Half sleeve tattoos are very dynamic in appearance.  When you have this type of tattoo, this body art is often the very first thing people will notice about you.  This type of tattoo goes completely around the bicep or lower arm. Often people spend a lot of time designing exactly how they want this extended tattoo to look, while others who’ve had multiple tattoos in the same area will simply find an artistic way to connect them using a unifying background or coloring.

You can have pretty much any theme in this amount of space, but remember the image will be wrapping around your arm.  There are of course many ways to link several tattoos together namely using naturally ‘bending’ tattoos for the wrap around such as Celtic, tribal or barbed wired bands.

You’ll then need to decide what overall theme you want for the half sleeve tattoo. Even if you have connector tattoos the overall appearance will work better if it flows from one image to another taking the eye on a very smooth ride completely around. There are several common themes you might consider from the Wild West to comic books; there are plenty of ideas out there to look at.  Look around, and then try to incorporate your own ideas and personality into the mix.

When you have a theme then decide on the exact placement. See if you’d rather have it on your upper arm than the lower.  Then decide which arm is best for you.  Some people choose the larger dominate arm because this affords them more space for the tattoo, but if you put it on the smaller arm it gives the illusion of greater size. If you put the tattoo on your lower arm it will be seen more easily, however in this area it’s hard to hide the tattoo. An upper arm half sleeve tattoo can be hidden simply by wearing extended short sleeve shirts.

Find the artist you want to work with for this half sleeve tattoo.

It’s important to find a good artist who will take this work very seriously. You’ll be living with it for the rest of your life, so it needs to be a tattoo you love and feel good about having displayed on your arm.  If you already have work done in the area show this to the artist and see if working with these images and incorporating them into one overall depiction will work or if they need to be covered over by the artist.  Usually when doing a half sleeve tattoo an artist will do a trace of the area to be tattooed and design the entire tattoo before even starting the process. This gives you both a chance to make last minute changes.  Since this is a large area with many images it will almost always take more than one session to complete.

Where to go from here:

• Tribal Tattoos Are For Everyone – Tribal Tattoo Designs
• Tattoo Designs For Men – Men Tattoos
• Beautiful Tattoo Inspiration
• What You Need to Know Before Getting a Tattoo