Black and grey realism tattoo of feathers and scrolling ornament on the upper arm and elbow of a person with long dark hair.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Feather and scrollwork tattoo on upper arm

Realism · Upper arm · Black and grey · Photo

A shaded black and grey tattoo of feathers, swirling scrollwork and what appears to be a bird's wing or head sits on the outer upper arm and near the elbow. The linework is soft and the shading builds depth across the feathers. The photo is taken from a low angle with the arm raised, and the subject's face is not in frame.

Realism Upper arm Feather Scrollwork Swirl Bird Wing

Find an artist for this

Take it to an artist as a reference. A good artist will make it yours rather than copy someone else's tattoo.

A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Mrs Ada Keeble had counted the same nine pewter spoons every Friday since the coach stopped running to Saltcombe, and on the Friday the letter came she counted them twice. The lodger in number four had gone out before breakfast with his paint box and had not come back for his supper.

Keep reading

Dennis Marr had painted the scrollwork on the boarding house sign the spring her husband died, curling the letters of Seaview into vines that looked as if they were trying to climb off the board. He had shown her how to shade a feather with the flat of a brush, dragging the black thin until it greyed at the tip, so that a thing which had never flown seemed to lift off the wood.

The constable brought his hat and a leather satchel up from the cliff path. Inside was a gull's wing, dried and folded, and a sketchbook full of the same wing drawn again and again, each one a little more like a head turning back to look at the sea. Ada sat on the bottom stair with the satchel open on her knees and understood that he had not run off at all.

She put the spoons back in the drawer, then took them out again and laid them on the windowsill for the morning light. On the back of the last drawing she found a line in his square hand: Tell her the feathers go on last. Ada went through to the kitchen, filled the kettle, and waited for the tide to turn.