Eyeball Tattooing Procedures
These days the topic of eyeball tattoo attracts more and more attention among both a wide audience of contemporary citizens and the minority of tattoo fans. While eyeball tattoo still remains cloaked in a number of myths and misperceptions, it is important to clearly understand what the procedure of eyeball tattooing looks like.
A human eye is exactly where all eyeball tattooing happens. Hence, first of all, let’s remind the eye structure from the course of biology we all learned as part of school program. Human eye is a very complex system with many structural elements in it. You can see it by looking at the picture below. Pay special attention at one specific layer, called cornea, because this part is involved during eyeball tattoo.
The cornea is a delicate yet very important part of the human eye. Its main purpose is to refract light. That is why it is transparent, and while being full of sensitive nerve endings, it has no blood vessels. During eyeball tattooing a doctor or a tattoo artist first dips a needle into a dye or ink and then inserts it into a cornea of the eye. Under the influence of ink, the color of eye cornea changes from transparent into a chosen shade. It was reported that up to 40 injections may be required to color the whole white of an eye. Sometimes a three-needle tool or even a syringe is used to deliver ink into an eyeball. Though, a tattoo machine with three-needle configuration is said to ensure better results. The healing period usually lasts about a week, during which one feels as if something got into his eye.
Among the color pigments, used for eyeball tattoo, are India ink, Chinese ink, metallic powders, organic dyes, etc. While there is no approved procedure for eyeball tattooing, there is no any recommended ink. Though, India ink is often mentioned as the safest one with long-lasting effect.
While eyeball tattoo still remains a marginal procedure, which is not that frequently performed, certain medical risks are always present. That is why before deciding on turning your eye red or blue, please think twice or thrice; remember, eye tattoo is not that easy to remove, if at all possible.
