I have been keeping as busy as I can to do not have to write this article.....
I'm not a huge fan of scarification; even so I will try to keep it as neutral as I can....
You can basically divide the scarification process in 2:
1) Branding (scarification through burns, from heat and others; the definition of the world branding is literally:
-an identifying mark burned on livestock with a branding iron.
-mark with a branding iron; disgrace, condemn
-Mark of ownership of an animal
-Product identification
There are basically 2 types of branding, "strike" (is when the artist take a piece of metal and repeatedly burn the skin over a drawing) and "cautery" (is when the artist uses a cautery pen to burn the image on the person's skin).
2) Cuttings (fine scarification using a thin blade, and to this process you can add colour using tattoo ink, sometimes it can include the removal of skin patches).
Ok, now you know the difference between branding and cutting.......
Let me share a bit more with you:
If you decide to choose cutting the procedure will be more or less like:
- topical anaesthetic is first applied to the skin
- the design is drawn with ink onto the desired area
- The artist then traces the design's outline with a scalpel on your skin, you do not have to worry at this point, it will be a fairly shallow cut.
- After the out line the artist will apply more anaesthetic and wrap your skin for few minutes (not because he thinks that you are a wimp), but it helps the blood diversion, and make easier to work.
- Depending on the size and the amount of work involved the process can take something like 4 hours of: cutting, anaesthetic applying, wrapping and waiting until the volume of blood decrease.
If your choice is branding, the process is more or less like marking cattle (did you ever see it on TV and thought ," poor animal", ok so we are speaking the same language here; anyways the procedure goes more or less like so:
- You choose the image that you want (try to keep in mind that after burning the human tissue tents to expand quite a bit, and as the name say, you will be inflicting a third degree burn on your skin).
- try to stick with simple designs, you should know that the results vary quite a bit, and no artist can predict for sure how thick or thin the scar will be, it depends on each one of us healing process. Simpler the design easier is to predict the results that you will get.
- Try to choose a flat are of your body, preferably away from bones and vital organs
- The looks of the scar depend also of the how long the blade will be in contact with the skin, the artist should never apply pressure to it, in order to get a heavier scar the artist have to keep the blade in touch with your skin for longer.
No, you want a very elaborated image, sure, no problem at all, I actually agree with you, once you are doing something at this level do it well......but those designs have to be very well panned on paper and after well shaped on the metal blade, the shapes should be between 1 to 3 inches long, so the iron can retain the heat long enough to make a clean and even strikes. Is a good idea to have the artist to place the blades on your skin to check if all the surface of the blade is in contact with your skin evenly.
Before starting the process you should ask the artist to test the blades, just to be sure that is all ok, and you wont have problems with metal distortion, caused by an uneven distribution of heat thru the metal or by the metal to be to thin or to small. The artist should test the blades on a piece of metal to find out the perfect balance between heat and pressure, so he won't have to perform the tests on you!!!! Is not really the best of the options use your body as test piece.