It can be quite difficult to find a design that you want to tattoo on your body. Most people are looking for something original. If you can't seem to find the right design, you might want to spend some time generating tattoo ideas in Midjourney.
I believe that this article can benefit both people who own or work at tattoo shops, as well as those who want to get a tattoo.
If you work at a tattoo shop, you're already familiar with the various tattoo styles that exist today. You'll find it easier to write good prompts and generate awesome ideas for tattoo design.
In case you're not too familiar with the different tattoo styles that exist, you might want to learn about them before you start writing prompts. I'll include a section in this article dedicated to the various styles you can mention in your prompts.
How to Write Midjourney Prompts for Tattoos
The first decision you'll have to make is how much you want the text-to-image AI model to randomize a concept. You can do this by deciding the level of detail you want your prompts to include.
Let's say you have an idea to tattoo an image of a bird on your hand. If you were to write a prompt that consists only of a few or several words, you'll leave a lot of room for randomization. This will allow you to go through numerous ideas that vary in design.
On the other hand, you can also add a great level of detail to the prompts you're writing if you want to decrease the level of randomization. Of course, I'll show you how to do this with 12 prompt examples.
Another thing that's incredibly important to mention in your prompts is the tattoo design style. To find more information about this, you should read the section below.
The Different Types of Tattoo Styles
There are countless tattoo styles that exist today. To keep this article somewhat concise, I'll pick only 12 styles. If you're not familiar with them and want to get a tattoo of a design generated in Midjourney, I advise you to spend some time researching the tattoo styles that exist.
Here are some of the most popular tattoo styles in the world today:
- Tribal - This is arguably one of the most popular tattoo styles of all time. It's also the oldest style in the world since it dates back thousands of years.
- Watercolor - The watercolor tattoo style has become incredibly popular in the last several years. It also takes quite an effort to do correctly. Only experienced tattoo artists can confidently tattoo watercolor designs.
- Traditional - The traditional tattoo style can be recognized for its bold lines and limited color palette. You've likely seen many tattoos done in the traditional style.
- Neo Traditional - The neo traditional style builds on the classic traditional designs. It uses more colors, intricate details, and subtle gradients to achieve a certain aesthetic.
- Blackwork - When it comes to tattoos, blackwork is a style that describes any design that is created using only black ink.
- Illustrative - If a tattoo design is colorful and 2D, and looks like it could fit perfectly in a children's book, then it features an illustrative design.
- Minimalist - Most people think that minimalist style tattoos are always small, but that's actually not the case. They don't have to be small at all. Instead, their design only needs to consist of simple and clean lines.
- Floral - Flowers are always beautiful, regardless of whether you observe them in nature or you decide to have a floral design tattooed on your body.
- Realism - This is a style that aims to essentially recreate a photo on the skin. It's quite a complex task to tattoo a design in the realism style on a person.
- Line Art - People often confuse minimalism with line art. Both styles consist of clean lines, but line art can often include much more complex designs.
- Geometric - The geometric tattoo style is cool because it breaks down any design into basic geometric shapes. You'll often find repetitive geometric shapes when you're making a design using this style.
- Abstract - The abstract art style is one where the artist can really let their creativity flow. You can also produce outstanding designs in an abstract style in Midjourney.
There are many more styles that I could've mentioned. One of the more popular styles that didn't make my list is the Japanese tattoo style. I encourage you to find additional styles and mention them in your prompts to see what type of designs you can generate.
If you're not sure how to write Midjourney prompts for tattoos, I'll show you in the next section of this article.
12 Midjourney Prompts for Tattoos
I think you'll be surprised to find out just how good Midjourney is at generating tattoo designs. Some people have already started using these designs, but I suspect it will become a much bigger trend in the future.
There is something special about knowing that artificial intelligence designed a tattoo that you put on your body. It can symbolize how far technology has come, which makes it alluring to people who want a special meaning behind a tattoo.
Without further ado, I'll show you some cool Midjourney prompts for tattoos and the generated outputs. I will write a prompt for each of the 12 tattoo styles I mentioned in the previous section.
/imagine tribal style tattoo design that depicts a radiant sun with tribal patterns, the tattoo symbolizes vitality, energy, and life with a sun that features geometric swirls --v 5
I believe that I will never have something tattooed on my body. But if there is one particular style that has always been really cool to me, it's the tribal tattoo style. I included all four of the generated results here because I think they're each good in their own way. It's impressive what Midjourney can generate from a couple of lines of text.
It's also great that there are two examples of what a design could look like on a body, as well as two clean designs that you can bring to a tattoo artist so they can clearly see what they should tattoo on you.
/imagine watercolor style tattoo design, mesmerizing blend of vibrant watercolor splashes and cosmic elements like stars, planets, and galaxies, creating a dreamy and otherworldly effect --v 5
I'm absolutely in love with astronomy. Have been since I can remember. The watercolor style seemed like a good fit for a cosmic concept, which is why I decided to write the prompt above. I can say that I'm quite impressed with the result here. It's much better than I expected.
/imagine traditional style tattoo design of a skull symbolizing mortality, defiance, and strength. The skull design should also incorporate other elements like roses --v 5
I'm going to be honest, I didn't know a lot about tattoo styles before I started doing research for this article. But one style that I could immediately recognize is this one. I can particularly recognize seeing a combination of a skull and roses tattooed on at least a few people.
/imagine neo traditional style tattoo design of a phoenix rising from the ashes, the design should feature fine linework, bold colors, and intricate details, rebirth, mythical creature, powerful --v 5
These designs are quite complex, but I can already imagine how good they would look as a tattoo. The design truly features intricate details. It's important to also include keywords in your prompts, just like I did here with 'powerful' to give the generated output a certain flair.
/imagine blackwork style tattoo design of a large-scale mandala design that incorporates intricate patterns and geometric shapes, the design should contain varying shades of black --v 5
This looks amazing. I wonder how much time it would take for an artist to tattoo a design like this on someone's back. I mean, look at the insane level of detail in this design. I think it would take several visits to a tattoo shop for this design to be finished.
/imagine illustrative style tattoo design of a lone wolf filled with confidence and courage, the wolf should symbolize the independence of a person and inspire people to find joy and happiness without relying on others --v 5
I like all four generated results here. The first and the third designs are more serious, while the other two are kind of playful. Either way, if you're looking for a tattoo design depicting a lone wolf, you'll likely love one of these four images.
/imagine minimalist style tattoo design of a solar system, the design should be simple and inspiring at the same time, astronomy, wondrous, awe --v 5
These designs are absolutely incredible. This is the type of tattoo I love to see. It's a great conversation starter as well because I know that a person with a tattoo like this must be interested in astronomy.
/imagine floral style tattoo design that should contain various intertwined flowers and leaves, the design should capture the intricate beauty of nature --v 5
This is yet another set of four tattoo designs generated in Midjourney that feature an impressive level of detail. What's most intriguing is that these designs were created from a relatively simple prompt.
/imagine realism style tattoo design depicting the portrait of an explorer from the 17th century, nostalgic, adventurous, intricate, interesting --v 5
I'm not too familiar with how people dressed during the 17th century, so I hope Midjourney didn't get it wrong. These designs are awesome. I'm not particularly fond of realism-style tattoos, but I am impressed with what Midjourney generated.Â
/imagine line art style tattoo design depicting a soaring bird that is meant to symbolize grace and elegance, the design should capture a majestic bird in mid-flight, freedom, resilience, pursue your dreams --v 5
I'm not sure which one of these four designs is the best. I would say the third or fourth one, in my opinion. I came up with some good keywords to put in this prompt. Keep in mind that you can also use phrases as I did here with 'pursue your dreams' to describe a feeling or emotion you want to go into the design of the image.
/imagine geometric style tattoo design depicting elements of nature, such as mountains, trees, or waves, the design can use triangles, polygons, and other geometric shapes to form the natural landscape, resulting in a unique and modern interpretation of the natural world --v 5
Okay, I must say that I got a bit creative with this prompt. I wanted to write something creative and see how it would turn out. Luckily for me, it seems that the prompt generated some stunning designs.
/imagine abstract style tattoo design displaying an exploration of fluid forms and vibrant colors, the design should capture the essence of spontaneity and creativity, energetic, captivating, harmony, artistic --v 5
I was debating on whether I should upload another set of four images or just put the image above. I ended up doing the latter because this design just stood out so much. It really does display an exploration of vibrant colors and fluid forms.
Final Thoughts
Wow. We created some stunning tattoo designs today. While I would be absolutely flattered if someone would tattoo one of the designs that were generated from a prompt I wrote, I would encourage you to come up with your own prompts if you'd like an AI generated design. I hope I provided you with enough information and examples to help you write good Midjourney prompts for tattoos.
I feel like I should do a quick recap before I finish the article.
People who work at tattoo shops should be able to write prompts like the ones I showed in this article quite easily. For you, it will be no problem to imagine an idea for a tattoo design and express it using natural language.
On the other hand, there are many people who aren't even familiar with the different tattoo design styles that exist. If you're one of them, you should take some time to learn these styles so that you know how to express your ideas in Midjourney.
After you've picked a specific style, you should describe your idea in the simplest way possible without leaving out any important details. That's the best mindset to have when you're writing prompts.
