back from A-kon

I mentioned a while back that I put Aura on my Popodoll 68cm body and was much more pleased with that match than when he was on the Angelsdoll body I had him on before. Well, I gave it more time and decided that despite the fact that I have at least once in the past drawn him looking a little more muscular, this didn't really mesh with my mental image of him. It was more based on influence from in-game images of Blood Elves.

Or rather... I didn't decide this. I was browsing DoA and saw a thread asking people what they thought about the more muscular trend with dolls these days, and for the most part that doesn't bug me at all, but there are definitely certain characters I wish I could get less muscular bodies for. For example, I always felt that even the relatively slender Domuya bodies were too well-defined for Lyric. If I was sure it would not make him bobble-headed, I would get him a Doll Chateau body, but I'm a little concerned the 60cm body would be too small for his Soom head. More research may be in order.

But I'm getting off topic. Aura, Andael, Statik, Esyrlon, and Doppelganger also have more slender builds (of the non-muscular variety). Doppel works just fine as the 60cm Dollmore body is tiny and works perfectly for him. I'm content with the Domuya flexi-perennial body I have for Esyrlon. It's a little more well-defined than I imagine him in my head, but the overall size is very good. Statik has a modded Thaasa body which leaves him with almost no muscle mass, so I'm happy there.

Andael and Aura have proved more problematic. Neither of them is supposed to be more slender-emaciated like Doll Chateau's bodies and both of their heads are too big for some of the other options out there. I still haven't figured out what to do with Andael, so for now he has to deal with improper body types, but I got an idea a while back for Aura.

I wasn't sure if it would work or if it was too stupid, so I never really mentioned it. But I saw some pictures of the Dollstown 18yr girl bodies and thought the overall shape looked really good. So I did some research for a while and tried to see how it would compare to other dolls in that height range (trying to keep his height relatively close to Cailath's and they're both supposed to be in the 70cm-ish area)

Anyway, I dug up almost every spare doll part I had lying around (as well as some things like lego sets that I hadn't opened) and managed to scrounge up enough money to buy one second hand. It's freshskin so it doesn't really match aura's head, but then I'm not sure what would since Har is an odd sort of pinkish color? I might eventually dye it to match better but for now since you can really only see the very tips of his fingers (need to get him bigger hands at some point) it's not a big deal.

The body arrived RIGHT before I left for A-kon. I was kind of hoping to get the mods done in time to bring him with me, but I didn't have enough time so I just really roughly sanded down the chest and had to call it good enough for the time being.

I did a little more work on it today since I don't have to go back to work until Tuesday. It's still not quite in a state where it's worth showing off, but I tested his clothes on it. I kind of hated it at first since they were made for a body with wider shoulders, so I sat around lamenting the waste of money and decided to try to find someone else the body might work for. I considered giving it to Avelarion and had his robe and head on and everything, and then for some reason I decided to try Aura's head on it again.

I think I like it better this time? I can't decide if the clothing combo looks good or completely ridiculous.

 The first one kind of helps show how slender it makes him? And then of course my camera didn't want to focus for a straight on shot except for the one time I was screwing around holding the camera at an angle. But there he is from the front. I don't feel like he looks exceptionally bobble-headed so that is good. As I mentioned, I'm really waffling on whether the red on white is good or bad. I'll probably re-make his base layer robe with another brocade of some sort if I decide the white isn't working for me. I do like the idea of a pattern on it. Also, Avelarion's robe is far better constructed than Aura's was.

Hopefully this will also give me some motivation to update Avelarion's outfit. Aura's gloves need re-designing I think. And I may go back in and line his hood to help hide how badly brocades fray. Possibly assault it with fray-check?  It was meant to be a prototype. I didn't expect to actually like it as much as I do. I would re-make it but it turned out completely different from the pattern I drafted, thanks to my failure at sewing. But I ended up liking the messed up design better than what I had planned so I'd have to figure out how to make the same mistake again on purpose. XD

Anyway... I'm really happy with it aside from the clothing fitting difficulties. If money was not an issue, I'd buy like three more of these bodies to do the same mod to (and maybe even some to not mod and actually use as girls). It definitely has a lot of the issues mentioned in the Dollstown 18yr thread like the difficulty sitting up un-aided, but it's so elegant looking that I just really don't care.

Got distracted and it randomly occurred to me that the Spiritdoll Elegance body might work well for Andael. Will have to look into some head size comparisons between that and Migidoll and possibly save up for that next. That is of course assuming that Batchix and Donn Kinney don't steal all of my money this summer with their impending doll releases... Maybe I should shoot to start saving for a new body for Andael this winter. XD

And in closing, here is my favorite shot of Aura from my mini shoot today. I love when his hair is being crazy and unruly.

I know I've already written like an entire novel for this entry, but one more thing occurred to me. Iyrilaeth's new wig (which I should get some pics of real quick) --okay back-- has blonde and white like Aura's does. Anyway, I think this is kind of a cool coincidence because it's sort of my headcanon that in my story's universe, those two are related somehow. Aura only has one kid, Elaria, and having Iyrilaeth be older than them would ruin the timeline, but I never planned out Cailath's children so it's possible Iyrilaeth could be descended from his line. Just random thoughts. XD

And in closing (for real this time) here is Iyrilaeth's hair all cut and stuff.

minor update

I ended up cutting Iyrilaeth's hair after telling myself that I would just buy another of the wig if I hated myself for cutting it. But I don't, and it's perfect for him now! I've been meaning to get pictures but I've been distracted by other things and feeling mildly under the weather.

Also did a bit of face up practice. I think I may need to calm down on the reddish lines along the cheeks and across the nose. XD I think it's really cute but perhaps not appropriate for every character ever.

I should also give Iyrilaeth a proper face up (or at least touch up the one he has) since he looks almost like a blank head with eyebrows next to everyone else.

I hate face plates...

I decided today's project would be redoing Lyric's face up, and then I decided while I was at it I would redo Andael's since last time my attempts at airbrushing resulted in him looking rather sunburnt.

Lyric behaved for the most part. I had some minor difficulties but nothing I'm super concerned about.

Andael, however, is a Migidoll Noel and he uses the face plate system and is impossible to deal with. As you might recall, last time I attempted to redo his face i dropped his head on concrete and shattered one of his ears and chipped his nose. I was able to repair the ear and decided the small chip in the nose didn't bother me that much so I left it alone. Well, this time I dropped him again and chipped the area above his right eye.

I don't know how I'm supposed to hold a face plate when doing a face up. If anyone has any advice that would be great... I'm not super happy with his face up (which I went ahead and attempted anyway because I wasn't in the mood to mix up epoxy and fill another hole in his face (because he got one in his chin completely randomly. I never dropped him or injured his chin. It just was suddenly there when I was wiping his face one time)) but I'll leave it for now because I just don't have the patience to attempt it again.

Lyric looks a bit more angry than I'd intended, but then he has every right to be and I suppose it makes sense he'd express it a bit. He also looks very dead but that's also appropriate for his character.

The dark spot on Andael's eyebrow is where the chip is. I haven't finished the eyebrows yet because I didn't feel like mixing up paint and attempting to draw fine lines.

In other news, I got a free wig with a purchase on ebay recently. The plan was to cut it shorter to be proper hair for Iyrilaeth, because while I did really like the one he was using as a temporary, it just wasn't very in character.

Anyway, this wig is long and curly at the ends and Iyrilaeth is supposed to have about chin length hair, but I am finding that I actually rather like it on him as-is. I am not sure if that's just because I like the wig as-is or if I actually like it on him.

Ignore his ridiculous ensemble. I haven't finished making his clothes yet so in the mean time he's just wearing an assortment of stuff. His face up needs improving since it was just hastily thrown together after his mouth mods, but after the luck I've had today I'm going to leave it alone for a while.

I'm going to give it some time and see how I feel about the wig later. The color is perfect and if it was shorter the style would be perfect for the character. I'm just finding it hard to bring myself to destroy it.

Iyrilaeth's new hands (and a shot of Anna's too)

I have this massive fascination with hands and wrists that started with (oddly enough) watching Lady and the Tramp as a kid. I loved the way their paws bent when they were doing things and whilst crawling around the house pretending to be a dog I realized human wrists and hands were really neat.

Anyway, years later hands are still a big deal for me so a major part of doll 'shelling' is finding the right hands to express their character. I have a whole separate wishlist for hands I want for characters that I don't even have heads planned for yet.

Sometimes I'm okay with something generic as long as it's an attractive looking hand but sometimes I have a very specific look in mind.

To get to the point, I really wanted a pair of the Dollshe DS18M rhythmos hands for Iyrilaeth and after selling some things, I decided to go for it before they stopped producing them and I potentially lost my chance to ever own them.

They arrived today and I am pretty much in love with them.

I did a box opening for hands because I was so excited.

The tiny wrist balls are a mild issue since they sink into Iyrilaeth's wrists and he ends up with no mobility pretty  much, but that is something I guess I can try to work on at a later date. He'll need restringing before I can really do much about that since it was really hard to get these on as is.

I actually broke one of his old hands in the process. To fix this I will probably just remove the rest of the resin lump there (aside from the notch that keeps the hand in place on the joint) and replace it with a metal screw-in hook.

After an absurdly frustrating few minutes of trying to wrestle with his overly tight stringing, I managed to get these on and life was good.

I also recently bought a secondhand pair of Iplehouse hands for Anna. I wasn't a huge fan of the default Aoi Tuki ones and had been meaning to replace them for years but none of the hands I really liked for her tended to be sold separately. A few months after putting this pair of Iplehouse hands on my wishlist, I managed to find someone selling them secondhand so that I could avoid the waiting period.

The resin match is not great (although I imagine at one point it would have been because Anna was far more pink years ago). I am not that bothered by it but if I ever decide I am I may just let the new hands sit on the porch for a little while to yellow a bit. (or go and try one of those light dye techniques to make her more pink again all over. Might be a better plan since her Souldoll head is more pink than the body too)

I actually considered taking pictures at the time but I thought it might be weird to make a post featuring doll hands. Obviously I have since changed my mind.

more mods and some face ups

I modded Orkas' head more after my post last night. I was looking at Elfdoll Vivien (a strong contender to take over the role if this head doesn't get its act together and work for me) and decided I would attempt to instill some of that sort of expression into the head I currently own because if it works out it will save me time and money.

Anyway....

Oh god that second one is orangey. Should have color corrected that but I so seldom feel the need to with the new camera that I didn't think about it. Oh well. Anyway... I still feel like he comes across a bit smirky or something when the camera is looking down on him. Also not sure I accomplished frowny squinty so much as just "the sun is in my eyes" squinty. But ... I chalk that up to my novice level of sculpting skills. I feel like it looks a bit better in person. He looks a bit young for his character now (I'm not sure why having smaller eyes makes him appear younger to me but... I have no idea how my brain works when it comes to 'shelling' characters.)

Here is a s hot of Iyrilaeth. His new face is very minimalist so far because I was quite frustrated after dealing with Orkas. I'm relatively pleased with his new, more neutral expression. I feel like ideally I should have built up the epoxy a bit more so there wasn't still an indent where his old mouth corners used to be. I'm too lazy to fix that right now though and it's functional on a basic level. This shot makes his nose look huge.

mouth mods

ended up deciding I did want to redo Orkas' face up. But then I decided one side of his mouth looked potentially more smiley than the other. During a discussion with Selly about why I needed to fix this, I realized that, whether or not I liked the Cyril sculpt as is, I needed to mod it if I wanted it to properly fit Iyrilaeth's character.

So after spending 90 years trying to tint epoxy and still failing spectacularly, I altered both of their mouths in an attempt to make them less smiley.

I decided to do Iyrilaeth's at the last second so his face up is only partly wiped because I was hurrying to make sure the epoxy wouldn't get too hard to be easily worked. I don't like how large Orkas' eyes are by comparison. Tempted to close them a bit or something. We'll see.

picture spam

Just a wee bit of spammage of Iyrilaeth. Not very good pictures but I modded his wig a bit more last night. Straightened some parts that I felt were curling in too much. In all the red with his hair like this, I feel like he's trying to be Arthur from Disney's Sword in the Stone.

On my next off day I need to actually try to get decent pics of him not just sitting indoors under fluorescent lighting. The first picture I managed to color balance closer to his actual appearance, but I failed at doing it again for the second one despite the lighting being the same.

arrivals!

I believe this is my first box opening since starting this blog. Others can be found in the archives but they were re-posted from LJ.

 Yesterday while I was at work, the mail tried to deliver my Nabarro Cyril. (Which I have been waiting on forever. I stalked the sculptor for months in eager anticipation of his release.) And just so we're clear, by stalked I mean I visited their blog regularly.

Anyway, I woke up early this morning so I could make it to the post office before work. Here is the box-ception I was greeted with upon my return home.

This was the wee box within a box. I was, for some reason, under the impression that this head would be larger than normal and I might have to find some ungodly huge body for it. This box immediately put my mind at ease, as anything that could fit inside of it could not possibly require a larger than average body.

Here we have the first glimpse of his head.

And the eyes that were sent with it. Wasn't expecting free eyes, but that's neat! These won't work for what I have planned for the head, but I'm sure someone else can put them to use at some point.

And then I yanked out the head by the plastic bag. Thankfully, fuzzies did not go flying everywhere. I love his profile.

And here is the head, finally free of packaging. For now, he has absconded with Batu's body. The fit is good and I actually really like how the head sits on the neck, but the body is quite a bit too muscular for how I imagine Iyrilaeth, so someday we'll be finding an alternative. For now, this will have to do. Will have to attempt face ups after work.

EDIT:

 

 Here are some pics after a hastily applied face up to test out this mold's compatibility with Iyrilaeth's character. 

And here is a mock up of what I am potentially planning to do with the corners of the mouth:

The little dimply doodads at the sides have grown on me since seeing them in person but they don't really fit the character so if I do decide that this will work for Iyrilaeth, some modding will most likely be done.

And finally, a shot of Iyrilaeth modeling a wig I modified. Because I kinda sorta want him to have a fiber wig instead of a fur one. But I'm not sure this is quite his style even if I do like it.