Who Tattooed It Better? Tattoo Artists Weigh in on Celebrity Portraits

While some of our videos on INKED’s YouTube channel highlight how to fix bad tattoos—as well as tattooers’ reactions to them—these celebrity portraits are all great. The artists’ challenge was to pick which one they like better. 

6ix9ine

Pony Lawson says Nastasya Ustinova‘s piece, shown on the right, has great composition and loves how creative the artist got with it. 

Joe Smith loves the simplicity of Roly Viruez‘s take, shown on the left. 

Marilyn Manson 

Dave Paulo‘s piece, shown on the right, shows a more iconic and recognizable Manson look, according to Guy Aitchison.

Bobby Cupparo likes Luka Lajoie‘s piece on the left, for the use of warm and cool colors.

 Beyonce 

Nikki Simpson is drawn to Samuel Potucek‘s color portrait of Beyonce, saying it’s “doooope.”

Carlos Torres picks the black-and-grey piece by Peter Belson aka Peter TheThief, saying “I’m a black-and-grey guy.”

Mac Miller

Cupparo, sitting with Mark Wade, says he likes the color portrait on the left, by Khail Aitken, where Wade confidently disagrees, pointing to Tomas Šaray (Aka Tomas Wolftown)’s black-and-grey on the right. Cupparo throws up his hands, saying, “They’re both good.” Wade agrees following with, “They are both really good.”

Game of Thrones’ Khalessi

Lisette Martinez and Ruben Barahona like Michael Taguet‘s on the left, while Sara Fabel finds the earthy-tones on Nikko Hurtado‘s piece “stunning.”

Conor McGregor

“They’re both really good in totally different ways, because we are talking about a close-up portrait and a full body, which is also difficult to do,” says Anali De Laney.

Shine points to the detail in Pony Lawson‘s black-and-grey piece, which Joe Smith says will hold up over time. Fabel notes, all of McGregor’s details are in there… and she means all the details.

Stefano Alcantara picks Steve Butcher‘s close-up color piece on the right, and Wade says it is extremely clean and readable.

Dexter

Steve Butcher says Paul Acker‘s piece on the left looks “more real and natural.” TeeJ Poole and Pony agree, but as Lawson points out, both are great, but if the two have to be compared, he is drawn to this portrait.

Nikki Simpson applauds the creativity on Valentina Ryabova‘s tattoo on the right. Lalo says he likes the temperature of Paul Acker’s piece on the left, but overall, agrees with Simpson.

Having a hard time picking, Yomico concludes that both artists are really good.

Rihanna

Jesse Levitt and Anali De Laney love the purple lighting effect on Rihanna’s portrait, done by David Giersch.

Kevin Boudreau says he is drawn to Anjelika Kartasheva‘s piece on the left. Shine says the black will help the tattoo stay solid over time.

See the full discussion