A "company" face-up vs an outside artist face-up

I admit, a good company faceup will sometimes sway me towards a doll. Some companies have fabulous faceups and when the perfect faceup meets the perfect sculpt it's a dream come true. Sometimes, the company will tweak a faceup for free for you.

If I can't get a good company faceup on my dream doll, I will commission one, but I try to avoid it since it takes so long and it causes me some anxiety to ship out a doll. However, the one commissioned faceup I have, is so BRILLIANTLY gorgeous and way prettier than any faceup that company could ever offer

 

Company faceup is a hit and miss thing. Regardless of whether they actually LOOK like the promo pictures, you either love it or you don't. I was lucky that my first two dolls came with company faceup that I really loved. My third doll came blank because I hated the company faceup so I was forced to do it myself. My fourth...I really loved the promo pic so I ordered him with a faceup and I hated it when he arrived. The funny thing is, all the other people who ordered him got the faceup that looked liked the pictures but mine DID NOT. So from then onwards...I have ordered all dolls blank. I no longer trust company faceups because it's unpredictable.
I'm lucky that I'm nifty with a brush and I did art so I can kind of depend on myself for faceups. Of course, if I wasn't, I would send the head off to a faceup artist who speaks the same language as I do. Don't want language barrier preventing my doll from being perfect.

 

In my opinion, all heavily dependent on the particular doll and the fact that you yourself want to get.
Some dolls look very interesting with standard makeup, in this case I'm trying to find "company" makeup. But this does not negate the possibility to consider options for makeups of third-party artists.
Some dolls standard makeup looks inappropriate. In this case, I will try to find a makeup artist who can convey what I imagine.

 

I prefer to oder a doll with company face-up. But if I want to make my own character I'll add a doll without make up and do it myself

 

I don't think I've ever sent a doll out for an outside artist faceup (yet). Of course it would be great to get an unique and beautiful faceup on the doll, but the shipping part is scary because things can get lost in mail, it has happened to me (not doll stuff). Also how would I explain to the customs that I didn't buy the doll head that was sent to me, just the paint on it? How would the fee go on that? I'm afraid that the customs would hold my awesomely faceupped heads out of confusion, which would be a bother.

I basically just have a phobia for mailing my heads out to other countries. That's why I either get them with company faceup or paint them myself.

 

Depends on the face-up. If I don't like it, I'll order the doll blank.

 

I only want the company faceup when the company faceup looks like how I want the character that the doll will represent to look. I have four dolls and a floating head with factory faceups. Of those, one was a Soom doll that, when I saw his promo pictures, looked exactly how I wanted the character to look, and I bought him quickly. One was a Souldoll girl, and when I asked Souldoll to make the brown parts of her default faceup grey instead, they responded, and the resulting faceup was exactly how I imagine her character. One was a limited Souldoll head I bought because I loved its limited faceup. Of my other two dolls with company faceups, one of them is likely going to be given to my mother because she seems to have fallen in love with her much more than me, and one was a head I bought on the Marketplace that came with a faceup, and is just waiting for me to decide whether I'm going to buy fantasy parts for her or not before I send her off to get a new faceup (if I buy her fantasy parts they'll need to be blushed to match the new faceup anyway).

I also have two dolls with custom faceups that I commissioned, that are perfect for their respective characters in a way that their factory faceups would not have been perfect. And three, soon to be four, blank dolls, waiting for me to save up for their own faceups, because their factory faceups weren't what I am looking for for their characters.

If you have a character that looks a certain way, why get a company faceup for a doll whose sculpt matches your character, when the company faceup makes it look not like the character? To me, that makes no sense.

 

I have two LTF's with face up but would like to own one just factory.

 

Umm...It depends on company and artist. Some companies can do gorgeous and fine face up. If it looks similar to how my character like, then I would order their face up together with doll. But sometimes I just get a reasonable or Event's head without face up or the mold looks great but face up not, then I would send it to my favorite face up artist. I really hope that more companies will provide custom's service. (>,<)/

 

Like a lot of other members have said, if the faceup looks good and is similar to what I wanted for the character I had in mind, I will have the company paint it. Granted, I haven't asked for the company do tweak the faceup, because all of the faceups I had done by the company have been limited. In my own experience and preference, I like the faceups that have been painted by an artist I commissioned best. Part of what I like about it is that I get to contribute to what the doll will look like, and it's truly one of a kind. It's a lot of fun, and I've just liked those faceups better than company ones

 

If I really like the company face up, then I would get that, if not then I would try to do the face up myself. I'm not a great face up artist by any stretch, am still very new to it, but would not be able to bring myself to send the doll away, also studied fine art at uni so feel kinda silly sending a doll to another artist.


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I prefer artist make up as I have kind of specific thoughts to the face up of my dolls. Company face up sometime is good as they may adjust the face up a bit to suit the doll, or even they do custom face up(like Volks FCS face up)

 

I prefer artist faceups, as I like my dolls to be as unique as possible. But that's just my opinion.

 

All of mine dolls are my or being characters. And I didn't se one more doll who has "right" character face-up from company)
And I don't like to have dolls "how all have".

 

These posts are so much fun - I had no idea there is so much forethought and decisions into making your "dream doll" come together. I have been use to collecting dolls that I have seen and fallen in love with and purchased, but I can see how this doll collecting form will be great for me to "play" with! Great information gals.

 

I think the important questions to ask when considering a company face-up are:

1) Do the company photos reflect how the face-up will actually look? This is something you can research best through looking at people's owner photos. Some companies are very good at keeping their face-ups consistent, and some tend to be a bit more sloppy. There's no point ordering a face-up based on the company photos if you know that the doll you actually receive might have a very different face-up (unless you have no face-up preferences and just want your doll to come home 'complete').

2) Does the company face-up suit your character? It doesn't matter how nice or how consistent the company's face-ups are if they don't suit your characters. I would say you should avoid paying for a face-up you aren't in love with in most cases. Sometimes, if it's just one feature that bothers you, you can alter it when you receive the doll (for instance, I have changed a dolls eyeshadow from bright blue down to a dark brown, and I've taken a doll with super sunburned-looking cheek blush and adjusted her to have a more delicate blush. Both cases just involved blushing additional pastel over the company face-up).

I have company face-ups on almost all my dolls. I've found that company photos represent the face-ups very well, so I can buy them with confidence, and I create my characters based on how I feel about the company photos, which means the face-up always suits my characters Except for sometimes having to tweak them slightly, I've been very happy with them all.

 

If it's a standard model, I'd have custom make up to make the doll into what I like.
But if it's a Limited, then I'd have company faceup because I think it's important.