This post covers an appointment from two weeks ago.  The weekend prior, my camera battery died and my charger was MIA.  It was finally found (left on a job site) so I decided I would post up these pictures in advance of my next appointment tonight.  As a result, you can see some of the lines are still healing.  My only major take-away from this appointment was how fond I am of the background elements he is adding to the piece.  If you look at Hokusai’s painting, there isn’t any wind or cloud elements separating the layers of the tail feathers (for example).  In my opinion, adding these background elements goes a long way in making the phoenix an incorporated element of the whole suit vs. a copy of a painting tattooed on me.  It’s subtle, but I believe it will pay off huge once we’re into shading and color.

Horizakura only did about an hour and change because we were going to meet a mutual friend who was in town.  My next appointment is tonight, so I imagine we will continue with the tail across my lower abdomen.

I also thought I would include a little note here about perspective when viewing pictures of tattoos.  Especially when we are evaluating tattoos online, it’s important to remember that you are looking at flat images of three dimensional surfaces.  A good example (and the reason I wanted to add this note) can be seen below.  If you look at the right wing from today’s post, it may appear to be overly thin in comparison to the left wing.  But if you look at this side view taken four weeks ago, you can see how the perspective changes the shape of the wing.  Not earth shattering information, but I figured it was worth pointing out.