Realistic owl tattoo with yellow eyes and grey shading on the upper arm, viewed from the front.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Realistic owl on upper arm

Realism · Upper arm · Mixed · Photo

A large owl with a front-facing head fills the frame, with its amber-yellow eyes as the strongest points of colour. The feathers are rendered with fine, layered shading in black and grey, with soft clouded tones behind the head. The image is a close crop of the upper arm, with the design filling most of the visible skin.

Realism Upper arm Owl Eye Feather

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

The owl had sat on the boundary oak since before my grandfather was born, and everyone in Hollin Edge knew it watched the lane. You could not walk under that oak after dark without feeling the stare come down through the leaves, yellow and unblinking, as if someone had lit two lamps and forgotten to tell you who held them.

Keep reading

I came home from the mill pond at nine with wet shoes and a story ready. Mother was at the range, stirring the pan of barley, and she did not turn round. 'You were at the sluice again,' she said. 'Mrs Pargeter saw your lantern.' I said I had been nowhere. It was the first lie I had told that week, and already it sounded tired in my mouth.

Outside the window the owl dropped from the oak and settled on the yard wall, its feathers blurred grey against the grey dusk. It turned its head slowly, the way Father used to when he was deciding whether a bill was worth paying, and my face went hot. So I told the truth, all of it: the gate chain, the rush of water over the hatch, the little punt I had let drift into the reeds and lost.

Mother set down the spoon. When I looked back at the sill, a single brown feather lay there, neat as a letter, and I understood the bird had been watching the whole time, waiting for me to be honest enough to notice it.