FOR TATTOO ARTISTS

THE CONVERSATION IT IS FOR

A client arrives with a 4cm design for the inside of their wrist, full of hairline detail, and you tell them it needs to be bigger. You have said it hundreds of times, and some clients still hear an artist upselling them. A neutral read that says the same thing lands differently, because nobody is selling them anything.

That is not hypothetical. One of the real reports we publish is a Roman-numeral date at 4cm on a wrist. It scores 58 overall, with aging at 50 and readability at 55, and its headline says the serifs will blur into solid blocks. That is the advice you would have given, arriving from somewhere else.

BEFORE THE CONSULTATION

Send the client to the check before they come in. They describe or upload the design, choose the placement, size and style, and within about half a minute they have an overall score and a score with a one-line verdict on six things: design, placement, aging, size, style and readability. That part is free and needs no signup.

The practical effect is that the first ten minutes of the consultation have already happened. A client who has watched their wrist design score red on aging walks in asking what size would work, which is a better starting question than whether you can do it smaller. If you want to point them somewhere more specific, each body area has its own page on how it ages and what to ask.

IN THE CHAIR: THEIR OWN PHOTO

The preview puts a design onto a photo of the client's own body, or onto one of seven body templates if they have not taken one. The background is removed from the design automatically, and it can be dragged, resized, rotated, flipped and adjusted for opacity and blend so it sits on the skin rather than floating above it.

It all runs in the browser. The client's photo is never uploaded, and neither is the design, which is worth saying when you are asking someone for a picture of their ribs. It is not a stencil and it does not account for how skin curves, so treat it as a way to agree scale and position before you draw, not as a substitute for placing the stencil on the body.

A downloaded preview is free with a small check.tattoo mark in the corner. The client can remove the mark and get full resolution for $4, once.

WHEN A CLIENT BRINGS A REPORT

Some clients will pay $19 for the full report on their design. It adds the reasoning behind each score, the specific changes to make before booking, and an artist brief written to hand to you: the design, the placement and size they chose, the style notes, and the points the report flagged.

Read it for what it is. It was written from the design as the client described or uploaded it, it has never seen their skin, and it knows nothing about your healed work. Where it agrees with you, it has done half your explaining. Where it does not, you have information it lacks, and the useful thing is to tell the client why.

WHAT IT CANNOT JUDGE

Execution. The highest score we publish is 93, for a bold blackwork panel on a back, and every dimension in it is strong. What that number cannot tell anyone is whether the solid black will heal evenly, which depends entirely on who packs it. The scores rate an idea against how ink behaves in skin. The tattoo is still yours to make.

It is also pro-tattoo by design. It never tells anyone not to get tattooed, and on memorial and meaningful pieces it is written to be careful rather than clinical.

QUESTIONS ARTISTS ASK

Does it cost anything to use with clients?

The check and the preview are free, with no account and no card. A client can pay $19 once for the full report on one design, and $4 once for a full-resolution preview without the small check.tattoo mark. Nothing is sold to you, and nothing recurs.

Does a client's photo get uploaded anywhere?

No. The preview runs in the browser, including the background removal on the design, so a photo of someone's arm never leaves the device it was taken on. That is worth saying out loud when you ask a client for a photo of a body part.

What if the report disagrees with my advice?

Then you have more information than it does. It reads the design as described, never sees the skin, and knows nothing about your healed work. Treat a disagreement as a prompt to explain your reasoning to the client, not as a second opinion that outranks you.

Is there an artist or studio account?

No. There are no accounts on the site at all, no dashboard and nothing to install. If you use this in consultations and something specific is missing, email support@check.tattoo and say what.