even think about hitting the laser: call your cover-up specialist first. Ask them specifically which parts of your old tattoo absolutely need to be lightened and which ones are fine to leave as-is since they’ll get obliterated by the new piece. That way, you’re not burning cash and sessions on spots that no one is ever going to see again.

Map this timeline out in advance. Two to four laser sessions, 6 to 8 weeks apart, followed by a 3-month recovery period prior to the cover-up session. A laser treatment will cost between €150 and €300, depending on the size of the tattoo. The entire process can span 6 to 9 months.

Before and After: Setting Realistic Expectations

To put it simply, there is no way a cover up could look like a tattoo just done. Obviously there is likely to be some difference in the texture because the tattooed skin already has an ink under it; and there may be some ghosting in the original artwork for a year as it stabilizes; it may show to a slight degree under sunlight when certain angles are met, but for all intents and purposes, only you will notice.

So, what is there to expect? No one but you can see the original. The cover-up looks like a tattoo. Colors over a tattoo may be a little darker or duller than that color on the new part of the tattoo. Slightly darker or duller. The best cover ups even artists can't find it.

Another important thing that a lot of people don't do is to ask to see healed results. New photos of the fresh tattoo will look great, the color is fresh and bright, the lines look great. Healed results show what a tattoo will really look like. Ask to see them! Demand them!

Choosing the Right Artist for Cover-Up Work

A good tattoo artist can be a bad cover-up artist. Totally different skillset. For cover-ups you need to be comfortable with designing within limits; have experience with how ink sits over time and over other layers; and have covered a good number of already-traumatized pieces of skin. And when you look at their cover-up portfolio, it shouldn't be 3 examples hidden among the sea of their work. It should be 15-20 at least. Showings and afters. Healed, not just fresh.

During your consultation, a true cover-up specialist will document your existing tattoo with photos, go over style preferences, and then show you two to three options customized for your tattoo. They are going to be transparent with you. They'll let you know, for example, if your tattoo is too dark or too big for particular approaches. They're not going to overpromise.

Red flags? An artist claiming to have covered up tattoos of any kind without seeing it. An artist without a cover-up section in their portfolio. An artist recommending a design that's the same size or smaller than your tattoo. Flee from all of these. Prepare yourself for the cost of a cover-up tattoo to run 20-40% higher than standard tattooing. This higher price reflects the more time-consuming design process and the more intricate, technical nature of tattoo removal coverage, so you will get your money's worth.