Realistic Doll Tattoos

TS: I like your dragon!

 

I do a pencil sketch, followed by pastels, and then "ink" it with my acrylics in very fine lines.

 

TS: Wow you're really talented!! That's a really brilliant replica!! And I like how you made it look "soft" and not sharp like a fresh tattoo! Very realistic!

 

i was thinking of giving my girl a tattoo myself, and whilst i was looking for watercolours i came across this: http://direct.hobbycraft.co.uk/productdetail.asp?productcatalogue=298101

does anyone know if thats okay to use on resin?

 

Sounds okay, excpet for that non-soluble permanent outliner. If you seal well first you should be fine.

 

Wow! I love ti this has inspired me to tat up my doll

 

I wouldn't chance it hun as it says they are permanent so there's a good chance they'll stain.

Better using pencil, pastels, and watercolours for that softer tattoo look with less risk.

 

Filthy Warumono I love Phrophets tats....man I wish you could Tat Sandalio...

 

I love the look of all these tattoos! ^_^ Especially the 'fresh' ones, they seem so alive.

 

I'll have to come back to this later. Everyone's tattoos look amazing. I love tattoos, have quite a few myself, so I'm sure I'll attempt to add some to dolls in the future

 

Ehehe... I feel sort of silly posting in here, as these are the first "tattoos" I've done... I did them in watercolor pencil. ^^;





(I think I'm going to redo them in the near future... I was using a low-cost brand of pencil and it keeps rubbing off even after sealant! >.<)

 

Wow... post to subscribe

This is awesome!

 

Thought I would share, though I'm a bit embarrassed because my work isn't the best, haha.

I decided before I tanned my Juri, I would give her a few tattoos, one on her back modeled after my own on my thigh, simplified, plus a nautical star on her chest.

The back tattoo of hers, done with watercolor pencils and gently smudged with a damp Q-Tip.



And my own, this is about four hours old, haha. Its over two years old now, and hasn't faded at all. I think because my thighs get NO light.



And her nautical star, again, done with watercolors.

 

Wow! Stunning tattoons you all have here! They look so realistic and beautiful.

 

woah, so many awesome tattoos here 8D&#9829;

here's a few that i did for my boy a few months ago:






those are my first attempt so they are still not that good :/
i've gotten feedback on how dark and "fresh" they look, and some great advice on fixing that 8); (blushing a layer of skin-coloured pastel on the tattoos)
imma go try that out once i get the time to

the materials i used for the tattoos are:
normal graphite pencil (for sketching first)
normal watercolour pencil (colouring in and final outline)
MSC to seal

the process is basically like doing a faceup; seal and draw/colour, and then seal again 8)

other than trying to fix the fresh look of my boy's tattoos, i'll be working on a few more complicated designs which i will attempt on using a mixture of pastels and watercolour pencil :/ and hopefully all turns out well...

 

Wow those are fabulous!

 

Amazing tattoos!
Amazing skills!

 

Amazing tattoos!!!

 

Here's my first try at a tattoo, still not sure about the gear and now that I look at it I think I liked it in black and white more than with color. Live and learn right This was done freehand with my sister's fancy graphite pencils for outline and pastels for color.





Normal position


Leaning forward

 

wow it's stunning i love how you paint the tree branches, and the green i so delicate!

 

I have a question for those with tan or odd colored skinned dolls, will layering pastels with a sealed coat of whatev(mr. super clear/testors dull cote/etc) make the colors more opaque or will the tan/othercolor still show through strongly?

 

Welp, here is my first tattoo. I just used watercolor pencil and worked in layers sealing with zoukimura spay in between until it looked dark enough. It looks like it has aged a little to me from all my unsteady handywork, but I have no tattoos of my own nor any close tattooed friends to compare to.

 

These were amazing, thanks so much to everyone for sharing. ^_^

 

wow this is such a great thread! i used to be a tattoo artist myself, and i plan to have my doll completely covered but having never done this before, i wasnt sure where to start. may i ask what is likely a really dumb question? when you refer to using pastels, are you grinding them into a powder to apply with a brush? do you need to wet the brush, or water down the pastel mixture?

 

I didn't use pastels in my tattoo, but when I'v used them before for faceups I have always grated them into a powder and applied them with a brush. You don't need to add water though. Pastels are meant to work as a dry medium. You do however need to seal your doll with a base coat to give the resin some tooth for the pigments in the pastel to grab on to. And do splurge for the high end super soft pastels. They do make a difference. Hard pastels or pastels with a low amount of pigment in them are really frustrating to try and use with dolls.

 

Ive done a little tattooing on my dolls torso. i did it with indian inks and found it really good and easy to use just needed about 2 layers and a fine brush. it was a tribal tattoo. im still working on geting picks up of it because when i was restrining my doll after words the hook in side his hand broke and havent been able to replace it yet.

but ya ive been using indian inks to tattoo my dolls it stains very little even with a pure black. as long as you get it off with in about 3 hourse of it being on with a normal magic earaser it comes right off the resin.

 

great! thanks you for the advice! i cant wait to give it a try, i plan to pick up supplies tomorow, ill be sure to get soft pastels

 

looove all the tattoo's! Can't wait to start having ago myself

Oh god..Prophet looks amazing!!!

 

wow I can't believe I've never seen this thread before >_< I absolutely adore tattoos.. I haven't gotten any of my own yet ._. I have a terrible time committing.. but my junior delf terra, Deity is full of 'ink'

hip tattoo: koi fish with the kanji for &#24651; 'koi' (love) XD terrible pun.. but it's a cute tattoo

half arm sleeve: sleeve is based off of a kimono fabric pattern


arm kanji: &#32654;&#31070; 'mikami' (beautiful god) his real name.

back tat: &#40372;&#12392;&#20197;&#21570;&#27874;&#32005;&#33865; (crane with japanese maple)


shiroi_yukiko did these beauties for me!

 

Here is my tatoo girl (i have erased it, since this photo..) Please don't mind the crapy lightning. I did it with watercolors pencil (base), next with acrylics and cover it with blue pastel (on her shoulder) ^^

 

Wow, this gives me alot to think about...my boy is getting tattooed after a real person and i'm sure he would want them to look real.

 

The tattoos in this thread are amazing. I love the details that are put into them, the coloring techniques and placement of pieces. It's made me ponder whether or not my own characters will have any...and whether I'll be able to tackle doing something that awesome. o___o

 

WOW! Really great tattoos, I fell in love with the sakura blossoms tattoo.

 

Today arrived my GORGEOUS winter event head from kaminari ^_^
So I set about painting her... And yes, I'm aware the head is a boy - but she's transformed into a beautiful girl! Her name is Jack and I must admit I drew a lot of inspiration from Mass Effect 2 (*shame shame shame*) ... Her tattoos are her most obvious feature. They are not copied, I made them up as I went along




XX

 

The tattoos in this thread are just amazing! I've been watching this thread for a while, so I finally have my own to add (note: this is based off some image i found online).

Done in watercolor pencil and pastels.
I'll probably be wiping it soon - I want to add many things and clean up the edges; and then probably give him some sleeves.

 

Not to sure if this will help, I don't have a doll yet but I figured I could upload my own tattoo for ref?
This is about 4h old at the time, and it hasn't faded much becuase its above my ankle, and it like never see's any light o-o lol *2yrs old*

 

I keep stumbling across threads that are giving me so many ideas of things to do!
My husband is a tattoo artist, and I get to hang out at the shop pretty often so I see all kinds of tattoos and stages of healing/aging. I have some great inspiration now to do some work on my dolls!

 

This is so inspiring! I really want to start putting tattoos all over my dolls now! *laughs*

now if I could only get over my fear of actually painting/editing my doll. ._.

 

Great Thread here, and fabulous tattoos. I agree with the not using black as the outline, go with a smoky gray and then fill with chalk colors with lots of sealings in between. If you take the chalks into the outline each time, it will soften the harsh edge. Most tribal tattoos are black...but a dark gray would be more convincing I think . Reminds me of when I used to draw on all my dolls when I was small

 

I like using black as an outline - because in a perfect world, I'd never want my tattoos to fade. So even though mine can't stay crisp and black, my dolls' will.

 

Adding some of my recently done tattoos for Abarai Renji (Bleach anime/manga character).
With InvisibleWings' IH Lee at a meetup:










Watercolor pencil.

 

Point well made...

 

Wow! Everything is so great... I just love all of the designs and everything. I personally could never get a tattoo even if I wanted to (I scar very easily, among other things), but now I really want to have a doll with tattoos... None of my characters have tattoos, though. Great work, though, everyone!

 

wow all of these look so amazing! When ever I choose to get an SD boy I intend to have him so tatted up lol These are great inspiration!

 

I don't know if the OP knows this, but the original images for their post are gone. They should probably be renewed, this is kind of a handy reference.

 

Amazing tattoos!
I want to show his version of the tattoo.

 

Kate: those roses are absolutely amazing, can I ask where you got the image/inspiration for them from?

 

Here's a tattoo I did recently on my daughter's Luts Mia. It was originally going to have color, but she liked it so much with just the shading, that we decided to leave it like this.

I used black for the outline, but with a very soft touch, to keep the lines fine and the color subdued. I did the same with the grey. I guess I was going for more of a 'lived in' look, like she'd had it for a while.


I put the design together from a couple of sources. One was some flash for the wings - re-imagined, of course, for the smaller scale. The other was an actual picture of an Alpha/Omega tattoo.

Mia loves ink, and will be getting more. I'm currently working up an Egyptian scarab design for her upper back.

 

Well, as far as realistic doll tattoos go, I've found that the key lays pretty solidly in style preferences. If you like the classic style of harder line tattoos then your job will be a bit easier. But if you like realism, you're going to have a tougher time scaling down so far, and still holding onto that detail.
I use graphite pencils, and watercolor pencils for most of my more realistic style tattoos I do on my boy. I start with a light sketch of the lineart over a sealant, and then start fleshing it out how you would a real tattoo. Shading, details, and then lastly going back over with the darker watercolor pencil to give the crisp look of your harder lines. But then, because of the nature of the watercolor pencils, when you spray your sealant again, it is going to do a bit of a spreading effect, that's going to make it look as if it's set a bit more into the skin [in my opinion anyway].
This is an example of some work I've done in this process.

 

all these tattoos are so inspiring! I love seeing the different techniques that can be used. My DollZone Anson should be arriving soon and I can maybe see some crazy flower body art in her future....

 

My goodness these tattoos are all wonderful! You all are so talented...I really want give my girl a tattoo now!

 

I've got another one for this thread


Tattoo2 by kcetude, on Flickr

 

There are some true pieces of art in this thread o.O

 

These are all so inspiring! I've been considering giving one of my dolls a tattoo of some sort but I had no idea where to start~

 

I love all of the tattoos! They look incredible!

 

@sorasoul - i love how that tat works with his body. great work.

 

Gah, all these tattoos are amazing

 

This thread has amazing tattoos. I am glad a couple dolls I want have tattoos because so much inspiration has been found here.

 

Amazing thread!! Thanks a Lot! ^_________^

 

I'm glad I found this thread. I've got a IS Valentine coming and I was planning on giving him a rosary tattoo (he's a very religious character) but I was having trouble figuring out how to do it. Plenty of techniques in here to give me some ideas (and plenty of doll tattoos make me envious of how gorgeous they look - props to all the artists)