Y’all do know that when tattoos are fresh that its millions of little punctures in the epidermis while the ink that is deposited is sitting in the dermis, right?
This is why tattoos are bright when fresh. Color change or dulls occurs because when you heal your epidermis (1/?)

Is closing (no more open wound). The flaking you go through is mild scabbing that falls off (think of sunburns). And once completely healed it now has fresh new skin over it. Skin is NOT clear. Ever pulled off sunburns? Can you see through it like a piece of cling wrap? No (2/?)

Due to the new skin on top of your tattoo your tattoo appears to dull out. The difference is less stark on white skin simply because the tattoo sits on a lighter background and the dermis that forms on top is not as dark as poc. On darker skin your depositing ink(3/?)

Onto a dark background and the epidermis is slightly darker. A ok example would be imagine watercoloring on white paper, the color is going to be vibrant, then to simulate the epidermis healed place tracing paper on top. Not much different right?? Now do the same thing on(4/?)

Tan paper, is the color as vibrant as on white? No because the color is sitting on a darker background. Now let’s also include the epidermis on the tan paper by putting a piece of slightly tan tracing paper on top to simulate the epidermis. It becomes very dull right? (5/?)

Now this is only a very simple example of color in skin. It does not take into account the undertone of the skin, the color of your epidermis, the consistency and brand of inks, how packed the color is in your skin, the healing process itself or sun exposure.These all -(6/?)

Effect final outcome for healed tattoos (Sun exposer breaks down tattoo ink and also causes tanning so your epidermis becomes darker thus dulling out your tattoo more)These all effect final outcome for healed tattoos. tanning affecting tattoos is noticeable if your lighter (7/?)

In the winter and are tan in the summer. I get very pale in the winter months and my tattoos are very bright, some even have white in them that are very noticeable, but only in the winter. In the summer months when I tan (not on purpose just walking in Texas sun) my tattoos (8/?)

Are still vibrant but the white in them turns a weird tan color, this is due to my epidermis becoming darker in the sun. It covers the white ink with the epidermis color and appears to dull it but in reality it’s still the same color that was put into my skin and just the (9/?)

Top layer became darker thus changing the color you perceive. Tanning takes place in the skin's outermost layer, the epidermis. About five percent of the cells in your epidermis are special cells called melanocytes. When exposed to ultraviolet B light-
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, melanocytes produce melanin - the pigment which is ultimately responsible for your tan. If you are a poc and are wanting to get a color tattoo your artist will most likely suggest you get a swatch test first. A swatch test is a dot of all the colors in order to see-(11/?)

Which colors will show best on you. Immediately we can see that yellows in this example may not work for them but!! That is not set in stone as these are fresh and not healed and settled but this is a good starting point to plan your colored tattoo (12/?)

Thanks for coming to my TED talk, I get very tired of explaining how tattoos and skin works so I made this thread. If you are a POC with colored tattoos please drop some pictures of them fresh vs healed. This will help people understand and see how color changes on darker skin.

Same person