[00:00:00] Billy: When you see somebody come in immediately after getting laser, how do you know that the skin is not fully intact?

[00:00:08] Sara: I like to start on the lighter side ’cause we can always go darker. Oh, go more full when I see them. For their touchup, maybe that’s all they wanted. They like that softness. They like that level of just a little bit more natural.

[00:00:19] Billy: We normally say after laser. It’s a good idea to wait at least three months. Mm-hmm before you get tattooed again.

[00:00:27] Sara: I’ve had clients come to me that have had laser elsewhere with yellow brows, and I can tell the skin has been different.

[00:00:33] Billy: Permanent makeup is often advertised as semi-permanent, but some of the pigment that’s being used is far from semi-permanent.

[00:00:42] Welcome to the Faded podcast. Today we have Sarah. Sarah is a permanent makeup artist here in the Vancouver area, and she goes by Irish Wolf Artistry. Welcome to the podcast, Sarah. Hello.

[00:00:55] Sara: Thanks for having me.

[00:00:56] Billy: Sarah was a client of ours and um,  she’s also been working in the area doing. Eyebrows. Do you do lip blush?

[00:01:06] I

[00:01:06] Sara: do lip blush now, yes.

[00:01:07] Billy: Okay. Eyebrows, lip blush, sometimes freckles, I’m assuming? Sometimes

[00:01:11] Sara: freckles. Really? Yeah. But mostly eyebrows. Yeah. Okay.

[00:01:14] Billy: Do you do any eyeliner?

[00:01:16] Sara: Not yet.

[00:01:16] Billy: No. Okay. Okay. Um, yeah. And thanks for sending so many of your clients to us, to, uh, clean their canvas before you do their brows. How does that usually work?

[00:01:27] Um, do they usually ask you to touch them up?

[00:01:30] Sara: They would prefer that. Because laser usually scares 80% of my clients before I educate them a little bit on it. Um, so before they, I see them, I ask them to send me a photo so I see how much ink is in their skin currently, and if I, if it’s going to be a successful coverup, um, if I can’t really tell through the photo, I’ll have them come in for a consultation and then we will see their options.

[00:01:55] Um, with the laser, I do push laser a lot more than  doing a coverup. Because to me, I feel like when you cover up, even if it’s a, it all depends, obviously, but if it’s a light gray ashy, I know I can do a nice cover up, but maybe in six months to a year you’re gonna see all that again. Yeah. So you’re at this point now.

[00:02:17] To get a clean slate, start fresh. That’s always my number one, you know? And it is your face, so I, I take it seriously. Your face, your money, you have this option now.

[00:02:27] Billy: Yeah, it’s kind of like a window of opportunity. You either do the laser now or you go down the road of doing touchups or trying to fix up work.

[00:02:36] And then if you decide you wanna do the laser after, it’s much more difficult because you’ve added more pigment. Um, when you look at browse, what is the deciding factor? Like, why would you sometimes tell a client, uh, look, it’s probably better for you to get laser right now, as opposed to just touching it up.

[00:02:54] Is it the saturation level? Yes. Is it sometimes the shape too? Do they want to change the shape?

[00:02:59] Sara:  It could be the shape, absolutely. The shape, the saturation level.

[00:03:04] Billy: I’m just curious ’cause I’m never really part of this conversation. Mm-hmm. But when clients express their concern about laser, what, what’s the reason why they tell you that they don’t want to do laser?

[00:03:16] Sara: I hear they’re gonna lose their hair.

[00:03:19] Billy: Okay.

[00:03:19] Sara: Um, it’ll burn their skin.

[00:03:21] Billy: Okay.

[00:03:22] Sara: Um, they’ve had experiences with laser tattoo removal where it was so painful. Um, after now seeing you as well, I honestly. It was such a breeze, like I know you’re not asking me that question yet, but I get excited talking about it and expressing to them how easy it was and.

[00:03:41] Billy: So you came to us to get your eyebrows removed at one point,

[00:03:44] Sara: right.

[00:03:45] Billy: Did you have those same concerns? Were you worried about your hair falling out?

[00:03:48] : No.

[00:03:49] Billy: No. I, I, I think I would, if I was going to get laser, I’d be like, you know, I’ve heard a lot about this, uh, hair loss or, you know, I’ve seen people get their eyebrows singed where it’s just all  white hair and then they end.

[00:04:01] Breaking off and getting all brittle. So I think I would be concerned if I didn’t know, if I didn’t have any firsthand experience. Mm-hmm. How does it usually work then? You usually recommend them to get a couple sessions of laser to lighten it up, or do you recommend complete removal if you have that chance?

[00:04:18] Sara: Um, I say both. You know, if it’s a nice light removal and they just feel comfortable with that, and I also, I know that they’re in good hands going to you. And when they come back to me, they say they loved the consultation. As did I with you. You’re very, are you sure you wanna do this? Here’s the possible risks.

[00:04:35] You know, I love that you’re. Preparing me for an outcome that there might be a shade of pink and yellow, and we’ll cross that bridge when we get there. And it is a journey. It does take some time,

[00:04:47] Billy: I guess. You know, when clients come into you and you tell ’em, okay, hey look, it’s better. I recommend you get laser.

[00:04:54] I know from an artist’s perspective, it’s hard to cover up work. Mm-hmm. It, it’s possible. Mm-hmm. That even from  tattooing, um, clients come in and they want to. Put a new tattoo over top of an old tattoo, whether it’s permanent makeup or just a body tattoo, and they’re not thinking about the new image that they’re looking to put over top of what’s existing.

[00:05:15] Mm-hmm. They’re just in their head. They just think I want to cover it. And for some reason, I think a lot of people think of tattooing as it’s just gonna, whatever you put over top is just gonna kind of defeat what’s underneath. Mm-hmm. And that doesn’t always happen. It, it definitely looks great. In the original picture, uh, you take a photo at the studio and it’s like, oh, that’s awesome.

[00:05:37] There’s a lot of contrast between the new tattoo and the old one. Mm-hmm. But then when time goes on, that new tattoo starts settling in a little bit and the contrast reduces. And I guess that’s the same thing you’re looking at. Yeah. Because, uh, you have, you have a unique style with your brows. The way you do browse is.

[00:05:58] Not like everyone else does, in  my opinion. That’s why we try to send so many of

[00:06:02] : Oh, thank you. Our clients

[00:06:03] Billy: to you. You do such a great job.

[00:06:06] : Thank you.

[00:06:06] Billy: And I think the beauty behind your work is the use of space. Mm-hmm. I think you, you kind of understand how pigment’s gonna heal over the long run, and you put a little bit more space in between the strokes, um, just so it doesn’t kind of bleed into one shade.

[00:06:25] Mm-hmm. And I, and I think that’s. That’s what I love about your work. Um, and you do, you don’t do microblading, you do nanos strokes, right? Correct. Yeah. Did, did you start off doing microblading? I did

[00:06:36] Sara: start off doing microblading, yes. Okay.

[00:06:38] Billy: So for anyone who doesn’t know, well maybe, how about you explain what microblading is?

[00:06:42] So, micro blade

[00:06:43] Sara: microblading is a manual tool. You’d stepped in pigment and then it’s small cuts. I don’t wanna knock microblading. It’s. It’s suitable for certain clients, more younger skin. Um, I still prefer nano. That’s just my personal opinion.

[00:06:57] Billy: So what’s nano?

[00:06:58] Sara: A nano is a tattoo machine, single  needle. Um, sometimes more than one needle, but it’s a lot more delicate.

[00:07:05] Mm-hmm. And it punctures holes in the skin, like little pixels implanting the pigment. So there is no cutting. Um, it’s a lot. It’s more versatile, better for all skin types. Um, you can do the powder brows, you can do shaded strokes. You have a lot more control of your saturation. Mm-hmm. Um, depending on the client’s skin, all of that, so.

[00:07:27] Billy: Okay. And you studied under Hoy? Yes. Who’s in Calgary? Ho’s awesome. She’s awesome. I I, I’m definitely

[00:07:36] : No way. What’s up?

[00:07:37] Billy: You better get out here on the podcast. Yeah. I want to have her here so bad on the podcast. Yeah. ’cause she’s such a, she’s like, uh, an innovator in um

[00:07:45] : mm-hmm. In

[00:07:46] Billy: the permanent makeup world.

[00:07:48] And she’s doing laser now too. She’s doing such a great job. She’s doing. You know, permanent makeup removal, lots of skin stuff, which is really cool to see their business grow. But  I’ve been a fan of HO for years. I think we met back, I don’t know how many years ago we met at the Calgary Tattoo Convention and we’ve kind of stayed in touch over the years and, um, yeah, I’ve just, I’ve watched how she’s taken the nano strokes and really kind of branded it and put her own.

[00:08:19] Twist on it, and you can definitely see that you’ve been, you know, trained properly by her. So yeah, she’s, she’s great. Hopefully we can get her on the podcast at one point here. Yeah,

[00:08:32] Sara: I’m sure she’d love to.

[00:08:33] Billy: Yeah.

[00:08:33] Sara: Come visit Vancouver again.

[00:08:35] Billy: Yeah, for sure.

[00:08:41] Depending on what type of client we have, um, we do. Quite often recommend you for, you know, if they want like a nice fluffy mm-hmm. Kind of natural looking brow. That’s what I think you’re known for. Yeah.

[00:08:59] Sara: Um, and  I’ll going back to like starting with microblading. When I saw Hoy and I saw her work and her, I went straight to Calgary.

[00:09:08] Learned from her. I’ve seen her in person three times and done a lot of training with her, which she finally told me to stop. She’s like, stop coming. You know, you know what you’re doing, but you know, I got obsessed with it. Like I love doing it. But, um, microblading, I just, I took the clients and realized it wasn’t suitable for all skin types.

[00:09:26] If I could do something that was suitable for. Everyone give everybody what they needed. Mm-hmm. Best fitting for their skin type and all that. Um, then I’m gonna do that. Yeah. And only that

[00:09:36] Billy: because basically microblading, it’s not a blade, it’s a bunch of needles that they just take and like turn to the side.

[00:09:43] Mm-hmm. So it’s pretty much like taking a mag and dipping. In pigment and slicing the skin open. Mm-hmm. So I would think that that’s much more traumatizing than using a single needle with a machine that has a lot of torque that’s just puncturing the skin with  ease. Mm-hmm. So I can see why nano strokes would not only look good right away, but over time I think they would heal more crisp mm-hmm.

[00:10:10] And stay more crisp over time.

[00:10:12] Sara: Right. No, I, I agree. Mm-hmm. Um, doing. The microblading and having microblading done on my skin, my skin’s really dry. It looked great even up until I saw you. Mm-hmm. I think you were probably like, oh, it’s not bad, you know? But for me, um,

[00:10:28] Billy: I was lying. Oh,

[00:10:29] Sara: no,

[00:10:29] Billy: I’m

[00:10:29] Sara: just kidding. Okay.

[00:10:31] Billy: I usually tell people straight up how I feel, but you know. Yeah. When people come in to get removal done, it’s not really, my opinion doesn’t matter. Yeah. It’s what they think, you know, and, and what their artist thinks. But yeah,

[00:10:41] Sara: so with my microblading, it’s, I had my initial session and my touch-up. And it just soaked up right away.

[00:10:47] And it was, it was really lovely. It was really nice. The shape was great. I could laminate and it looked great, but I needed something softer. I wanted to be more fresh. Mm-hmm. Especially in the front where I actually have brow hair. I didn’t need all that. Those strokes,  and like you were saying, the trauma with the microblading and the strokes placed together over time, it did kind of look very solid and blocky.

[00:11:08] Yeah. I needed that airiness and the, just the softness coming back. So. Mm-hmm. That’s what I was after.

[00:11:16] Billy: So you came in and you had a few, how many, how many sessions did we do? Two. We did two sessions. Mm-hmm. Two or three? Three. We must’ve done more than two. We did three. Because you ended up with yellow brows.

[00:11:27] Yep. Um, you came in with pretty solid brows after the first session. I believe they were. Uh. Red. Mm-hmm. So all the dark lifted and it left the undertone, which was kind of a red, maybe an orangey looking color. Yeah. And then after the next session, we removed all that red, which left behind the yellow. And I’m pretty sure we hit the yellow once to try to lighten it up.

[00:11:53] Um, and a lot of times the yellow is just so stubborn and they say, you know, they,  they market these lasers like they can remove all pigments. Well, that’s not in all cases. There’s some pigments that are just completely resistant to the laser, and yellow is one of them. I’d say we have like a 50 50, um, success rate when we’re trying to remove the yellow.

[00:12:18] Um, in some cases it does lift. In other cases we hit it and it reacts, like you’ll see that it’s absorbing the laser, but nothing happens. Mm-hmm. And you know, we’ve come to the point now where if a client comes in and we hit the, the browse a couple times and we’re not seeing any progress at all, we’ll just tell ’em to stop.

[00:12:39] ’cause we don’t want clients coming in and spending money and not seeing results.

[00:12:42] : Mm-hmm.

[00:12:43] Billy: So after that, if, if. If there’s no possibility for the laser to work, then we do recommend saline, saline removal. Some people call it glycolic acid. Um, there’s different kind of, I guess they use different chemicals depending on  how they were trained or mm-hmm.

[00:13:01] What they have available, I use, uh, saline and it’s made by, um, lift. It’s called lift. Uh, I think it’s LI pigments. Mm-hmm. That makes it, yeah. Um, but I’ve known tattooers who have done this like, well before saline was even a thing. They would use, um, witch hazel and just use witch hazel and tattoo it into the skin and it will pull the pigment out.

[00:13:26] So it’s not a, it’s, it’s not such a new thing, but it’s, mm-hmm. It’s a new kind of phenomenon. I guess. A lot of people talk about it now and market it as an alternative to the laser. Um, so yeah, you actually came in after your third session of laser and we did the saline. So how did that go?

[00:13:47] Sara: It went good.

[00:13:47] And the, when I messaged you and took a closeup of what yellow was left before that third round of laser, it wasn’t even that bad, but it did lift a lot. The laser did take out a lot of the yellow and it was  barely. It was barely there, but again, for me, I already gone that far.

[00:14:05] : Mm-hmm.

[00:14:05] Sara: I wanted to, okay, let’s do, let’s do it all.

[00:14:08] Let’s, let’s do the saline and the saline. Lifted it a lot. It did. I’m so happy. Yeah.

[00:14:14] Billy: Okay. That’s good. It took quite a while for it to kind of settle down though, right? We did the, we did the saline session, and I think it was around a month or so until your brows got back to the normal,

[00:14:24] Sara: but it wasn’t bad.

[00:14:25] So the first like. Four or five days. It was pretty bad. Stabby. It was scabby. Okay. But that was fine because if you’re anything like me and you’re just so excited to get to that end line and you’re almost there, like I, I didn’t care at that point. I was just like, it’s okay. Bring it on. Did I knew what to expect too.

[00:14:42] Yeah.

[00:14:43] Billy: And

[00:14:43] Sara: um,

[00:14:44] Billy: did you try to conceal the scabs with me? I was just gonna say that,

[00:14:47] Sara: yes. And it worked. Did it? Yes. What’d you do? Just concealer and I had a little brush and I. Just got in between and it was, and then I just fluffed my hair. Really? It was, yeah, and then put a little makeup on the ends. I, that was  actually on like day three, so it wasn’t bad.

[00:15:02] Oh, wow. You’re not

[00:15:02] Billy: supposed to put makeup on it though. No, I’m just kidding. You can I, I guess like an open wound. Really? It’s not good Yeah. To put the makeup on, but I, if you have to go out and about and you need to conceal it, then I guess that’s your only option. It was

[00:15:15] Sara: just a scab.

[00:15:16] Billy: Yeah.

[00:15:17] Sara: It

[00:15:17] Billy: wasn’t open wound.

[00:15:18] Not open, yeah. Okay. Okay. I, no,

[00:15:20] Sara: no, no. I know what you’re saying, but. So it was, it felt comfortable enough to, yeah, because I know just to leave it alone and,

[00:15:27] Billy: yeah.

[00:15:33] I’m really wondering now, so you’ve been through the, the laser removal process and you know how difficult it was to get that pigment out. When you use pigment, when you select pigment, do you keep that in mind for your clients that you’re working on, that at some point they may decide to make a change?

[00:15:54] Sara: I like to start a on the lighter side.

[00:15:56] Mm-hmm. ’cause we can always go darker. We can always go, oh, go more  full. When I see them for their touch up. Maybe that’s all they wanted. They like that softness. They like that level of, you know, just. Just a little bit more natural. Mm-hmm. Um, or they might say, Sarah, I liked it. Right when you did it, it was a little darker, a little sharper.

[00:16:13] Then I just bump up the color, so I do play it safe.

[00:16:16] Billy: You’re talking about saturation level. Saturation, but actually when you pick the pigment off of the shelf and you shake it up and you, and you consider the ingredients. Mm-hmm. Do you think about what’s in that pigment when you tattoo somebody or. Has that thought?

[00:16:32] Not really.

[00:16:33] Sara: Oh. Of, I mean, of course, you know, with the right level of modifying the colors. Yeah. Is that what you’re

[00:16:41] Billy: Yeah, well, well, I just, I’ve noticed that there’s some pigments that have yellows in there mm-hmm. That are just impossible to remove.

[00:16:49] Sara: Right.

[00:16:50] Billy: You know, back in the day, even, you know, less than 10 years ago when people were doing browse.

[00:16:56] Yeah. I don’t think anyone considered the option of.  Possibly having to remove them. And, and now it’s quite common for people to get browse and two years later decide, Hey, I want to, I wanna remove these, I wanna change the shape. Or I, I wanna, I want to go all natural, or what, whatever it may be. So that seems to be something that, that is an option now.

[00:17:19] So when you’re choosing the pigment, are you kind of making it easier for your clients?

[00:17:24] Sara: So I have asked. Ho and Lance from Ho Tattoo. Mm-hmm. Because they do have the laser now and they’ve educated me a lot on the laser and I think that’s why I got so stoked on the laser removal and reached out to you and found you.

[00:17:35] But, um, I’ve asked them. What pigments were stubborn? Which ones did you find the most? Yellow? Mm-hmm. Like was it this brand? That brand? Um, and I think Lance told me a couple. Um, I do use Hfi right now, uh, which I love, but I would love to like do a couple test marks and maybe mm-hmm. We can hit the laser and just make sure that it is.

[00:17:58] Being easily  lifted out because that is

[00:18:01] Billy: huge. Permanent makeup is often advertised as semi-permanent.

[00:18:05] Sara: Mm-hmm.

[00:18:06] Billy: But some of the pigment that’s being used is far from semi-permanent.

[00:18:09] Sara: Right.

[00:18:10] Billy: Um, and it would be nice if a pigment manufacturer actually considered the laser. It almost worked it backwards.

[00:18:18] Sara: Aren’t you working on that?

[00:18:19] Billy: I’ve been speaking. I’m not plug my need. You, I’m not plugging my own thing here. No, I, I do, um, talk a lot with, uh, the owner of Solid Ink. Okay. Uh, Federico, he’s a friend of mine and, um, we work together to make, uh, s and p pigment a scalp Micro-pigmentation. Pigment. And he had at one point a permanent makeup line.

[00:18:41] Which I believe, if I’m not mistaken, he discontinued it. But he’s been talking about getting that going again. So at some point I, I would like to see that happen either with him. I, I do think though it should be a standard across the industry. Yeah.

[00:18:55] Sara: Yeah,

[00:18:56] Billy: I think it would be nice to see, you know, I’m sure if  one manufacturer did it, others would follow.

[00:19:03] : Mm-hmm.

[00:19:03] Billy: But I think somebody needs to take the initiative and be like, okay, look, um, these are the pigments. You know, almost work it backwards. Like which ones are so stubborn that can’t be removed with the laser? What ingredients, and let’s not include them. Mm-hmm. And let’s see if we can make a pigment that’s gonna last and look nice.

[00:19:23] And, um, you know, allow for people to make changes when they want to. Right. I, I would say that’s probably the biggest concern when people come in to get removal, is that they don’t want to end up with yellow. Right. Um, and you know, even a lot of your clients, when, when you send them into us and we go through the initial consultation, that’s part, that’s like the last part.

[00:19:46] The, the last section is like, okay, let’s talk about pigment and what you can expect during the process. Mm-hmm. So nobody’s surprised. And that’s usually when people get really nervous and they’re like, well, I don’t think I can walk around with yellow  brows. Or, yeah. If they want to change the shape for any reason.

[00:20:04] Um, you know, and you have yellow poking through. It’s just gonna, I mean, it is pretty noticeable. Some yellow is quite noticeable.

[00:20:11] Sara: I agree. And I, you know, I do see some photos of coverups with the yellow underneath, and I’m just like, oh, you know, that was expensive. You know, I don’t know if like, sometimes there’s a, I think you could do a nice powder.

[00:20:24] There’s options, right? Mm-hmm. But, um, how many clients do you think, like percentage wise, turn. To a point yellow where it’d be hard to cover up.

[00:20:34] Billy: There are quite a few. Quite a few. Yeah. Lately I’ve seen a lot more. Yeah. Um, even some years ago I was not seeing as much yellow, but now I would say maybe 25% of our clients have yellow undertones.

[00:20:48] Sara: Right. And this is probably mostly due to the coverups. Or the, or. The corrections. And the corrections from the coverups, the co. So when they come in for the gray brows and they don’t do laser  and the artist says, I can cover that up, they color. Correct. Do the strokes or the powder, and then there’s that much more Yeah.

[00:21:07] Red, yellow in their skin. So, or the removal process. So it makes it even worse.

[00:21:12] Billy: Yeah. So not doing the laser from the beginning Yes. And choosing to color correct. Is what’s causing a lot of the issues. Mm-hmm. You think? Mm-hmm. Yeah. So I’d say out of that 25% of the people who have yellow, I would say half of them.

[00:21:27] Will successfully remove it and the other half they’re stuck with it. Yeah. And they either have to choose to do saline or to just cover ’em up.

[00:21:36] Sara: Mm-hmm.

[00:21:36] Billy: When you cover yellow brows, uh, do you find it difficult?

[00:21:40] Sara: I don’t find it difficult. Some, I’ve had clients come to me that have had laser elsewhere with yellow brows, and I can tell the skin has been different, like harder to work with.

[00:21:51] But this could be also be from. The way the tattoo, the old permanent makeup artist did it. Mm-hmm. So there’s some scarring, right?

[00:21:57] : Yeah.

[00:21:58] Sara: Um, so that’s been challenging.  And when I do have a client with some yellow brows and they say, what should I do from here? Do you think it’d be a nice coverup? I have them come in and I will draw some strokes over top.

[00:22:09] If the yellow’s poking out too much, maybe go in for another removal. Maybe saline would be a good option. But it is nice to be able to draw on the strokes and see if that color behind. Is going to bother, and knowing that the strokes I draw on top will be a little lighter. I try to be really delicate with that process to give it the most realistic.

[00:22:29] Billy: Mm-hmm. I’m curious when you see yellow. You’re trying to cover it up. Mm-hmm. Does that change your approach? Like how you align your strokes? Do you put ’em a little closer? Yeah, I will. You saturate a little bit more?

[00:22:43] Sara: Maybe not in the first session. Mm-hmm. Just to play it safe, you know, see how it heals.

[00:22:46] ’cause I, I might not have to place them too close and I can always do like nice. Pixelated Fluffies in between. Mm-hmm. Just to soften that yellow or hide it, camouflage it a little bit without going too heavy.

[00:22:58] Billy: It’s kind of like cooking.  And when you’re using salt, like yeah, you can add salt, but if you add too much right away, you’re in big trouble.

[00:23:05] Yeah. So you can always keep adding it.

[00:23:06] Sara: Yeah. And it might be per, it might be. Great. You know, so Yeah.

[00:23:10] Billy: So less is more. I, that’s why I love your work. It’s Well, thank you. It’s nice and fluffy. Yeah. And it heals nicely. I’ve seen, you know, in person too. Oh, thank you. Clients have come in like thinking of changing the shape and I’m like, you, those are great.

[00:23:23] You don’t have to do anything, just leave ’em alone. Yeah. I’ve seen your, I’ve seen a lot of your work in person and online and it’s all been awesome. Thank

[00:23:30] Sara: you. Well, your work is amazing too. That’s why I am sending everybody your way.

[00:23:34] Billy: Thanks. Yeah. And they have

[00:23:35] Sara: great experiences with your whole staff.

[00:23:38] Billy: We’re trying.

[00:23:39] Sara: Yeah.

[00:23:39] Billy: It’s, you know, over the years, uh, when we first started doing brow removal, we were kind of, you know, figuring things out as we went along. Mm-hmm. But now I think we kind of have a, a really good understanding.

[00:23:58] Pigments haven’t been changing much.  Not only pigments that are coming right out of the bottle. Mm-hmm. But ones that are modified or mixed, those are the ones that we have the biggest problems with. Yeah. And you can tell you, you can see the brows right away and know that this was just some big mixing pot of pigment that, you know, it always seems to turn like a burgundy color underneath

[00:24:22] Sara: my pigments that I use.

[00:24:23] Now we can modify the level of the modifier. So I can add the orange. Does that make sense? And how much Yes. Warmth needs to be.

[00:24:34] Billy: Yeah.

[00:24:34] Sara: Added

[00:24:35] Billy: you having experience, I think, you know. Um, what will and will not heal nicely over time. Mm-hmm. But a lot of, a lot of the artists out there, some of them knew, some of them not.

[00:24:47] Um, they’ll mix pigments together thinking like, oh, this is gonna, like, this looks great right here, but they don’t really take into consideration, or they don’t know how it’s gonna heal over time. Mm-hmm. And, you know, you know, that’s  when we see, like, we have some, we’ve seen some brows. It’s like, I don’t know what color that is.

[00:25:05] Yeah. Like, it’s just. Mixed, you know, and it always seems to turn like this burgundy color and we’re like, oh no, here we go again. Like we can tell right away.

[00:25:15] Sara: Yeah. And it’s frustrating ’cause then you feel like this industry’s in this vicious cycle and there’s no changes being made. It’s like same pigments then the laser and the yellow the you.

[00:25:24] Yeah. Yeah.

[00:25:26] Billy: So that’s one of the reasons why I really wanted to do this podcast was to, to bring a little bit of awareness. Mm-hmm. About pigments. And what works with laser, what doesn’t, you know, all of our experiences, I’d like to share it so that way we can help educate people. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Um, but yeah, it’s, it’s been a challenge to just kind of keep up with the pigments.

[00:25:49] I would say that’s probably the most difficult part of doing the laser. Yeah.

[00:25:54] Sara: I think too, um, the way pigment is implanted in the skin when it’s oversaturated.  That’s when you really get the more ashy gray tones and then there’s the corrector put on top. So if everybody could just lighten their hand in the pigment load, you’ll see that color a lot more to, I don’t know if that makes sense.

[00:26:13] It

[00:26:13] Billy: does, yeah. Be if you’re delicate with the application. Yeah. Then you’ll see a nice crisp, and then

[00:26:19] Sara: your touchups are a lot more refreshing to see those, those warm colors without oversaturation all the time.

[00:26:27] Billy: I think that that skill comes with confidence. If you have confidence and you know how it’s going to heal.

[00:26:34] Because when you’re doing the tattoo, you have to trust the process as, as the tattooer. Mm-hmm. Or as the artist, you have to know how that’s going to heal. Mm-hmm. And if you don’t and you try to do too much, the next thing you know you have a big blown out tattoo. Mm-hmm. That’s just gonna turn to a blob.

[00:26:51] : Right.

[00:26:51] Billy: And I learned that the hard way. Yeah. Tattooing when you know you’re doing like a little script or something like that and you, you think, oh, that  letter’s not dark enough. I need to go over it a few times to get it to, you know? Mm-hmm. I want it to heal dark. And you see it like a year later and you’re like, oh man,

[00:27:07] : yeah,

[00:27:08] Billy: that thing is blown out.

[00:27:09] I went way too hard. Any type of line work that that is the case.

[00:27:15] : Mm-hmm.

[00:27:15] Billy: I think that would be a very difficult. Thing to tattoos, like you’re tattooing on the face. Um, there’s hairs there. Mm-hmm. And you’re trying to do single needle lines on the, like, can you pick a harder thing to do?

[00:27:30] Sara: I know. Well, it, it’s funny too ’cause my clients with no brows or alopecia clients is the best, you know, it’s clean slate.

[00:27:37] Mm-hmm. It’s almost like a piece of paper. It is like fish needle in a haystack when people have full hair.

[00:27:42] : Yeah. And they’re

[00:27:43] Sara: trying to fish in there and find that line. But. It’s fun. Yeah. Sometimes I do sit back and I’m like, wow, the, these people have so much trust in me and tattooing their face, you know, it’s, it’s pre pretty rewarding, you know?

[00:27:56] Billy: It is, and it’s the same with doing, um, with the  removal. Mm-hmm. Sometimes we see people come in and, and they’re not happy with their brows at all, and they look after the first session when we, you know, we do get lucky sometimes and we’ll just completely remove it.

[00:28:10] Sara: Oh, oh yeah. I have those clients. Yeah.

[00:28:12] Yeah. And I post them on my Instagram. They’re still there. Just like, look at this. But also you educate that it’s not always gonna be that way.

[00:28:20] Billy: Yeah. It’s definitely not. But we do get lucky sometimes. And when we see those clients look in the mirror and they, you know, we have people crying for joy. Mm-hmm.

[00:28:27] All the time. But then again, there, there are some other ones that are not as easy at all. Mm-hmm. So I don’t want anybody to get the impression that this is an easy, you know. An easy process on average, it usually takes anywhere between three sessions and six sessions to completely remove the pigment and not damage the skin.

[00:28:49] : Mm-hmm.

[00:28:50] Billy: And I always tell people, you know, they hem and haw about oh three to six sessions. That’s, and they do the math in their head. They’re like, oh, that’s gonna be, you know, eight months or whatever it’s  gonna be. I tell ’em, I, I say, we can get that off in one session if you want, but that’s, I don’t think that’s what you want.

[00:29:06] : Mm-hmm.

[00:29:06] Billy: You know, you wanna do it safely. Mm-hmm. You don’t wanna damage the hair follicles. You don’t want to singe them off or create scar tissue that you can’t cover with a tattoo.

[00:29:16] : Mm-hmm.

[00:29:16] Billy: So that’s my goal when, when you send your clients to us, I want to educate ’em. I want to do the job properly and send them back to you with a nice, clean slate with no scar tissue.

[00:29:26] Sara: Mm-hmm. It’s important. Taking care of their skin. And again, I always say, this is your face. It’s like, don’t just cover it up and then have to deal with, ’cause you’re gonna have to deal with it. At some point you’re gonna have to get it removed and now’s the time, you know, before you make it worse. And then you are dealing with all those funky colors.

[00:29:43] And who knows,

[00:29:44] Billy: we normally say after laser. It’s a good idea to wait at least three months mm-hmm. Before you get tattooed again. Mm-hmm. And sometimes we see our clients and you po you’ll post a picture of like, redoing their browser. Like  another artist will post it. Yeah. And it’ll be like three weeks after.

[00:30:03] Oh,

[00:30:05] Sara: I’ve, I’ve had clients that come to me and as soon as my needle is in the skin. Sometimes even when I’m drawing, like, I’m like, this is like butter skin. This is not healed. I’ve had a, I had a client once that I knew, she wasn’t honest with me about how long it’d been. Mm-hmm. And that was, that was frustrating.

[00:30:23] So I make it, you know, learning from that. Experience with that client and make it really clear like we need your skin to be fully healed, for you to get the best results.

[00:30:32] Billy: So when you see somebody come in immediately after getting laser and you try to tattoo the skin, what’s the difference? Like how do you know that the skin is not fully intact?

[00:30:46] Sara: Um, well, it all depends. Sometimes it’s a little, I have to go a little slower. You know, make sure that the pigment is setting in there. But I, again, it all depends on the skin type. It can be mm-hmm. Very different. Um,  I switch my needles sometimes to a little bigger of a configuration.

[00:31:05] Billy: But Do you notice, like you said, butter skin earlier, so do you mean like the skin is so soft that it’s not firm enough to, you feel like it’s not gonna retain the pigment?

[00:31:14] Sara: Um, sometimes. Yeah,

[00:31:16] Billy: that’s what I, that’s what I think. Mm-hmm.

[00:31:18] Sara: And that’s

[00:31:19] Billy: what I normally tell people.

[00:31:20] Sara: Yeah. And you, you can tell. I mean, like I said, that one client in particular, when I wiped my first stroke, it was like almost gone. Yeah. And I’m like, girl, like this. Come on. You know? You know, I slowly got a little bit more out of her.

[00:31:35] She didn’t come to you for the removal, but, um, I think a lot of that had to do with. Maybe some scarring as well. Mm-hmm. From the previous work, but her skin from the removal, like it was pretty bad. Yeah. Like you can tell. Um, but yeah, I do make it a big point. Like I will not touch you unless it’s been three months.

[00:31:54] Billy: Yeah. I, I think three months is a, is a good amount of time if I, I know I’ve  gotten laser, you know, in spots like on my leg or whatever, and the feeling after a couple weeks, it’s not done. Mm-hmm. It’s, it still has to kind of get back to normal and it does take a couple months minimum.

[00:32:12] : Mm-hmm.

[00:32:13] Billy: Um, it’s not a great feeling.

[00:32:15] I’m not. I’ll be the first to say that I, I actually hate getting laser.

[00:32:19] Sara: No, mine wasn’t bad at all. Wasn’t No. And did you numb me? Do you not? I don’t even remember.

[00:32:24] Billy: I don’t know if we used numbing.

[00:32:26] Sara: I just remember the ice cube and the hose. We used ice and it was so fast.

[00:32:31] Billy: We used ice. We used the chiller.

[00:32:33] It’s usually pretty fine for me though. I don’t know if, if I’m just a sissy or if I’m hypersensitive or whatever, but it hurts. And I know after even a month’s time, I do not want to tattoo over that spot. Yeah. Like there’s no way in the world I’ve had laser on my legs and like arms and stuff, but if it was my face, I think definitely waiting the amount of time that is recommended is probably a good idea.

[00:32:58] : Mm-hmm.

[00:32:58] Billy: Well, I wanna thank you for coming on  the podcast today. Um. It, it’s been great having you on and learning. Thanks for having me. Yeah, it’s, it’s great to learn a little bit about you and what you do. Sarah Irish Wolf Artistry in South Surrey. Thank you very much for coming on. Thank you. And uh, I look forward to seeing you again.

[00:33:19] Yeah, for sure.

[00:33:20] Sara: All right. Thanks for having me.

[00:33:22] Billy: Yeah, take care.