Black fine line and dotwork feather-like ornament tattooed at the centre of the chest, with fine radiating dots and curled scroll details.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Fine line feather ornament on the chest

Fine line · Chest · Black and grey · Photo

A symmetrical ornamental design of a feather or flame shape, built from fine black lines and small dots, with curled scrolls at the base and a dotted spike extending upward. The linework is crisp and even, with the dotwork creating a soft shaded fan above the central motif. The tattoo is in black ink only against warm skin, and the close framing centres the design on the chest.

Fine line Dotwork Chest Feather Ornament Dot Line Scroll

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

You have been bent over the copper plate since the gas was lit, and the lamp hisses at your elbow. Mr Abney wants the feather ready for a counting house in Leeds by Monday, and he wants it perfect, every barb of it. Your burin skids on the third stroke and you curse under your breath, then rub the slip out with the heel of your hand.

Keep reading

The trick, Ada told you on your first day, is to stop looking at the line and look at the space between lines. So you do. The fan of dots above the spine comes easily, a hundred small stops of the tool, each one lighter than a breath. The scrolls at the base take longer. They must curl back on themselves like steam off a kettle spout, and both sides must match, because Abney holds every proof up to a mirror before he will sign it.

On Saturday, when the shop is empty, you pull a proof and hold it to the window. Something is wrong with the left scroll. It sits a hair lower than the right, no wider than a sheep's whisker. You know you did not make that mistake; the plate did. You take the scraper to it anyway, and the copper shavings curl up like the feather's own barbs.

Abney finds the spoiled proof in the bin on Monday and says nothing. He pins your correction to the board and sends the plate down to the presses. Three weeks later a clerk in Leeds holds a cheque up to the light, and you are not there to see the spike of dots at the top, straight as a pin, which you cut in on your last night, when nobody was watching.