doll-a-day

One of the things I really appreciate about Elfdoll is that Rainman posts pictures of his works in progress.  I enjoy looking at Elfdoll’s “Making Story” section because I love to see the progress pictures and primed masters.  Talk about being insanely talented; it seems like sculpting is as natural as breathing.

Tonight, this entry seems very meaningful to me.

I want to be Rainman when I grow up.

Thanks, Rainman.

1 Comment »

Vita Ersatz
Link: http://community.livejournal.com/vita_ersatz/

A quarterly event on LJ, posting un-cut dolly pics.  This is the first one!

(Duuuuhhr, Armeleia, why didn’t you post this in advance? *facepalm*)

No Comments »

Volks Yugiri and Williams, reposted with permission.
More photos here: DoA Thread
Other lovely photos at the House of Silent Children

These photos were taken by DoA’s Lirin of Sheri’s dolls. They first picture is from a photoshoot titled “You Floor Me!” That was specifically intended to show off the lovely new floor that Lirin’s father had made for their doll room.

The room, in addition to having nicely scaled props and furniture, is also an engineering wonder. Sheri wrote:

The “You Floor Me” shoot was literally to explore the new fancy floor her talented Dad created for the doll set. He built the 3 walled set last June (2007) as per Emily’s [Lirin's] design. He created beadboard to scale and found lovely flower and vine trim for the baseboard and chair rails. Emily chose the wallpaper and Bob carefully put it up. It is about 4′ by 5 ‘ and we have been finding furniture and accessories to create believable rooms for these resin people to inhabit. Jewelry Boxes can come in very handy and some of the knick-knacks in the photos are things my mother brought me from her travels, and my old dollhouse collection from when I was Emily’s age. I love seeing what Emily finds and puts together for each new setup of the space.

My husband Bob is a professional and fine art photographer and has supplied wonderful lighting equipment, camera gear and of course his expertise in teaching Emily how to take the pictures she imagines in her very creative mind. We homeschooled/unschooled for much of our daughter’s later school years (she is now 20). Following one’s passions to the fullest is a habit that continues to give our lives depth and meaning.

The structure itself breaks down into separate wall units so it can be moved when needed. The floor is also able to be broken down into smaller components. With the new raised floor we can slide the under bed storage boxes underneath it with dolls and props are not being used at the moment. Our living room was the first place Bob set up the doll room. It was great there, but eventually we wanted the room back for Christmastime. So now it resides in our bonus room over the garage, complete with a nice stereo. Listening to just the right music is sometimes a vital aspect of these photo shoots. It is a continuing labor of love by all 3 of us. I am so pleased that we can all play dolls in our own creative fashion.

I think that the creativity of the dolls is just vitally important, and part of why they are such an engrossing hobby (and why they have held my interest for several years now): there is so much that can be done with them, and there are so many tangental arts, interests, and skills that can be brought in.

One more, since there is so much to see! (Click to make big - I LOVE this Masha [Ilse].)

There are so many talented people in this hobby. :)

Thank you very much, Sheri and Lirin!

1 Comment »

Pipos Baha, owned by DoA’s sadistic_x_blood
Picture reposted with permission. [Source thread]

I’m sort of alternating days between customized and default Bahas, so today we’re on to another cool customized Baha!

Zer0 is pretty badass, being both pierced and tattooed.  The tattoos were done by DoA’s sour_dotz - the one on his arm is a rather detailed koi-themed sleeve.  The little piercings in his ears are awesome because they are so small and accurately shaped; they seem to be in perfect scale.  The double-necked guitar is too awesome for comment.
I liked her summary of his character, so I’m going to post it directly:
“As for a little info on him: He’s a demon, so he gets treated more like a “human” than a kitty. ^^ In fact he’s around 23-25 years old. The fact that he’s very small and cat like is what drew me to making him a tough badass, the perfect conflict. Because under his rocker mask he’s very calm, poetic, and gentle. He uses his publicity as the demon world’s number one rocker to send anti drug and alcohol messages to fans. He’s everything I wish all rockstars were.”

Rock on, little dude. \m/

Thank you, sadistic_x_blood!

No Comments »

I like to see how people take a favorite character and interpret it into a doll. Today I wanted to post links to several versions of FFVII’s Sephiroth! In no particular order:

• Starherd’s Yukinojo and El/Obitsu Hybrid as Sephiroth and Kadaj
• Bishonen House Head 5
• Kurosakura’s El as Sephiroth
• Layka’s El as Sephiroth
• Wow, all the cast of Advent Children!

If you have any links to cool FFVIII cosplay (especially non-DoA stuff), please comment with a link! :)

(Note: Since I’m just posting links rather than reposting images, I didn’t ask ayone for permission.  If you don’t want your thread linked, please email me at armeleia @ gmail . com and let me know!)

1 Comment »

Lahoo and Tan Lahoo, owned by DoA’s whitebread.
Resized picture reposted with permission. [Thread with more pictures]

This is a really adventureous customization by whitebread - for her screenprinting final, she printed anatomical designs onto her two boys. To put it mildly, I think this is really, really cool.

When I asked her what her thoughts were and what her goals had been in the project, she said: “I took a course titled “Freaks and Monsters” this semester which delt with the entire gamut of human freakery. Things like birth deformities and early medical practices that are quite horrible compared to modern standards. And one of the things that interested me was the old circus freaks. There weren’t just the people born different, there were also the people that made themselves different for whatever reason. Today we have the “Bodyworlds” exhibition with preserved human bodies. Studying how the west has gone through its various stages of infatuation and disgust with monstrosity and anatomy is kind of mind blowing. We’re coming out of a repressed phase regarding our dealings and feelings toward death and going into a gross fascination with it again.

Especially with ABJDs, dolls have become more like us and more stylized. We project human emotions and thoughts onto them, so why not some human anatomy? Even though they look like us, their bodies would be odd and even freakishly out of proportion if we saw them life sized.”

Which is interesting on a lot of levels - I think that the closer a figure is to human scale, the closer it needs to be human proportion. Otherwise we’re delving deeper into the land of the uncanny valley. Anything with deformities, etc, really does, which ties into that idea of freaks, deformity, and to some extent, the way we stylize the human face and figure. At any rate, I’m really thrilled to see a project with so much thought and planning behind it - not only the execution of the techical aspects, but also of the ideas and concepts behind it.

Very awesome. I look forward to whitebread posting the more “official” pictures from her slides for class. I’ll post a link to those too when she does!

Thank you, whitebread!

2 Comments »

2005 CP Juri head, formerly owned by Armeleia
My pic, so of course I have permission. :)

This was one of my 2005 dolly Christmas cards. At this point, Juri didn’t have a body, so this was taken on a bottle of body spray. She was later traded to someone else, and I think she’s one of the only dolls I regret selling. Someday maybe I’ll get another 2005 Juri!

CP Sleeping Yder mod and CP Ani Mod, owned by Junkets. Photo by Armeleia.
My pic again, so of course I have permission to post it. :)

After seeing The Nightmare Before Christmas in 3D, this year we went into the realm of 3d photography for the 2006 cards! If you have a pair of the red-cyan anaglyph glasses, you can see this picture in pretty snazzy 3d!

Merry Christmas!

1 Comment »

***Merry Christmas Eve!***

(No post today)

No Comments »

(Current Y!J Auction: http://page14.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/s39961623)
This picture has been on Y!J for a few years now.  I’m aware that the wine bottle is included to show the scale of the couch… but everytime I see this auction, all I can think is “Wow, that is one HOT bottle of wine!”

1 Comment »