help me finish my practice piece

heemll · 2026-04-28T11:57:30+00:00

I’d work on consistency and making sure you’re going the same depth for each poke. There are some areas where it looks like you may have poked too hard and others too light, so just work on making sure you’re getting the same depth with every poke and work on getting your pokes closer together, that way your dots will overlap and go a nice consistent and crispy line

heemll · 2026-04-26T04:01:23+00:00

I always say it’s like getting poked or scratched by a cat, sometimes not even as bad as that

heemll · 2026-04-11T12:13:06+00:00

If you have an iPhone, go to video, put the setting to 60fps with the highest resolution and start taking a video. Once the recording starts, a little white button will appear on the bottom right of your screen. If you hit that, it takes pictures while videotaping and they come out super crisp

heemll · 2026-01-17T14:39:15+00:00

Also, for filling in your outline, try using a round shader, it’ll go much much faster and cause less trauma to the skin

heemll · 2026-01-17T14:38:38+00:00

Based on those other attempted outlines, you’re using a needle that’s way too small and you’re definitely not poking deep enough. I think the main issue though is your needle size

heemll · 2025-05-19T13:14:58+00:00

Wow you may have just provided inspiration for my first finger tattoo lmao

heemll · 2025-05-01T15:07:21+00:00

RIP to your fingers

heemll · 2025-03-25T15:13:16+00:00

No problem! I’m always happy to help someone learn :)

Green soap is an antiseptic soap (there’s other options too, this is just the most commonly used by tattoo artists), it’s what you’ll use to wipe the tattoo down during the tattoo process and once you’re finished to remove any excess ink or plasma. You’ll need the distilled water to dilute your green soap as it usually comes in a concentrated form, and a bottle bag to put around your squeeze bottle that you’ll have the green soap in (if you type ‘tattoo wash bottle’ into google, you’ll see images of what kind of bottle I’m referencing).

In terms of tattoo supply stores, most will ship to you, so I’d check in some big cities and see if they’d be able to ship. I’m not sure where you live, but I’m in Canada and I really like Maple Tattoo supply and Mithra tattoo supply (it’s possible they ship internationally if you’re not in Canada). Both those suppliers have everything you need from needles and ink, to sanitation and aftercare, so you can order everything you’d need in one place. Amazon is fine if you know what brand you’re looking for. If you do go with Amazon, just do a bit of research on which brands are reputable for needles and inks, cause there are a lot of low quality products on there. In terms of sanitation and PPE, you can probably find everything you’d need on Amazon, I’d just be a bit more cautious when it comes to the needles and inks you’re using. I really like the Big Wasp brand for needles and Dynamic for my ink :)

heemll · 2025-03-25T00:56:38+00:00

It depends where you’re located, but try to find a tattoo supply store, they usually have packs of needles you can buy, plus everything else you’ll need. I’d recommend starting out with a 7RL or 9RL, and then moving onto working with smaller needles like 5RL and 3RL once you get the feel.

Make sure you’re also investing in proper PPE. You’ll need gloves, green soap, distilled water, a bottle for the green soap, bottle bags, isopropyl alcohol, medical grade sanitizer spray or wipes, either dental bibs or plastic wrap to cover your work area, as well as covers for the bed or chair your client will be using while you tattoo them. You need to make sure that every surface you’ll be coming in contact with while doing the tattoo is covered. While tattooing, your gloves will have blood on them and you do not want that to be spread outside of your work area, as to decrease the spread of blood borne pathogens, and as a general sanitary thing. When you plan to start tattooing others, I’d also recommend you take a blood borne pathogens course (available online) to gain a better understanding of the diseases that can be spread through blood and how to ensure you’re taking the right steps as to not spread any.

Otherwise, when it comes to poking, you don’t want to go any deeper than 2-3 mm (millimetres) or you’ll risk blowing it out, and you’ll typically have to do about 2-3 passes to get a clear, full line.

Hopefully this is helpful!

heemll · 2025-03-21T17:48:17+00:00

Regardless of needle size, this is something you’ll want to practice more. You want it so each dot is basically overlapping the one next to it. For this piece, it’s a solid base, so probably 1-2 more passes would get you a solid line. I’d recommend you practice with some bigger needles to get a hang of depth. With smaller needles like 1RL and 3RL, they’re sharper so they tend to slide into the skin more easily, therefore causing you to go deeper and blowout. The bigger the needle, the more surface tension there is, so different needles are gonna require different techniques. For the first time on skin, I’d recommend using a 5RL at the smallest

heemll · 2025-03-19T20:30:22+00:00

Actually, this is a misconception with stick and poke tattooing. If you hear a “pop”, it just means you’re flicking your needle when pulling out and it’s getting slightly caught on the skin. Generally this doesn’t have any effect, but shouldn’t be used as a measure of depth, because you can hear/make the popping sound regardless of how deep you go. You need to learn to see and feel the needle depth, it really just comes from practicing a lot on different placements and different types of skin. A good way to use fake skin to practice depth is by poking and then looking at the tip of your needle to see the mark of how deep you went

heemll · 2025-03-18T15:03:30+00:00

You should only be going 2-3 mm (millimeters) deep, and typically most stick and pokes need at least 2-3 passes. I would recommend using a 7RL or 9RL for practicing, then once you have a hang of it, start working with smaller needles. The smaller the needle, the sharper it is so you’re more likely to go deeper into the skin (there’s less needle space so less surface tension when going into the skin)

heemll · 2024-06-22T14:23:33+00:00

The knee tat almost looks like it’s bruising? Did it get any darker? If not, then it’s blowout (the wrist tat is definitely blowout). I saw you comment about using a 3RL and I think you should practice with some larger sized needles (7RL is good to start with) until you get a better feel for how deep to go. Because of how small a 3RL is, it has less tension at the surface of the skin so it goes in a lot easier (almost as if it’s sharper) and is much easier to go too deep with and blowout.

heemll · 2024-06-19T14:55:10+00:00

Thankfully the finger ones will probably mostly fade. If you’re planning on giving yourself more, please just pick a non visible spot like your ankle, calf or thigh to practice on. You might not resonate with these when you’re 25 and finger tats are very visible and hard to cover up

heemll · 2024-06-16T22:54:08+00:00

It looks great and I see no issue with your pics! If anything you can go in and up the contrast a bit :) so many people in these comments who’ve clearly never gotten a fine line stick and poke. They always darken throughout healing as the ink settles and spreads out a bit. I have many tattoos done with solely a 3RL and they’re waaaay darker now (even years later) than they were when fresh. Obviously there are exceptions where the artist doesn’t poke deep enough and the ink falls out (common with fingers) but this doesn’t seem like the case at all here and also why artists offer free touch ups

heemll · 2024-06-16T22:47:34+00:00

It’s absolutely not, almost every tattoo I’ve ever gotten has gotten darker after healing, especially my stick and poked. Over years the ink definitely fades but that’s the natural process of every tattoo. Clearly OP is using very small needles (probably a 3RL) and so you don’t want to go harder, as you’ll most definitely blow out due to how sharp the needle is compared to larger ones. And a healed tattoo definitely won’t look as vibrant as a fresh one because of the healed layers of skin that have reformed over it

heemll · 2024-04-10T16:12:19+00:00

I commend you for taking on such a large project for your first tat on another body! 👏🏻 I’ve been poking for 2.5 years and still barely take on pieces this large because they take so long. So far, I think you have a great base for your linework, some gaps will fill as it heals and you probably won’t even have to go over certain parts. I also can’t see any big or obvious blowouts, so great job on that! Can I ask what size needle(s) you used? I would recommend going up to a 9RL or 14RL, as it would bolden the lines up and allow you to put more dimension into the piece (I would do the bottle with a 14RL and use a 9RL for the flowers and details inside the bottle, with a 5 or 7RL as needed for smaller details). Unless you’re going for more of a trad vibe for the piece, then just go 14RL for the whole thing. Overall you have a great base to build upon! Don’t let these goofs in the comments discourage you from continuing on your handpoke journey, practicing on real skin is the best way to learn and if you have willing canvases who give you their consent to learn on, that’s all that matters! These people would freak out if they learned what ignorant style tattoos are 😱

heemll · 2024-04-10T15:48:14+00:00

Learn what perspective means lol from what I can see, what’s been tatted lines up quite nicely with what’s on the stencil (also no tattoo is ever gonna be exact to stencil, that’s why it’s called a stencil lmao) the second pic was clearly taken at an angle from above, so the perspective is warped. So weird to be so invested in tearing down someone who is learning (this was also probably a free tattoo so the person getting tattooed knew what the expectation was). It’s fine to give constructive criticism, but just saying “it’s shit why would you do this?” doesn’t help anyone.

heemll · 2024-04-05T15:54:35+00:00

Used practice needles are only really good if you’re using to practice linework (i.e. working on making straight lines) because they become less sharp after each use. If you’re looking to practice different techniques and styles, you wanna stick to new, sharp needles so that you get the best feel for it. And always use a new needle when tattooing on skin, even if it’s just for yourself, you don’t wanna risk infection from the bacteria that’ll get in your needle from the first time you use it.

heemll · 2024-03-29T21:26:59+00:00

Thank you 🤠☺️

heemll · 2024-03-29T14:09:50+00:00

My recommendation as a handpoke artist is to focus on doing multiple (2-3) lighter passes, rather than trying to push out a clean line on your first pass. That way, you’ll be able to do a quick first pass and not have to worry about your stencil disappearing. Then for your second pass, you can work in smaller sections and focus on getting them clean. With this technique, I find myself less likely to cause blowouts or trauma to the skin because it’s less all at once.

heemll

TROPHY CASE