Aversion to customization?

Is it harder for you to find the doll you want if you don't plan on customizing it yourself? It takes me a lot of time before a doll is just "right" to me, usually involving several face-ups, eye changes, wig changes, cutting the wig, sanding the face or opening the eyes... At the moment not a single doll I own hasn't had something done to him or her. X3

we all play differently and have different ideas on aesthetic. Personally I HATE sueding the dolls but I love the effect. The sueding just takes forever for me to do anymore!

 

I plan on learning to customize dolls, because the idea of modding appeals to me... I'd love to make a doll unique, and be able to say I did it all myself XD; But I don't think it's necessary.

My two current dolls (minus the new head) were painted by someone else. In Roo's case, all I did was go through the FCS process XD; And his new faceup is by Ferret_kun, not me. Kyu came to me as-is, and when he does get a new faceup, it'll be by batchix, because I want it to be just as stunningly amazing as it is now.

The new Breakaway head has been faceup'd by me, and while I'm... vaguely satisfied with the results... I find him slightly ugly compared to Kyu D: Not the mold, but... the faceup. I'll probably never be satisfied with my own work, and he's ok for now, but... I get frustrated easily... XD which makes it hard to practice.

So in that sense, customizing to me is frustrating because I have no practice and I've been spoiled so far with professional faceups and stuff XD

 

Not to mention some of us, myself included, just like putting different clothes on them and having them sit on our desk. I have no talent at any of the above. I just like pretty things.... Kind of an empty-headed mentality I suppose! There is a wide-range of BJD owner!

 

I ditto what Chama says, I love customising. It's half the fun of owning a BJD, I think. Sometimes you're freaked out that it'll go madly wrong, but that's all part of it. I think I'd understand if I bought a doll that came with a beautiful or limited faceup, but I get all mine blank so I don't have to worry about that.

 

I love customising; I must admit there are some aspects of the process I'm not so keen on though - stripping off an old face-up right back to the bare resin, for example, is boring and takes forever (especially if the previous owner used black paint - getting that out of the creases of mouths and eyes is a real pain!!), and all the sanding involved in opening sleeping eyes - ugh! But it's well worth it for the finished effect.

I just enjoy taking a "standard" doll and making it completely unique.

 

Well, one I'm lazy, two I'm afraid of destroying things. I've only attempted two faceups but then gave up and let someone redo it for me. I've never done anything that involves cutting, drilling, sanding, or anything.

 

i would be SUNK if i had an aversion to customization, although what i did do was buy a secondhand doll to practice on (who recently found a new home with hobbywhelmed, which makes me happy). now that i've worked on him, i feel a lot more confident doing the work that needs to be done on my Rasendo boy (whose legs are two different lengths) and i'm plotting and scheming learning to airbrush for the doll to come later's mods.

i can entirely respect the aversion to such things, though. my next doll will be coming with default faceup, and the only changes i will be making to him are basic esthetics (seam sanding, sueding, sealing, blushing), a different wig and new eyes. the faceup he'll be coming with is perfect already.

actually, i'm looking forward to having a doll that will only be in pieces for a day, instead of days to weeks.

 

I love the fact that I can change the wig and eyes of the doll
To me, being able to customise the doll makes BJDs different from fasion dolls like barbie and bratz

wigs and eyes are my favourate items to buy for the dolls

 

I'm absolutely terrified of unstringing/restringing/face-uping my Hound. I decided to clean his body this weekend, since it had some light stains and dirt on it. I also wanted to blush his body. I couldn't bring myself to unstring him, so I only removed his head. Later that day, I realized that Ciel's eyeshadow one his left eye, er...socket...was faded, so I tried to apply some pastels but it ended up looking too dark. When I removed it with only a wet towel, some of his original eye make up came off. I seriously wanted to cry. Yes, I am a wimp. So I tried to make it look as good as possible, and no one at home can tell the difference before I messed with his face-up and after, so hopefully he's okay. I really want him to be sueded, re-strung and sanded, but I'm terrified of doing it myself.

Someday, I'm going to buy a face-up less, unassembled doll, so I can hopefully overcome my fear of customization. BJDs are meant to be customized, so I want to (eventually) customize one.

 

Well, only customization i have given my dolls are tattoos, and piercings for my girls ears. I was going to drill holes in Athena's back to put yo-sd wings on her, kind of like princessai, but she was kinda scared, and i thought, i could really mess her up! I see what other people do, like paint their dolls a whole other color, and that's cool, if that's what they want to do, i just keep it simple.

 

When Sarang came her left leg fell off, so I just had to restring her on the first day! Mind you I didn't know how so it was about 2 hours of trial and error, but I think it was okay for me because looking at her face watching me made me try harder and not give up... (I realllly wanted to after the 10936273 cut...)

But I don't think I'll be changing her eyes anytime soon. Because they were the eyes she first 'saw the world' with... And cuz I watched the movie Dollmaster, and I semi-believe that dolls have souls (at least I want to believe), and that there soul communicates through the eyes.

 

I never feel like the doll is really mine until I've taken them apart and put them together again a few times - let alone the sanding, blushing, and other modifications that make them 'them'!

For me, from the moment a doll has his or her eyes in, they're a personality - and for me, the personality stays in the head and the eyes, so I don't mind the rest of the body being in pieces. I'm not too happy with leaving them without their eyes in for too long, though - when they're new, it's okay, but once I get used to them it's very strange.

 

I don't dare do anything yet, but then I'm new. I don't have a particular desire to change the default faceups I got - that look is what I fell in love with, so it makes sense to me to keep it. (Plus, I know my fine motor control is nowhere near good enough to paint all the tiny lashes and such, so I'd better have someone else do it if I don't want the results to suck.) And doing anything more adventurous scares me, and it's at least partly because of the money involved. I just don't dare ruin such an expensive doll!

Eventually, I do have a couple of highly-customized dolls I want to have/make, but I'm not sure yet if I'll do it myself or have someone else do it for me. For one thing, it would require extensive scuplting, and I have a lot of trouble with that (the fine motor control thing again). I'd like to try sometime for myself though, just to see what it's like and if I can do it. If it doesn't work out I can always just stick to changing hair, eyes, and clothing. Those are pretty non-scary.

 

I really can't get on with a doll I haven't painted.... Otherwise I just don't feel a bond with them.

I'm glad we are so diverse here! It provides a service and market for dolls to be painted etc. It works well that some love it and others love to have a beautiful doll created for them.

 

I remember when I had my Megi I was so exited to do his faceup! I'm atending an art college (SCAD) so I thought it would be a cool project. Then I realized that I had no clue how to take his head off. So, I searched these forums to find out how to take hime apart.

I had my mom pull off his feet so it would be simpler to get his head off. I spent at least half a day from 6:00 A.M. to 1:00 P.M. to get the face up done. It was fun but the MSC made my head hurt for a bit at first. The chalk pastels I had got sucked so I had to use actual makeup for the eyeshadow, lips, and blushing. The eyebrows didn't come out too even but it was covered up by his wigs. Geting his eyes in wasn't too bad. I prefered puting his eyes in than puting the eyes in an Oibitsu doll head. (Gwad those things are a pain!) Any other "goofs" I made wasn't noticible uless you took his wig off and really glared at him. For my first resin faceup he came out pretty well.

Then it came to puting him back together. I had my mom help me again. when stringing the right foot his whole leg came unstrung. We (I) had to find a wire hanger and "mod" it in order to string his leg again. To be frank my mom was pretty pissed at me and told me, "never to get one of these *things* again!"

I eventually had to sell him. (poor thing) When I get my Mo for Christmas (from my dad if I get a really good GPA) I'll have him be sent to my dorms. <.<;..>.>;

Back to the topic
Custimizing is fun but also can be a pain. It's a love hate sort of thing. If your afraid of doing a faceup yourself but want to do one I would recomend geting an Obitsu 60 cm head to study the basics.

I'm even thinking of opening a faceup thread. (I have all this paint and brushes form Color Theory and I could get better pastels form the school store)

 

*stunned* I never thought anyone wouldn't customize their dolls. This doll is the only one I'd keep the face-up for...except the lips are going to be changed a tad. In fact, I want to re-create those photos with the eyes and wig but not the dress.

I could say all sorts of things as to why I wanted Elfdoll Wu, but it comes down to the fact that I could do anything to him. I've known about ABJD's for over five years and I was never interested because I thought I couldn't change their wigs, eyes, sand them and so on. After actually reading up on what exactly I can do in August of this year...that was it. I bought him barely a week later.

 

I have absolutely no interest in doing any sort of customization on my dolls myself. This is a hobby and it is supposed to be fun, and endless hours of toil do not equal fun to me. I can sew, but I absolutely HATE making clothes for myself or my dolls, the act of having to do it for myself kills any sort of fun for me. I would much rather pay someone else to do the work for me. All of my dolls will have their faceups done by a professional artist, be it the company default, someone I commision, or a custom head being sold. I want my dolls to be beautiful things to look at, not frumpy homemade arts and crafts projects. As for changing of actual molds, I buy a head because I like the way it looks as is, weird imperfections and all, not because I want to completely restructure the way it looks and get rid of that head's defining traits.

I don't see eye changing or restringing as customization, and neither bother me. I restring dolls all the time for my roommates since they are cursed with many dolls with faulty company bodies, and am always trying out new eyes for my dolls. I do say that getting eyes set just right is one of the most maddening tasks you can ever do though.

 

When i first got into the hobby i thought "There so expensive i'm going to spend the money and buy they all completed including face-ups" then i got Ringo and was severally intimadated for awhile...i think it took me a month before i got up the nerve to do his face-up. then i ended up loving it! And have since blushed, re-stringed, sueded almost all of my dolls.

But if them being in pieces discurages you, then its not a bad thing. you simply do not like it. There is always options...like buying them complete, or sending them to someone else to have them customized. so dont feel bad about it. It's just how you feel. As long as your happy with them, there isnt a single problem.

 

I completely agree if my dolls were customized by me they wouldn't be my style at all..I like them to look as polished and perfect as possible, and I'm more willing to pay someone to do it in a relatively short amount of time than to spend years learning it myself.

 

I really love changing clothes, eyes, and wigs. I also love to add some blushing or gloss and perhaps some lashes.
But, I have painted before and I really am not good at it. I really love to have my dolls come complete from the company. Also, I will restring, but I hate doing it because it is a pain in the butt.
Finally, I can not stand to have a bodiless head around! I will either find a body that works or sell it.