Saturday, April 9, 2011

scarification

Scarification is the creative and artistic application of scars in a controlled manner to achieve an aesthetically or spiritually pleasing result. Scarification is considered to be different than Self-Harm, in the body modification community because it is mainly for cosmetic purposes rather than a way to cope with undue stress.
Many people that do these forms of body modification are doing it to mark a rite of passage in their lives. Even though many people hold that scarification is no more painful than tattooing, it is somehow more "intense" to most people. It has very symbolic meaning to them and often their peers or partners.
Typically the goal of scarification is to get raised scarring, preferably keloid scarring, but most people usually heal to hypertrophic scarring. Because scarification has a three dimensional aspect, many people enjoy the feeling of healed scars. As a rule of thumb, darker skin tones usually have better scarring than lighter skin tones.
There are many differnt ways to do scarification. Strike branding with strike branding, a sheet of carbon steel sheet metal is used, which is cut into small one inch strips. Taking the small strips, they are then bent or cut to the desired design. 
From there the pieces are laid on the skin and the edge of the steel is heated with a propane torch. Once it reaches the desired temperature, it is pressed against the skin for a brief moment, which is called a strike. This is done with each piece until the design is completed. 
Cautry branding is done with a design on the skin and a surgical cautery pen (which is very hot) is taken and used to draw along the image on the skin. The finished work can include a much more detailed image than that done by striking.
  One short term benefit over striking is there is no immediate seams that are seen with the cautery method, while with the striking method there temporarily will be seams in the design, although that ultimately turns seamless after time.
Even so, the cautery method leaves more of a natural flowing look, like a brush was used, while the strike method has more of a rigid look that comes from using steel, even if it ends up seamless.
There is also skin removal but cutting with a scalpel. You cut single lines which produce relatively thin scars, and skin removal is a way to get a larger area of scar tissue. The outlines of the area of skin to be removed will be cut, and then the skin to be removed will be peeled away. Scars from this method often have an inconsistent texture

scarification with scalpel

scarification with scalpel
scarification with dermal punch

scarification with dermal punch

scarification done by strike branding

scarification done with electrocautry

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