The majority of human canvasses come off the show with a tattoo worth paying for. But while the ink might be free, it’s still a gamble. Since you don’t get to shop portfolios for an artist who fits your style, you’re stuck with a stranger that may or may not send you home with a black blob that vaguely resembles a penguin. There have been several pieces up on the screen with sketchy linework or fingers like that the claws of a creature from your worst nightmares. And, guess what? It’s there forever unless you want to spend your own money to have it fixed.
In season 5 of the show, we saw Tim Lees give someone a hula girl whose face looked like it’d been stepped on. Kyle Dunbar in season 3 tattooed a portrait of a canvas’s mother that turned out looking like some sort of scaled zombie monster. There are bad tattoos from every season and you never know if that’s what you’ll go home with until it’s permanently etched on your body.