When it comes to covering up old or unwanted ink, there is a unique process that has started to gain favour in the tattoo industry. It used to be that when you wanted to cover up a piece of previous ink, you had to go darker, larger, and bolder. Tattoo cover ups were bulky, obvious, and generally unsightly.

Those days are gone.

Cover up tattoos have come in leaps and bounds as artists have learned new methods, new inks have been developed, and new tattoo machines have been invented. While all these new factors have helped tattoo artists to create beautiful, bright cover ups, tattoo removal has become the new way to create truly stunning cover ups where a once unwanted tattoo used to be.

Tattoo removal is the process of using a laser to remove ink embedded in the skin. The laser shoots short pulses of concentrated light into selected areas, breaking up ink particles and virtually removing its appearance. The divided particles are eventually removed by the body’s immune system. Tattoo fading, as it is commonly referred to, is the process of using the tattoo removal laser to lighten a tattoo before applying a cover up tattoo or in order to redesign an existing piece. This happens by applying the same process as a removal, just with fewer sessions so that the ink is lightened but not completely removed.

Both the fading and the removal process work best with black inks. The hardest colours to remove or lighten tend to be in the green and blue families.

Tattoo fading works wonders in fixing problem areas in previous tattoos, redesigning certain parts of an existing tattoo, or simply helping to completely cover up an unwanted tattoo. By lightening the ink, it allows the artist to be more creative with the cover up—having less restrictions on what they are able to accomplish with the cover up or redesign.

The procedure is noninvasive and highly effective in ensuring a spectacular cover up tattoo. As with any tattoo procedure, talk with your tattoo artist first to determine if tattoo fading will work best in your case.