Program

BLACK & GREY
REALISM

with Coreh López

Learn the exact Black & Grey Realism technique
and skip years of trial and error.

Start now
  • Audio EN + ES 9 subtitle languages

A course gets filmed in a week. I've been updating this program for 6 years.
12 updates, actually. And I'm nowhere near done.

I've been tattooing for 16 years and I haven't stopped learning for a single day.

But there's one thing I've never changed: when I tattoo, I always do it the same way.
Same needles. Same dilutions. Same voltage.

Everyone teaches you what voltage they use.
Nobody explains why.

"It works for me."
But then it doesn't work for you.

Your dilutions, your voltage and your needles aren't wrong.
What's wrong is you don't know why you use them.

You use them because others do.

And when something goes wrong (it will) you have no idea what to change.
So you change everything.

And next time it works. Or it doesn't.
And you don't know why.

That's not tattooing. That's gambling.

I always tattoo following the same 6 steps.
Whether it's a tiger, a portrait, or a sculpture.

Same technique, same method. Every time.

With the time I save, I focus on everything else: marketing, design, drawing, speed...

Realism isn't about talent.

It's about technique, drawing and methodology.

That's what this program is about.

What you get

6 years of my career documented. In easy-to-watch episodes and videos. Follow the order or go your own way. Yours for life.

Coreh López

Coreh López

@corehlopez

Realism Tattoo Artist 10 Masters

I've taught 10 live seminars. I've been tattooing for 16 years, the first 11 getting it wrong. I started copying other people's formulas, just like you. Now I teach what I learned from every mistake.

Portfolio

Three pillars.
One method.

Realism isn't about talent. It's about what you decide, what you feel in your hand and what you see before you tattoo. The program trains all three.

Methodology

Before you touch skin, you've already chosen the needle, dilution, voltage and order. Here you don't copy: you understand why each choice works.
6 steps. Any piece. Every time.

Decide before touching skin

My 6-step method, holding nothing back. The same sequence for any piece: learn it once and tattoo with it your whole career. Some people tattoo for 15 years without a method. You start with one.

How many shades I mix, what I dilute with and why. It's the question I get asked the most, and the one with the most different answers depending on who you ask. Here you watch mine at work, process after process.

What voltage I tattoo at. Yes, I tell you. But I also explain why, which is what nobody does. And you learn to find yours with your own machine.

The needles I use at every step. Not the ones you expect: for small details I use more needles, not fewer. When I switch, when I don't, and what happens when you choose wrong.

The stencil that survives the whole session. How I make it, how I apply it and the order I tattoo in so I don't lose it mid-piece. Because a wiped stencil can't be recovered: it's avoided.

Good realism and good Japanese are tattooed almost the same way. The trade doesn't like hearing it. Here you'll understand how to tattoo realism that will still be there in 20 years.

Technique

Touch: knowing how much pressure to apply, when to lift and how deep to go without damaging the skin. You learn that by watching complete processes, up close and in real time.

See the technique up close

Shading that doesn't show the strokes. It's realism's number one problem: gradients that up close are dots and lines. Here you learn to make them shadows up close too.

When to use a light hand and when to press in. Shallow or deep is the difference between healing well and scarring badly. And it's not decided on the fly: it's decided before you start.

Big and small saturations to build real volume. Where they go, how they're done, and the mistake that makes them show once the piece heals.

Where to put white, where to save skin and how to tattoo it without overdoing it. White goes in last and gets noticed first.

Realism barely uses line. Barely. Which lines to tattoo, which not to, and how to hide the ones that stay. Choose wrong here and you pay for it through the whole piece.

Everything gets practiced on synthetic first. How to use it, what to expect from it (it doesn't heal, doesn't bleed, doesn't forgive the same way) and the exact sign you're ready for real skin.

Drawing

The better you see, the better you tattoo. Train your perception to break any image down into light, shadow, lines, volume and texture. If you look at a photo and only see an eye, you're not ready yet.

Train your perception

Raise your level, drawing by drawing. 10 rules of realistic drawing applied across 10 skulls, with your progress visible from the first one. You don't need talent to start: you need to start.

Light and shadow in realism. Volumes, highlights, contrasts: what you need to see before you can tattoo it. Because realism is drawn with your eyes before the machine.

The stencil that doesn't fade mid-session. Made by hand, line by line, the way it's always been done. Knowing how to do it without depending on anything is what saves you when technology fails.

The digital stencil. Faster, more precise, with layers that save your design when the client changes their mind. My complete iPad workflow, from cropping to printing.

The perfect photo doesn't exist: you edit it. Contrast, cropping and cleanup before touching skin. A good edit is half the piece done; a bad one haunts you the whole session.

12th update

Masterclass: How to tattoo Double Vision

Learn the effect that made clients pick me and stop being one of many.

Face tattoo with overlapping eyes.

Design is 90% of it. Tattooing it isn't the hard part. The hard part is picking a photo that works. I show you which ones do and which never will.

Designing the double-vision effect in Photoshop.

From photo to design, step by step. Photoshop or Procreate. Black & white, second layer, selective erasing. Nothing you can't do yourself tonight.

Close-up of a tattooed eye with the double-vision effect.

The whites make the effect. Half the double vision is in the highlights. Where they go, how you tattoo them, and why you use them on both layers.

Clown tattoo with overlapping eyes.

The two mistakes that ruin it. Both happen during the session. I made both. You'll see them on real tattoos and how to avoid them.

Face tattoo with glasses and a double-vision effect.

How to shoot the final photo. A bad photo kills the effect. Four tips so people see the double vision, not just a good tattoo.

Coreh speaking into a microphone.

Stand out. Clients rarely ask for this. But once they've seen you do it, they trust you with everything else.

Only at 10 Masters

Learning is good.
Doing is better.

+25,000 students

Every review is real, and only people who finished the program can leave one. If you don't believe us, some of them left their Instagram. Go ask them.

Casey Morris

@https://instagram.com/jonesorigins

My animal tattoos are looking much more realistic now. thank you so much for the advice and footage provided. this course has helped me improve immensely.

Ismael Rueda Sánchez

@ruedink.tattoo

a fantastic course! honestly, everything has helped me gain confidence when it comes to using all kinds of needles, since I was wary and unsure about how to use anything beyond a 3RL. Now I can do tattoos of any kind without the fear or doubt of what material to use. Thank you so much for this amazing course! ;)

Translated from Spanish

Marine Paquay

@me.pqy

This masterclass allowed me to learn, discover and apply other techniques, take a more constructive approach to design, and above all think about longevity and good healing. Thank you for the work and for sharing this :)

Translated from French

Gordon Enrico

@inkskullgori

this seminar got me deep into the realism to understand it more and do my work better even if I am a 13yrs of experience tattoo artist.

Pedro Arceo siañez

@pedro.Akuma.Ink.cuu

I've improved my work considerably thanks to this course, one of the best investments I've made. What I really like is that besides seeing how things are done, it teaches you how to be prepared and solve problems or obstacles that may come up. 100% recommended

Translated from Spanish

Access the program

Today only: get the new "Double Vision" masterclass included at no extra cost.

Previously: €299 EUR €149 EUR

May be deductible as a training expense.

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  • +100 lessons
  • PDF resources
  • Lifetime access
  • Audio: English & Spanish
  • Subtitles: English, Español, Français, Português, Italiano, Deutsch, Polski, Čeština, Русский
  • Beginner to Advanced
  • Certificate of participation

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