If your New Year’s resolution was to finally get that tattoo you’ve always wanted, then it’s time to start looking into tattoo ideas today.
Don’t hold off until an hour before your booking. Whatever tattoo you’d like to get, you need to take time and look at several designs from different artists. Get a flavor for what’s out there and expand your horizons a little. If you do, you might find yourself with something far better than you’ve ever envisioned.
With this in mind, if you like the idea of getting a ‘deck of cards’ tattoo, then there are plenty of variations to choose from. For years now, this type of tattoo has been one of the most popular, with people going for both singular playing cards and the full deck from the ace to the king.
To help you begin your search, we’ve listed out 5 of our favorite ideas, as well as a few words on what makes them so special.
Poker Cards Design
Poker is one of the most invigorating and mind-compelling games there is – which is probably the reason so many people honor their love for it with tattoos!
Rather than just including a deck of cards, this tattoo incorporates poker chips into the mix, with three small piles of ‘1’s, ‘10’s, and ‘20’s just underneath the deck. This is also a great choice if you want to add a little color and texture to your tattoo, with green, blue, or yellow chips to brighten up the otherwise red and black playing cards.
Deck of Jokers Design
Not everyone likes to stick to the ordinary formula. Rather than tattooing cards that go from aces to kings, several people tattoo a deck of jokers only, with some of them even bursting out from the cards in an awesome 3D tattoo effect.
If you’re a jovial and light-hearted person, or you like straying away from the norm, this can be a great way to showcase your personality. Not to mention, having the jokers burst out from the cards will show depth and make the tattoo far more interesting as a result.
Full-Deck Design
Many card tattoos include either a single card or a deck of cards where only a few card faces are showing. But it’s not like you don’t have space on your body to display a full deck! A fully-displayed deck of cards can be sketched from the top of your arm, all the way down to the wrist.
Or if you’re not comfortable with tattooing your whole arm, the same can be done from your thigh to your ankle – perhaps with a falling effect to evoke movement. If you’d like each card to get its time in the sun – and not just the face cards – then this is a great way to do it.
Personalised Cards Design
You’re getting an artist to tattoo a deck of cards on your body, so it’s not as if they need to be picture-perfect! With this in mind, why not change some cards to represent your favorite movie or book characters?
To give an example, you can have an ordinary deck of cards, and then choose a set of The Dark Knight characters to represent the face cards – Harvey Dent as the Jack, Catwoman as the Queen, Batman as the King, and then the Joker as the Joker! Be creative with it and try to combine two cool tattoos into one.
Cards on Fire Design
While there are plenty of ways to make a deck of cards tattoo interesting – a few of them we’ve already gone into! – one of the most popular ways to add drama is with the fire effect. There’s nothing more breathtaking than accompanying your cards with flames as if the pack has been set alight in a particularly electric game of poker!
Other cool effects include cards being sprayed with water, cards with foliage growing from them, or aged cards that have been crinkled or torn over the years. Once again, take a look online and try to think out of the box a bit. A lot of people have a deck of cards tattoos, but there’s only one you. So go with something that honors your personality.