If there’s one thing we’ve learned from 15 years of laser experience and treating thousands of tattoos, it’s this: tattoo removal can achieve some absolutely fantastic results.
I’ve personally been carrying out laser treatments since 2011, with Skin Beautiful established in Felpham, Bognor Regis in 2012. Since then, we’ve successfully treated thousands of unwanted tattoos, including many complete removals, and our tattoo removal work has even been featured on ITV television.
Technology has moved on enormously, and tattoos that people once thought they’d be stuck with forever can often now be significantly faded or completely removed.
But despite all those advances, some tattoo-removal myths stubbornly refuse to disappear. So let’s get rid of a few of those as well.
MYTH 1: “Can’t you just turn the laser up?”
We hear this one a lot. More power = faster removal, right?
Not quite.
Great tattoo removal isn’t about firing as much energy as possible into your skin. It’s about delivering the right amount of energy, at the right wavelength, with the right settings, at the right stage of your treatment.
As your tattoo fades, treatments can change too. That’s where experience becomes important.
Our aim isn’t simply to remove pigment. It’s to achieve the best possible clearance while looking after the skin underneath, because ultimately that’s the skin you’re going to be left showing off.
MYTH 2: “Surely you can tell me exactly how many sessions I’ll need?”
This is probably one of the questions we’re asked most often.
We can give you an experienced estimate, but nobody can responsibly guarantee an exact number of treatments — and after treating thousands of tattoos, we’re very wary of anyone who does.
That’s not a limitation of the laser or practitioner. It’s because tattoo removal involves your body as well as the laser, and there are simply too many individual variables to predict precisely how quickly any particular tattoo will clear.
Some tattoos respond remarkably quickly. Others take a little more persuasion. Occasionally, two tattoos that look almost identical can respond completely differently.
Experience allows us to assess what’s likely. It doesn’t allow anyone to predict biology with absolute certainty.
Things that can influence how quickly and effectively a tattoo responds include:
Ink colour
Amount and density of pigment
Depth of the ink
Professional versus amateur tattooing
Location on the body
Layering and cover-ups
Existing scar tissue
Your skin type
Smoking
Alcohol consumption
Diet and general health
Stress and sleep
Genetics
Recreational drug use
UV exposure and tanning
Your individual immune response
Medical history
That sounds like a long list, but don’t worry. You don’t need the perfect tattoo, perfect genetics and the lifestyle of an Olympic athlete to get a great result.
These are simply some of the reasons your tattoo-removal journey belongs to you rather than being directly comparable with somebody else’s.
Your body removes the tattoo — not just our laser
The laser targets the tattoo pigment and breaks it down into particles that your body can gradually deal with afterwards. Your immune system then continues working on the treated pigment for weeks and even months.
So you’re actually part of the tattoo-removal team. We’ll operate the laser. You can have the difficult job of lying there.
And while you certainly don’t need to live like an Olympic athlete, looking after yourself isn’t a bad idea. If you’re smoking heavily, drinking excessively, sleeping four hours a night, permanently stressed, living on takeaway food and spending every weekend roasting yourself in the sun, your tattoo-removal practitioner probably isn’t the only one asking your body to perform miracles.
MYTH 3: “If I have treatments more often, it’ll disappear faster.”
It’s tempting to think so, but tattoo removal is one of those occasions where more isn’t necessarily better.
Once we’ve treated the pigment, your skin needs to recover and your body needs time to continue clearing it.
Here’s something clients often love hearing: your tattoo can continue fading while you’re doing absolutely nothing.
No laser, no appointment and no effort whatsoever. Your body can still be working on the pigment.
Sometimes giving a tattoo more time between treatments can produce a better result than simply treating it again as soon as possible.
So if we tell you to wait, we’re not trying to get rid of you. We’re giving your body time to do its part.
MYTH 4: “If I get a blister, something has gone wrong.”
Not necessarily.
Temporary redness, swelling and sometimes blistering can occur following tattoo removal. Most importantly, the area needs to be allowed to heal properly.
Which leads us to possibly the easiest piece of tattoo-removal advice we’ll ever give you: don’t fiddle with it.
Follow your aftercare, keep the area clean, give your skin time to recover and resist the overwhelming human urge to investigate anything remotely pickable.
Your skin is remarkably good at healing when we leave it alone.
MYTH 5: “Black must be the hardest colour to remove.”
This one surprises people. Black is actually one of the colours we generally love treating.
Black pigment absorbs laser energy very effectively at appropriate wavelengths and can often respond extremely well. But here’s where tattoo removal gets really interesting.
Your tattoo isn’t simply made from “black ink”, “red ink” or “blue ink”
Tattoo inks are mixtures of pigments and other ingredients, and their chemical composition can vary enormously between manufacturers, colours and formulations.
Historically — and in some formulations or laboratory analyses — tattoo pigments have included an extraordinary range of substances and compounds.
Black & Grey: Carbon-based pigments such as carbon black and soot have traditionally been common. Iron oxides and materials such as magnetite may also be found in some pigments.
Red: Historically, red pigments have included cinnabar (mercuric sulphide) and cadmium-based pigments. Other formulations can contain iron oxides and organic pigments, including azo and naphthol-related compounds.
White & Bright Colours: Titanium dioxide is widely associated with white tattoo pigment, with zinc oxide also used historically. White pigments can also be mixed with other colours to produce lighter shades.
Blue & Green: Various formulations have used pigments involving copper or cobalt compounds, while many modern formulations use organic pigments.
Yellow & Orange: Historically, pigments have included substances such as cadmium yellow and lead chromate, while other formulations use organic pigments including monoazo compounds.
Pigment is only part of what’s inside tattoo ink. Depending on the particular formulation, carrier solutions and other ingredients may include distilled or purified water, ethanol, isopropyl alcohol, vegetable glycerin, propylene glycol, witch hazel, preservatives and other additives.
Modern tattoo-ink regulations restrict or prohibit many hazardous substances, so this absolutely doesn’t mean every modern tattoo contains mercury, lead, cadmium or the other substances mentioned above.
But it illustrates something incredibly important about tattoo removal:
We can see the colour of your tattoo. We can’t see the recipe that created it.
Two tattoos can look like exactly the same shade of red but contain very different pigments and mixtures underneath the skin. One may respond beautifully; another may take considerably more persuasion.
Certain pigments — particularly some cosmetic and light-coloured pigments containing compounds such as iron oxides or titanium dioxide — can sometimes undergo colour changes when exposed to laser energy. In some circumstances a light pigment can actually become darker rather than lighter.
That’s one reason why understanding pigment behaviour and using appropriate test patches where necessary is important. Different colours may also require different laser wavelengths.
The colour tells us where to start. Experience tells us how to proceed.
And sometimes the tattoo decides to throw us a surprise anyway. After thousands of them, we’re quite used to surprises.
MYTH 6: “My friend’s tattoo took loads more sessions somewhere else — why is mine disappearing faster with you?”
We hear this one surprisingly often. A friend may have had 10, 12 or even more treatments elsewhere, while your tattoo seems to be making much faster progress with us.
So naturally: “Why is mine going so much quicker?”
There can be several reasons — but two things that absolutely matter in professional tattoo removal are the quality and capability of the laser and the experience of the person operating it.
Not all tattoo-removal lasers are the same. The quality of the equipment, wavelengths available, energy delivery and ability to produce the appropriate treatment parameters can all make a difference.
Simply owning something described as a “tattoo removal laser” doesn’t mean every machine has identical capabilities. Using an appropriate wavelength for the pigment being treated is also crucial. A fantastic practitioner can’t magically create a wavelength their machine doesn’t have.
But the laser is only part of the equation. Knowing how to use it matters enormously.
I’ve personally been carrying out laser treatments since 2011, and during that time we’ve treated thousands of tattoos at Skin Beautiful. That experience helps us judge how a tattoo is responding, select appropriate settings, recognise when something needs changing and — just as importantly — know when not to keep increasing the energy or treating too frequently.
Good equipment + experience = a very important combination.
Even then, we can’t simply compare your tattoo treatment-for-treatment with your friend’s. Their pigments, depth and density of ink, location, number of layers, treatment intervals and individual biological response may all be different.
That’s why 10 treatments on one tattoo aren’t automatically equivalent to 10 treatments on another.
Our aim at Skin Beautiful isn’t to see how many appointments we can fit into your tattoo-removal journey. It’s to use quality laser technology, appropriate wavelengths, 15 years of experience and carefully selected treatment parameters to get the best response we reasonably can from each treatment while looking after your skin.
So if your tattoo is disappearing faster than your friend’s did elsewhere, we’ll happily accept some of the credit. But we’ll let your body take a little as well.
The number of treatments isn’t the goal. The result is.
MYTH 7: “My tattoo has stopped fading.”
Tattoo removal doesn’t always happen at the same speed from beginning to end.
Early treatments can sometimes produce dramatic changes. Later, we’re dealing with what’s left — perhaps denser areas, deeper pigment, different colours or simply ink that’s proving a little more stubborn.
That’s when experience really earns its keep.
We can assess whether treatment parameters need adjusting, whether another wavelength is appropriate or whether giving your body more time is the best option.
A slower stage doesn’t mean your tattoo has stopped responding. Sometimes it simply means we’ve reached the stubborn bit.
And after treating thousands of tattoos, we’re quite used to stubborn.
MYTH 8: “If I drink gallons of water, I’ll flush the tattoo out.”
Sadly, it’s not quite that simple.
Staying normally hydrated and looking after yourself is sensible, particularly because your body plays such an important role in the clearance process.
But drinking four litres of water isn’t going to make your tattoo disappear overnight. Otherwise we’d have installed a water cooler next to the laser years ago.
Healthy body, normal hydration, sensible lifestyle. That’s enough.
MYTH 9: “Does avoiding a tan REALLY matter?”
Yes — and this is one of the easiest things you can do to help us treat you safely and effectively.
I once asked a dermatologist what is a tan, their answer was “damaged skin” we don’t want to be actively lasering that. Laser tattoo removal targets pigment. A suntan increases melanin in your skin, which can affect how safely we can deliver laser energy.
Keeping the treatment area protected from significant UV exposure gives us a much better canvas to work with. So think of avoiding a tan as part of your tattoo-removal programme rather than an inconvenience.
Look after the skin and we’ll look after the tattoo.
MYTH 10: “You can’t completely remove a tattoo — you’ll always see something.”
Actually, you might be amazed at what’s possible.
We’ve successfully treated thousands of tattoos over the years, including many many complete removals, where clients initially couldn’t imagine ever seeing clear skin there again.
With the right tattoo, high-quality laser technology, the correct wavelengths, experienced treatment, appropriate settings, sensible treatment intervals and a good individual response, the level of clearance can be exceptional.
We’ve seen tattoos disappear to the point where you’d struggle to know they had ever been there.
So can YOUR tattoo completely disappear?
Absolutely — complete removal is a very realistic outcome for many tattoos.
Every tattoo is different, which is why we assess yours individually rather than making blanket promises. Ink colour and chemistry, how deeply and densely it was applied, its location, your skin and your body’s response can all influence how quickly it clears.
Some tattoos disappear remarkably well. Some require more patience. Some colours are more challenging than others.
But after 15 years of laser experience and thousands of tattoos treated, we know just how impressive the results can be.
Modern laser tattoo removal really can leave you looking at clear skin where a tattoo used to be.
There’s another interesting point too. Occasionally, once all that pigment has disappeared, you may notice some texture in the skin underneath.
That doesn’t necessarily mean the laser caused it. The original tattooing process itself can create scar tissue, particularly if an area was heavily worked. Dark pigment can hide that texture for years.
That’s why our approach at Skin Beautiful isn’t simply “get the ink out as quickly as possible.”
It’s get the tattoo out while looking after the skin underneath.
After all, that’s the skin we’re hoping you’re going to be showing off when we’ve finished.
So if you’ve been looking at an old tattoo thinking, “There’s no way they’ll ever get rid of that…”, let us have a look.
You might be very pleasantly surprised by what’s achievable.
BONUS MYTH: “Tattoo removal is unbearably painful.”
This is probably one of the biggest things stopping some people from booking.
So here’s the good news: it’s usually incredibly quick.
Yes, you can feel laser tattoo removal. We’re not going to pretend otherwise. People often describe the sensation as similar to an elastic band being repeatedly snapped against the skin.
But there’s one enormous difference between getting a tattoo and removing one: a tattoo that took several hours to create may take only seconds or minutes to laser.
There are also things that can make the experience considerably more comfortable.
Cooling
Appropriate cooling of the area can help reduce discomfort. We can advise you on cooling before, during and after treatment.
Numbing cream
Topical numbing cream can also make a significant difference for some clients, particularly when treating larger or more sensitive areas.
However, numbing creams need to be used correctly. The product, amount used, size of the area being treated and how long it’s left on all matter.
So if you’re worried about discomfort, talk to us before your appointment and we can advise you on whether a numbing cream is appropriate and how it should be used.
There’s no medal for having tattoo removal without numbing. If we can make your treatment more comfortable without compromising safety, we’re all for it.
And regular readers may remember our previous highly scientific investigation into another possible pain-management technique…
CHOCOLATE.
There is actually published research looking at chocolate and pain perception.
No, we’re not suggesting you replace proper pain-management advice with a family-sized Dairy Milk. And no, Dairy Milk hasn’t officially been approved as an anaesthetic.
We’re working on it.
Don’t let fear of the discomfort put you off removing a tattoo you no longer want. With cooling, appropriate use of numbing cream where suitable, an experienced practitioner and the fact that most treatments are relatively quick, tattoo removal is generally far more manageable than many people imagine.
So… does tattoo removal actually work?
Absolutely.
Modern laser tattoo removal can produce remarkable results.
We’ve watched tattoos gradually fade treatment after treatment until photographs are the only reminder of what used to be there. We’ve faded tattoos sufficiently for tattoo artists to create completely new cover-up work, and we’ve achieved complete removal on many tattoos for people who once assumed they’d simply have to live with them.
That’s one of the reasons we still enjoy doing this after all these years.
I’ve been carrying out laser treatments since 2011, and Skin Beautiful has been established in Felpham since 2012. Our tattoo removal work has even been featured on ITV television.
And 15 years of experience has taught us something important:
Successful tattoo removal is a partnership between technology, experience and your body.
Our job is knowing which laser wavelength to use, what settings are appropriate, when to adjust them, when to treat and when to give your body more time.
Your body’s job is dealing with the treated pigment afterwards.
And together? Some pretty amazing things can happen.
Professional Laser Tattoo Removal in Felpham, Bognor Regis
Skin Beautiful Limited
125 Felpham Way
Felpham
Bognor Regis
West Sussex
PO22 8QB
www.skinbeautiful.co.uk
15 years’ laser treatment experience
Skin Beautiful established 2012
Thousands of tattoos successfully treated
Featured on ITV television
We welcome tattoo-removal clients from Felpham, Bognor Regis, Chichester, Littlehampton and throughout West Sussex.
Whether you’d like your tattoo completely removed, want it lightened ready for a new cover-up, or simply want an experienced opinion about what’s realistically achievable, come and talk to us.
Got a tattoo you’ve fallen out of love with?
You may be surprised by just how much we can do with it.
Facebook & Instagram: @skinbeautifuluk
Individual results and treatment requirements vary. Suitability and expected outcomes are assessed individually before treatment