Lilies + Lotus Mandala Cover Up

Arianna had an existing linework tattoo on the top of her hand and wrist, in what I call mehendi/henna style. She also had some SI scars on the inside of her forearm that were old, fairly colorless and nice and flat. Bright and articulate, she had thought about her tattoo ideas alot and had a whole plan to cover her scars and complete her sleeve. And she brought in a printout of her design ideas, which I love and always appreciate. She was thinking we could cover the scars with lilies and continue the mandala imagery to connect with her existing ink. From there, it was simplicity itself to follow her design. Normally I would recommend covering the scars with colored ink, after layering in the outlines (for the shape) and gray shading (for the dimension), instead of graywork (shades of black and gray only), which doesn't always completely cover scars, but hers were so old and colorless, I thought it would be OK to use that modality to camouflage them well enough, as she requested. I think they turned out nicely.

Here are some photos of the drawings, before, outline and very fresh final graywork stages (this will lighten up quite a bit, as she loses some of the ink in the healing process).