10 years in the doll hobby!

In 2009, I bought my first doll, a beauty white Luts Dreaming Lishe boy.
He arrived on 30 Aug 2009, and I named him Gabriel, although I mostly call him Gabby.

I was excited. Elated. And so so so happy. 

He was the only doll I had for a while. 

I bought more over the years, and sold some. 

Through all that, somehow, even though he's not exactly my current aesthetic, 

Gabby still brings me joy.

Today, Gabby is 10.

And with his birthday, 

today also marks the 10th year

that I've been in the BJD hobby. :)

---

I got a little cheesy writing the part above (^ ^ ^). But really, it's rather amazing to think that I've been in this hobby for 10 years now (I'll be 26 this year). And that Gabby, my first doll, sitting in the middle of the photo, is 10 years old. One thing I learnt since then is that beauty white skin is not a skintone I like on my dolls, if only because it yellows faster than I like. But also, I've gone through quite a few different phases in the hobby and I guess 10 years is a good time to reminisce a little. :)

So, first things first, this is my full crew now, as of August 2019. I have 5 SDs, 1 mini, and 1 YoSD. I also have 3 SD floating heads (not shown in the photos). Earlier this year, I read Marie Kondo's book, "The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up", and decided to apply her method not just for my regular stuff, but for my dolls as well. I put up quite a number of dolls on sale, and the bodies of some of the (now) floaties. It's pretty drastic, especially when I compare it to the me 8-9 years ago, who would have been all "more, more, more". But I guess with age and less time in general, I've learnt that it works better for me to have a little less dolls so I can spend more time on each of them.

I think the other big transition is realising what my aesthetic for BJDs is. I like dolls which have a bit of weight, who feel solid in my arms. Their joints must be smooth (no flesh pinching elbows!), and the resin should not be too shiny. I don't really like my dolls to be too tall, 65cm seems a comfortable size, and also, the 60+cm that I've always had, from when I first got Gabby. Pebbles (my Unoa) and Cypher (my Fairyland Pong Pong) are kind of the exception to the norm.

Over the years, I've also graduated from glass eyes to silicon eyes, to now urethane eyes. Wigs wise, I've gone from brightly coloured fur wigs to more natural tones and grey-green fibre wigs. I'm sure there are more things that have changed over the years, but these are the ones off the top of my head.

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Currently my crew consists of (left to right):

1. Sion 

[Migidoll Miho on Volks SD17 body. NS]

2. Parker 

[Kanadoll Adrian on Little Monica Harmony body. NS]

3. Pebbles

[Modified Unoa Chibi Sleeping Lilin on Unoa 1.5 body. WS.]

4. Gabriel

[Luts Dreaming Lishe on Delf Type 3 body. WS.]

5. Cypher

[Fairyland Littlefee Pong Pong. NS.]

6. Joe

[Distant Memory Peroth on Dollstown 15 old body. NS.]

7. Alfie

[Switch Waseon on Switch Attractive body. NS.]

And the floating heads which are not pictured:

8. Dennis

[Luts SDF Bliss. NS.]

9. Caillen

[Modified Migidoll Cynical Ryu. NS.]

10. Freddie

[Volks Olivia Morgan 2nd. NS.]

---

I have doll plans, but there aren't that many dolls on it. Mostly I've learnt that I really enjoy doing faceups, so that is something I'll try to do more of. Taking photos aren't that fun for me but I enjoy the end result and having pretty pictures to look at so I suppose that's something that I would still do. And some things I do want to get back into are making clothes and jewelry for my dolls. :)

But dolly plans aside, I'm also trying to remember that I already have all these amazing dolls that make me happy, and that I can just have fun with them as it is, even if it's doing nothing. I think sometimes, I have so many wants and desire, that I forget the things right in front of me. So I'm taking this opportunity to take stock, and be grateful for the time I've had in my 10 years in the hobby. I hope the years to come would be as amazing, if not more, and I hope you enjoyed reading this post. :)

Happy 10th birthday to Gabby~ :D

Happy 10th year anniversary in the hobby to me~

Doll Meet | 长老会 a.k.a. Elder's meet | 2019.07.14

I had a doll meet two weeks ago with genkiyankii and dtpconcepts again~

This was the 长老会 a.k.a. Elder's meet we were talking about in our previous meet, with all our old and yellowed dolls (that we still love!). We figured that if everyone brings their yellowed doll, then all the photos can be colour corrected together, and no particular doll will look terribly yellowed. Smart idea, right? Haha. Anyway, it happened that we all brought our first dolls, and genkiyankii brought along 2 small boys to gatecrash as well (Kara and Mel).

The cafe we were at (Knots Cafe & Living) was a pretty nice looking cafe, and when it got to about 3pm and the crowd has died down, we got more space for photos, which is always good. I think nowadays we spent about 1/4 of the time eating, 1/4 of the time taking photos, and all the rest talking non-stop lol.

Enjoy the few photos I have from the meet~

//

Dolls present:

Zen (Crobidoll Yeonho) - belongs to genkiyankii

Gabby (Luts Dreaming Lishe boy) - belongs to me

Shinya (Luts Ethan) - belongs to dtpconcepts

Doll Meet | 2019.04.14

Oops, I didn't realise I didn't post this here.

I had a doll meet with genkiyankii and dtpconcepts back in April, after I had just finished Alfie's faceup. Alfie is my Switch Waseon heh :)

It's been quite a while so I can't remember exactly what happened, but we spent the afternoon talking over food and dolls, and then decided that we'll order some doll clothes together + have another meet with our yellowed dolls (this meet just happened two weeks ago lol). The excitement for dolls was very palpable and fun to have with friends :) Also, Vel (genkiyankii's Switch Seolrok) has a faceup from bjdzanya and we spent quite some time admiring the work in person haha.

Well, that's it from me. Enjoy the photos~

//

Dolls present:

Alfie (Switch Waseon) - belongs to me

Vel (Switch Seolrok) - belongs to genkiyankii

Fuyuki (Little Monica Kliff) - belongs to dtpconcepts

FACEUP LOG: Interlude | Parker's (Kanadoll Adrian) faceup process

Since I've been sharing the progress of Parker, my Kanadoll Adrian, on Instagram, I decided to compile everything here for easy reference. It's always been interesting for me to know how other owners do their faceups, and maybe you'll find my faceup process interesting to read or useful for your own faceup progress. :)

/ / / / / P R E _ F A C E U P / / / / /

Inspiration/reference for this faceup: here on Pinterest.

Before even doing the faceup, I like to collate a bunch of inspiration photos and reference photos. 

Inspiration photos are usually for overall mood of the doll, and their overall colour schemes to match the hair or eye colour I want. My tendency nowadays is to use kpop idols' makeup for inspiration because they have really pretty makeup and there's more to choose from than if I use purely doll photos for reference.

Reference photos are photos of actual doll faceups. I use this for referring to other artists' technique, like how they draw brows, eyelashes, how they blush or use colours etc. I also collect a bunch of different faceups on the actual sculpt I'm working on, to see what type of brows or shading I like or don't like on the doll. Basically it saves me time from having to experiment with multiple faceups to find what I like and would work on the sculpt! It's like doing research lol.

I start with a board and sometimes add to them along the way as I do the faceup.

/ / / / /  F A C E U P / / / / /

My process usually looks like this:

* MSC x 3 layers (base protection)
* Pastel work (until the MSC is saturated and pastels don't stick well)
* MSC x 1 layer
* Pastel work (99% done for pastel work already)

* MSC x 1 layer (to seal before starting line work)

* Line work (and minor pastel work after lines are done if needed)

* MSC x 3 layers (to seal overall faceup)

* Gloss x 2 layers

I've seen artists do pastel and line work together but I almost always do the line work last. It's partly because I use watercolour paint instead of acrylic paint, and doing pastels after lines mean the pastels stick to the line work and it gets very dark in the places where I've drawn lines. So I try to avoid pastel work once I start drawing lines. I think this mostly depends on what you're comfortable with and what materials you have. For me, 2 layers of pastel work is enough to get the saturation I want because I'm using very pigmented pastels (Schmincke). But if I was using pastels with more filler (e.g. Rembrandt), then I would probably need more layers.

Anyway, here's photos from the faceup process. 

(Side note: It's the first time I tried tracking the time spent working directly on the faceup, and I'm not sure if this is my normal amount of time or not, since I usually count the whole duration from start to end, which includes lull time and real life, meaning that that could be anywhere from 2 weeks to 2 months or longer.)

//

[ 01 h 00 min ]

I wanted a dark eyeshadow on him, so I start with laying a base with first a yellow oxide layer, then a vermilion layer. I've found that layering multiple colours turn out better when you want a darker look. 

He also has faint eyebrows here, because I like to get the shape of the brows early since I need some erasing to get the hang of it and it's easier to do erasing bits of the faceup on a blank head than when I've already done blushing.

//

[ 02 h 30 min ]

At this point I was half-regretting using an old can of MSC for his base MSC layers because the pastels weren't sticking that well. I did a reddish brown over the previous colours, then a vandyke brown. It's quite a bit of pastels in the eye area and the MSC was getting saturated so I stopped and left the head thinking I'll blend later.

//

[ 03 h 30 min ]

While blending, I ended up adding more brown, and hey, it sticks! That's the thing I've noticed - that somehow if you leave the head for a while and come back, it's like the MSC can suddenly take more pastels. I'm not sure why or how this works, but it... does. Also did more blushing overall and on his lips. There's blue on the under eye area as well but my phone camera doesn't pick it up much.

//

[ 04 h 15 min ]

More blushing, more blue, and then I drew the eyebrows thicker. At this point the MSC was really saturated and I had to spray a new MSC layer to continue doing pastel work.

//

[ 05 h 15 min ]

Two photos taken at the same stage, the top one is from my phone, the bottom one from my DSLR. You can see the phone camera doesn't do the colours justice but anyway, it's a good quick way to keep track of my progress. 

Here, I added some walnut brown (a greyyish brown) and black pastels to the eye area to darken them. Think of it like eyeliner done in eyeshadow powder. I also added some walnut brown and rose madder (sort of burgundy) to the lips.

//

[ 06 h 00 min ]

Worked mostly on the lips, adding rose madder to darken. Minor adding of colour on the eye area and blushing. After this was another layer of MSC to prepare for the line work to come.

//

[ 07 h 30 min ]

Drew eyelashes, eyeliner and eyelid lines with varying mixtures of brown and black.  A tip I read is to never use black paint as it is, which I find to be very helpful. Black + brown can make a natural black, while black + purple gives a more inky black. I opted for black and brown here.

Somehow, the eyelashes turned out different styles on each side despite my best effort, and the eyelid line is wonky because it follows the carved resin which wasn't perfectly symmetrical. At this point I was a bit sad because it seems like my line work was screwing things up. BUT! I would try to fix this later, and in hindsight, while my lines here at this stage weren't great, they were not un-fixable or as bad as I thought. So if you're like me and have a tendency to feel discouraged by hiccups in the process, I urge you to put that judgement on hold, and just continue first. Sometimes I'm just being too critical on a work-in-progress and things actually work out better as it goes on.

//

[ 08 h 45 min ]

Drew in the lip seam line and lip corners with a crimson mixed with brown. Also tried to fix his eyelashes to make it more balanced (made his right eyelashes longer in parts). It's fixable, like I said, even though I was pretty down about it before. I also drew in eyebrow lines and more eyelid lines.

//

[ 09 h 15 min ]

Lip lines. Gradation done with very fine and faint lip lines (more crimson and brown mixed in varying amounts for different levels of darkness). I've never been a fan of lip lines on dolls, but I think it was because I couldn't do fine strokes last time. With very fine lines, I'm starting to like the effect it can achieve!

//

[ 09 h 45 min ]

Still working on lip lines. I added a almost more brown (rather than crimson) shade in the centre where the lines are the most obvious. Also darkened eyelid crease lines.

//

[ 10 h 30 min ]

Added skin texture/freckles and moles with a very watered down sandy brown and crimson mix. I think I always use at least 2 colours for any sort of line work, and just mix them differently depending on how dark/light I want that area to be. It gives the line work more depth than if you just add water to control darkness, or if you add straight up black or white to do this. I suppose if you use acrylic, the water bit of mixing doesn't apply but the rest should be the same.

//

[ 11 h 00 min ]

For gloss, he ended up with 4 layers of it, on the lips and eyeliner/eye rim. I usually do about 2-3 layers just because the gloss I use -- Winsor & Newton (pictured) -- takes a few layers to get the shine I want. And also because gloss eats up a bit of the MSC so once a layer of gloss is on, I can't try to fix it or add more in that session, otherwise it would shift the paint and pastel underneath. So I have to wait till the next round of glossing to fix it.

On a related note, I do also have Tamiya X-22, which is what more people use, but not every doll needs super glossy lips and eyes! It's a personal preference but I use my Winsor & Newton gloss more. I prefer the buildability of this gloss over the super high shine of the Tamiya X-22.

//

Anyway, with the gloss added, Parker's faceup is officially done!

I don't usually glue applied eyelashes on my dolls, although I might try it for Parker. But in the meantime, please enjoy the photos of his finished faceup :D

This was a lengthy post to write, but I hope some of you find it helpful. If you have other questions, feel free to ask them in the comments below ~

Sion's new body | Volks SD17 Hijikata Toshizou 1st box opening

If you saw my previous post detailing my sudden rush of feelings about Sion and ordering him a Volks SD17 body on Mandarake on Monday, you won't be surprised at what this is -

A box opening!

Yes, Mandarake is really fast, and it definitely satisfies the urge to buy and get (almost immediately) rewarded. I'm typing this on a Saturday, but I ordered and paid for the doll on Monday, and the package came on Thursday. 4 days from order to arrival. :0

Anyway, I say I got Sion a SD17 body, but what I actually bought was a full doll - Volks SD17 Hijikata Toshizou (1st). I'll probably put the head on the marketplace after I'm done sorting things out. Along with Sion's old body. But let's move on to the box opening first, shall we?

This is how the box came! The yellow paper is for the GST (goods and service tax) I had to pay because I didn't dare ask Mandarake to underdeclare. ;-; Oh well, it's better to be safe right?

I opened the box from the bottom so that's why this is actually the back of the Hijikata box.

Took it out. Mandarake's shipping and packing is always secure and I'm always really happy when I get their stuff (plus the quick turnover between order to arrival helps).

Without the bubblewrap. The box is actually really nice. A pearly white, which is much nicer than my SDGr Tae Lovely Dress box. And for something from 2010, this is in pretty good condition!

I forgot what exactly was inside and was pleasantly surprised to find a wig! There's also the certificate, and the costume (minus shoes, belt and pocketwatch but that was written in the sales page so I was prepared for it). The bag is a zippered cushioned case which is convenient. I never realised Volks did this type of cushion so early? I got similar cushions from Switch for the Attractive Body. Anyway.

Hello~

He's such a cute doll even though I didn't buy him for the head but just for the body.

His default faceup is quite cute actually. And in like 80-90% good condition? The eyes are still hot-glued in lol. At this point I realise he's pretty unyellowed as well and so out came some other dolls for comparison.

Volks NS 2010 (Hijikata 1st) and 2008 (Olivia 2nd). My Olivia's definitely alot more yellow.

More resin comparisons. Sion (Migidoll Miho) is actually the yellowest here... yes, even compared to Freddie (Volks Olivia)... And I know Elly (Volks Tae) has yellowed slightly because her leg parts are a different colour. But the new SD17 body matches her which means it's pretty unyellowed for its age.

See? Sion is actually yellower lol. Also yea I drew sideburns for him for his wig and it looks dumb like this oops.

Sion's twin, Hew, on the left, is actually less yellow than Sion and would probably match the Volks SD17 body better but I feel weird snatching his brother's head to use for him so... I'll probably leave it as it is. 

Hew (left) on the Little Monica Harmony body vs Sion (right) on the new Volks SD17 body! I love the new proportions Sion has. He used to have a similar body to his twin (type A while Hew uses type B) but eh, the upgrade is wayyyyy better. I don't know what I'll do about Hew but he's staying on his current body for now because I spent too much on Sion...

Ah, so I've mostly been singing praises about the body (super happy with this purchase), but there's some minor flaws, of course. You can't really see it here but his finger tips are kind of dirty/grey. And his forearm is super smooth almost like he's been handled there alot? Which is weird because his forearm is still about the same colour as the rest of his body so I'm not sure why/how that happened but it's not a super big deal. There's also some minor scratches and stuff from handling I guess, which is normal and doesn't bother me now.

And here's Sion :D So cute. I want to redo his faceup so he can be the best version of himself possible but I'll do it when I have more feeling/energy.

Sion feels better now, and damn do I like the Volks SD17 body. Not just because it looks nice and gives Sion better proportions, but also because of it's heft. Like it's heavy, and that's something I like in my dolls like they feel more solid? I feel like I like bodies that are more heavy, and consequently all the dolls high on my list of favourite at home are those with solid feeling bodies... lol.

Lastly, here's a quick height comparison of Alfie (Switch Waseon on Attractive 65 body), Sion (Migidoll Miho on Volks SD17 body) and Gabby (CP dreaming lishe boy on Delf type 3 body).

Sion. I'm having a lot of feels about him since putting him in his old wig yesterday and this might be all over the place but I'm just going to go ahead and write it all down first. Maybe I'll come back to add photos later because I'm typing on mobile.

It started from me watching alot of Peppertones music videos. They're a sort of k-indie band that's been around for 15 years and I only just got into them last week but it's pretty much being an obsessive spiral. The best (and worse) kind. Best because hey I feel something and god that's awesome when I've been irritated with work lately, but also worse because I get so engrossed in finding out everything I can about them that sleep becomes secondary. And that's something I don't want because I want to take care of my body so it'll take care of me you know. But sometimes my mind gets obsessed and things like this happen.

Anyway, it was looking at 2012 Jangwon (the bassist) and his sweepy longish emo hair that made me want to... do something. Either go out and get that haircut myself (bad idea, it's hard to maintain; been there, done that), rage/passion draw emo hair (im out of practice but i did try it later at night), or, hey, light bulb moment, didn't Sion used to have a similarly styled emo hair?? So I went to dig out his old wig, and glasses (because Jangwon wore thick glassed and damn am I obsessed with this dude at the moment) and dressed Sion up. I even took photos with my DSLR (mostly because my phone was charging and I couldn't resort to my usual quick phone camera shot) and then I edited the photo over dinner and then damn. It reminds me why I love this dude (Sion, not Jangwon lol) so much. Like over the years I've switched Sion over to a different wig because the emo one was annoying to style but this is giving me all the feels.

And then, night came and I was still listening to Peppertones while drawing Sion, and I had a NEED to find Sion a new body because I think part of the reason I don't play with him as much is because his current body doesn't cooperate with me. Also it's kind of too narrow now that my aesthetics have changed and just. HE NEEDS A NEW BODY, my mind screamed in my head at 11pm. I searched up doa and mandarake, had a long internal debate about whether to get a volks body for him, if sd17 or sdgou is better, and which I could afford because I only have enough to buy one. And then I decided to go to sleep because I wanted to be a responsible adult, sleep on time and not make rash purchases. But oh boy, that was not a well thought out idea because what happened was I spent an hour in bed thinking about this still and not sleeping and even in the middle of the night when I woke up I was Thinking about getting Sion a body. 

(^ the sketch of Sion playing bass here because ahem, of course right? Had to do it even though Sion doesn't play any instruments lol. Also my friend commented "thicc" which like, that's definitely my aesthetic so, it makes sense to buy him a volks body because those are thicc????)

So, come morning which is today, I got up, thought about it some more, and went on Mandarake to put the sd17 body into the cart and now I'm waiting to see if I got it? And I'm thinking also, damn, this is the doll that makes this hobby The Thing for me, you know? My dolly friends and I were talking about it some time back, and I couldn't name a doll that made me super into the hobby, but then I realise it's not cos I don't have this doll but cos I forgot. It's Sion, man.

The awkward thing about this is that Sion has a twin brother, Hew, and I have no idea what to do with the brother. Like I definitely love Sion more than Hew and also, hobby wise, do I need two mihos??????

I don't have an answer to that. All I know is that I'm reminded of why I love Sion and I'm just going to do what I can to get him right.

Also, another thing I've been thinking about is this. Whether I can have less dolls so I can do more for each of them. Like even sew for them, because I do enjoy that, it's just that I'm very slow at it, from making patterns to actual sewing but if I have less dolls it's probably more doable? Ah, I don't know. I ran through the crew yesterday in my head and there's very little potential dolls to cut down on...

I mean I know who are the dolls I'm less in love with but... does that mean they don't make the cut? Idk. For now imma just focus on Sion first.