Laser Tatoo Removal |
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Tatoo Removal Cost
This varies based on size, complexity, age, and color of the tatoo. The bigger and more complex it is the more the removal will cost. The more colors that are involved the more treatments you’ll need, driving up cost as well. A good guide is that a basic, black tatoo will start at around $125 per square inch. That means the only pigment used in the tatoo is black, and there’s nothing fancy about it that needs to be addressed separately or is out of the ordinary.
Tatoo Removal Time
Again this depends largely on the tatoo itself. A multi-colored tatoo will take more time to remove since different lasers must be used with different pigments. The lighter pigments are harder to remove, so they’ll generally require more treatments. A general guideline is somewhere between 3 and 9 treatments, with each one being 4 weeks apart. For a large, complex tatoo, you might a year or more away from complete removal, and several thousand dollars.
The other question I get quite frequently is how much does it hurt? For laser tatoo removal, probably not much more than when you got it in the first place. The recovery will be somewhat more annoying, with pain similar to a sunburn. This can be controlled with a mild topical treatment, though. You won’t be in enough discomfort to keep you from you normal daily activities, but there are precautions that you’ll need to take. Your licensed dermatologist will inform you of those precautions before and after the procedure.
The success rate is generally very high, but does vary from person to person. Generally those with less skin pigment fare better with the tatoo removal than those with dark skin. The only way to get a true answer, of course, is to schedule a consultation with a professional and see what they have to say.
Tatoo Cover up, Types of Tatoo Removal |
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One of the easiest and most innovative ways to get rid of a tatoo is to get a tatoo. No, you haven’t lost your mind and I’m not trying to catch you in some crazy maze of circular logic. Interestingly, many people aren’t necesarily opposed to having a tatoo, but they are opposed to having the specific tatoo that they happen to have permanently inked on their skin.
Take for example someone who had some some mildly extreme views as a young adult. They may have gotten a burning flag tatooed on their arm, or maybe a scantily clad lady, or just something like a skull and crossbones or an anarchy sign. Some people wouldn’t want those types of tatoos shown, especially if they’ve moved on to corporate America or some other “judgmental” place where it could leave a bad impression with their colleagues.
Another example is the “true love forever” tatoo where you get your boyfriend’s or girlfriend’s name tatooed on your shoulder or back. Sure, it seemed like a good idea at the time, buy you’ve long since ditched them and you need to shed the last baggage you’re carrying - their name on your body!
A relatively simple and inexpensive solution in this situation is to have something put over it to hide the original text or picture. You’re basically using new tatoo pigment to cover up the pigment already in your skin with either a plain shape or a whole new image or creation altogether.
Yes, you’ll still have a tatoo that people may be able to see. But it’ll be transformed into something more palatable than the “Death from Above” or “This End Up” tatoo that you currently have. It’ll only be as painful as you thought the original tatoo was, and the cost wil be very reasonable compared to laser or dermabrasion tatoo removal.
Laser Tatoo Removal |
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As I said in a previous article, laser tatoo removal requires very high intensity laser exposure at specific wavelengths (or frequencies). Those wavelengths are determined by the color of the tatoo pigment, the lighter colors requiring a much more difficult wavelength to remove than the darker colors. Black pigment, of course, is the easiest to remove being that it is the darkest.
Think of Q-Switched lasers like an air compressor. If you hold the exit port on your air compressor open and let the motor run, you’re going to get a nice steady breeze out of it. Nothing that could, say, drive a 3″ framing nail into a 4×4 post. Now, if you close the exit port and let the motor run for a bit and charge up the tank with air, then you’ve got something. The next time you open the exit port you’re going to get a huge release of compressed air, capable of doing all kinds of damage.
Now, depending on the size of the motor on your compressed air tank, you can get a certain amount of air out at a specific PSI. That is, once pressurized, the motor can put out say 5 CFM at 90 PSI, or 3 CFM at 110 PSI, and so on. A Q-Switched laser follows the same idea.
Q-Switching is nothing more than storing up energy inside the emitter of a laser and letting it out in short, powerful bursts. Just like the air compressor. It can only pulse at a certain rate and keep up with the super-high output levels required to break down tatoo pigment.
This by itself is very effective for breaking down dark pigment, but the output light must be modified to effectively break down the lighter pigments, and is usually done so in the handpiece of the laser with specialized lenses and components.