Are ball joints ugly?

I love my dolls' joints! I like how realistic yet still doll-like my dolls look, if that makes sense? I think a totally realistic body with skin and hidden joints would be very, very creepy.

 

I'm just wondering how this would be a discussion point on a forum focused on ball jointed dolls. If one found the joints ugly then why buy the doll and even more so why frequent a forum that has a focus on dolls with joints

 

I think that a lot of people are drawn to ABJDs by their facial sculpts first. It's so often the focus of photography of the dolls, and that's how a lot of people see their first doll I would guess the curiosity over the actual joints follows after that. Especially since they are often covered or cropped out of pictures.

 

Every Art has its aesthetic and its technology. Here we gather around our love affair with the art and technology of ball-joint dolls ... which, of course, wouldn't be ball-joint dolls without the ball joints. Nope, they're not Barbies, nor do they incorporate the sort of high-tech animatronic armatures of some silicon dolls I've seen. Different aesthetic. Different technology. Tell me you like apples better than oranges, and I'm cool with that. I get the concept of preference. Tell me an apple should be an orange, and you'll have me scratching my head for the silliness of it.

I have my great-grandmother's bisque doll, one she had when she was a young girl in the late 1800s. It's a ball-joint doll ... and the joints on that doll look nothing like the joints on my lot! So many of the things we appreciate and continually redesign have their aesthetic and technological roots in the past. Happily, there are artists today who still create stunning (and wildly expensive) stringed puppets despite the fact we have hands-off robotic technologies.

"... in this day and age the technology should be there to have more realistic joints with equal or more poseability ..." Well, it is. We just don't need to apply that technology to every aesthetic. Whew!

 

It's the articulation and ball-joints themselves that knocked me out entirely and pulled me straight into the dollery! I've long collected articulated figures and antique dolls and just wanted more more more articulation! I've got a basket on my bureau full of doll bits and pieces and part - all antique, or repros - that are unstrung and I love the pieces to death!

My dolls tend to be mostly nude, some aren't face-upped, all the Big Boys are wearing the Soom jointed hands - the more articulated joints the better!

 

Thanks for correcting me there is room for discussion on joints themselves how they've changes. I originally was expecting repetive posts on I love joints how could one find them ugly.

kateb originally yes I was drawn to ABJD facial sculpts but I love them or the whole thing now the engineering has me love them even more. i've always been into dollcollecting but BJD themselves change how i see dolls.

The joints allow me to pose them and come up with interesting photoshoots. I've noticed how ABJD aestheic has changed just in the last year. Some dolls now sport double joints and hidden joints and such.

I equate the joints with what makes these dolls infinitely more playable than standard dolls so I love the joints. I've posted photos on my DA where I got comments that I should have airbrushed the joints out to make the doll photos more lovely. But to me that was like asking to remove a vital part to the doll's appeal and style.

 

I like the joints because to me it makes my doll look like a doll.

Super realism just doesn't do it for me.

 

I was a bit skeptical about the joints and especially what happens to the knees sometimes(when you get that hollow opening),because it looked less real to me,but having seen the Priadol,I have a rekindled passion for joints.The priadol was just TOO real -scary-.

 

Some people like apples some people like oranges. I for one dont even notice the ball joints anymore.

 

Hmmm, I guess coming from the world of antique dolls exposed joints seemed completely normal to me, and much more honest and basic than those rubbery icky-clicky hidden Barbie leg joints.

My favorite bjd joints are the oldskin Volks ones... nice and dolly, not insanely poseable, but not rigid, locking or breakable. Just your basic honest ball joint.

Raven

 

If your friend doesn't like ball-joints, then that's just him, I guess.

Personally, I find that they're very beautiful. It makes the dolls all the more artsy, and actually keeps them as obvious ball-jointed dolls. If they had joints that didn't show, I'd be creeped out by how real they are at that point..

 

I love them, they make our dolls what they are

 

Honestly, I would like the dolls more if there were no joints. And if I could still pose them the same. But it doesn't bother me enough to not buy them (except in the case of really obvious jointing, like jointed hands).

 

I like most joints. Sometimes there is the odd double knee joint that looks crazy and weird, but for the most part, I like the look of joints. I have a love-hate thing with the jointed hands though, I love how they are jointed and are super mobile but I don't like the look of them, too many joints too close together for my tastes, but I'm slowly getting used to the look.

 

I love them- they're so interesting!

 

Even when I was first learning about these dolls, the joints never bothered me or looked ugly to me. In fact, I found them intriguing and beautiful, almost otherworldly. When I saw an article in either FDQ or Haute Doll with pictures comparing the body types of all the different fashion dolls, I was horrified by how ugly their joints were! Honestly, some of the pelvises made me want to cry, they were so unnatural-looking . I think ABJD sculptors take a massive amount of trouble to balance posability and aesthetics in the creation of our dolls' bodies, and I take my hat off to them.

 

I think the joints are part of what makes them so beautiful... that old world esthetic definitely appeals to me. If I wanted a bjd to look like a barbie... then I would have gotten a barbie....

 

I think the strings give these dolls alot of life and personality, being able to see them like tendons going through the joints will always amaze me. The newer bodys are getting very complicated and I can't wait to see what the future holds.

 

I agree with Absynthe. I also don't understand why your friend would 'enforce' his opinion so strongly. It sounds as though he's trying to sabotage your new hobby.

Personally BJDs are very life-like in thier look. The resin base gives them a natural glow which I like as opposed to silicon based dolls. Also silicon can be quite 'grippy' because of the rubbery texture and make clothing a hassle to get on and off.

I love the idea that BJDs are in bits that are strung together. If a piece is damaged you can unstring and replace it.

.. And not forget about face-ups!

The list could go on. I think you can do alot more with a BJD then a barbie..

.::::.