Black and white photo of a small shaded grey skull tattoo on the inner forearm near the wrist, in a realistic style.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Small shaded skull on a forearm

Realism · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A small human skull is tattooed on the inner forearm near the wrist, shown in a black and white photograph. The skull is drawn with fine, soft grey shading that gives it volume around the eye sockets, cheekbones and jaw. The image is in greyscale, and the person's grey t-shirt and dark jeans sit out of focus at the edge of the frame.

Realism Forearm Skull

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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

Dear Tom, the thaw came in on Tuesday and took the top off the lane, so Dad has had me on the tractor all week with a chain round my middle. I am writing this at the kitchen table with my boots still steaming by the range, because I want to tell you about the skull before I lose my nerve.

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Old Mrs Pryce's field, the one behind the hedge where the ewes went down in the hard snap, gave it up when the frost lifted. A small skull, the size of a clenched fist, lying in the furrow with its jaw gone. I carried it home in my coat pocket like a bad habit. It sits now on the windowsill beside the tea tin, and every evening I have been trying to draw it with the stub of the 2B you left behind.

The trouble is the shading. You cannot draw bone in one line. You have to go soft around the eye holes, let the grey pool where the cheekbone turns, and leave the top of the brow almost bare, like paper that has been rained on. I have spoiled eleven sheets. Dad says I am wasting good paper on a dead sheep's cousin, but he picked it up on Sunday and turned it over for a full minute, then set it down very gently, the way he used to set down your school reports. He has stopped asking when you are coming back. Instead he asked whether it was a man's skull or a woman's, and I said I did not know, and he said that was the honest answer and went out to feed the dogs.

I am sending the best of the drawings with this. Keep it somewhere the damp cannot reach. The lane should be clear by Saturday if the wind goes round to the west, so come home for the day at least. Bring your good coat.

Nell