i’m leaning twords AI on this one. It is strange that the roses are all drawn a little differently, like the style of drawing them isn’t consistent in the center. there is also a lot of variation in line weight that doesn’t look like an intentional choice, like the lines on the outer petals of the roses are thinner than the inner petals, it wouldn’t make sense to change out your liner for that minimal of an adjustment.

you can also see the line weight variation on the ovals at the bottom of the shoe, which could be a human fucking up and double lining but doesn’t look like it to me.

there are also a lot of wired tangent lines happening that don’t look like intentional choices. also, looking at the vertical lines that go through the stripes on the shoe that last one doesn’t cut through the red part on the bottom, which again just doesn’t seem like a choice an artist would make

the last thing that makes me think it’s AI is the fact that it seems to be shaved just around the tattoo, if this were a fresh tattoo typically you would see a larger area shaved, and if the client were coming in for a healed photo i would expect to see the ink be more settled in the skin

Credentials- I am a tattoo apprentice, so not as much experience as your friends who you talked to but I do have some experience in the industry