Skip to content
alex666masterclass
Log in

All masterclasses / for artists already tattooing

Strawberry in Gold — Full Color Realism Session

A strawberry in gold on the belly — 5h 50min of color realism, from the first lines I map in with the machine to the last highlight. The whole piece sits in warm tones: red, yellow, orange, brown, with white only in the highlights and no cool tone alongside the warm range to carry the contrast. I call out the inks, the needles and the machine as I go, and I name every color decision as I make it.

Strawberry in Gold — Full Color Realism Session — online tattoo masterclass, full online course · 5h 50min · color realism tattoo training by Alex Cold

What is inside

This masterclass is one full session, eight modules. Not a highlight reel: nothing inside the recording is dropped, only the pauses are cut. The stencil is already on the skin in the first frame — I start by mapping the piece in with the machine. From there I walk through every color call and every needle or machine change as it happens.

If you've ever looked at a color piece and wondered what happened in the 80% you never see in the finished photo — this is that part of the work in full, with no editing around it.

The two hard parts of this piece

Warm tones only. Red, yellow, orange, brown, with white only in the highlights. The gold is built as an effect on top of the warm range — there's no separate gold pigment in this piece. Of all the ranges I work with, warm is the least forgiving: there's no cool tone beside it to carry the contrast, so everything has to come from inside the range itself.

Belly skin. Stretchy and mobile, it swells fast and takes ink hard — and the detail here has to stay fine. The recording shows how I pack that detail in: what I watch for in density and depth, and in what order I work.

How it's filmed

  • Voiceover through the whole recording, 5h 50min
  • Face-cam segments where I cut to camera and walk through a single decision
  • A separate camera on the station: the palette and how I work with it, across the whole session
  • I call out the inks, the needles and the machine, and the names also appear as on-screen labels

What you won't find here

  • No fundamentals — you already need to be able to pack color into skin
  • No color theory lecture either: theory shows up only where it drives a decision in the work

What is covered

  • ▸How I saturate warm tones and how much extra density I pack in — I say the call out loud at the moment I make it
  • ▸How to build a piece with no cool tone to lean on
  • ▸How the gold illusion is built: from a warm base to clean highlights, without going muddy and without losing the metallic effect
  • ▸Highlight placement — keeping highlights from sinking into the surrounding tone
  • ▸Fine detail on stretchy belly skin: density, depth, order of work
  • ▸How I keep the piece clean through the session — so the light tones don't go dirty by the end
  • ▸Inks, needles and the machine, stage by stage — what I change between base, saturation and highlights
  • ▸Color selection and mixing as the session goes on — what I mix with what, and the order I take the elements in

Modules

  1. 01

    Mapping the piece in

    The stencil is already on the skin in the first frame — I open by mapping the whole piece in with the machine. On detailed tattoos I always start this way: if the map is complete from the beginning, every detail is still in its place in the finished result.

  2. 02

    Darkest areas first

    The first thing I do is work through the darkest areas — the frame everything else gets read against. I say out loud how much density and depth I'm putting down.

  3. 03

    Mid-tones and the order the inks go in

    Then the mid-tones: which ink goes over which, and why that order and no other. The palette is on the station camera the whole session, so what I mix with what is both said and seen.

  4. 04

    Packing density into the warm range

    I saturate the warm tones and refine the shape at the same time. There's no cool tone beside them, so the depth has to come out of the range itself — I say how much density I'm holding back and what I'm watching for.

  5. 05

    Highlights, and the first element closed

    White only ever goes into the highlights. This is where the warm base starts reading as metal: how far to take a highlight so it doesn't sink into the tone around it and stays sharp. The last corrections to the shape, and the first element is closed.

  6. 06

    Into the second element

    The map for it went down back in the first pass, so I work it in the same order: darks, mid-tones, density, lights.

  7. 07

    Density and fine detail

    I bring the saturation up on the second element and pack in the fine detail. Belly skin stretches and swells and takes ink hard, and the detail has to stay fine — you see how much ink I'm packing in, how deep, and in what order.

  8. 08

    Bringing the whole piece together

    One pass across both elements in the wide shot, taking the piece to its finished result. The finish: the last highlights, and the piece fresh, straight out of the session.

Who this is for

  • ▸Color realism artists who already pack color confidently and want to follow my reasoning across a whole session
  • ▸Anyone working in the warm range — my own thinking on density and layer order, said out loud
  • ▸Anyone building portfolio pieces on hard placements and taking work to conventions
  • ▸Anyone more interested in what happened along the way than in how it turned out

Common questions

Is this a cover-up masterclass?

No. A small part of the piece sits over a scar and over an area where a tattoo was removed — I'm upfront about it, but it's a side detail, not the topic: I don't break that area down separately in the recording. The skin there healed long ago.

Why warm tones only?

Because the gold here is built as an effect on top of the warm range — there's no separate gold pigment. And warm is the least forgiving range: there's no cool tone beside it to carry the contrast.

Do I need color realism experience?

You need to be able to pack color into skin. Everything else I walk through step by step.

Will this work with my machine?

Yes. Rotary or coil — the logic carries over to any machine: what matters is what I change and when. I call out my own setup and put it on screen as a label, so you can see what I'm working with at each stage.

How much tattooing versus talking?

The work takes up nearly the whole runtime, with the commentary running over it. Individual decisions are covered in face-cam segments cut into the recording.

What language is the video in?

English and Russian audio — both are included; which one plays depends on the language of the page: the Russian page plays the Russian track, the English page the English one. Full EN + RU subtitles as well.

Do I get a certificate?

Yes. You get it as soon as you finish watching: you enter the name you want on it and download the PDF.

How long is access?

One year from purchase. You can rewatch the masterclass on any device.

When will it be available?

Leave your email on this page — I'll write to you as soon as access opens.

Educational content. Results depend on your skill level and how much you practice. This is a recorded masterclass, not one-on-one coaching tailored to your specific work.