BJDs and unskilled modifications

Personally, I really want to sand down my Chrom's face a little, but then I think "Man, He is pretty like this... But he could be perfect" But then I think, holy crap I paid nearly 300 bucks for this head, and if I get sick of it, or need the money, I don't want to ruin chances of reselling him.

 

Well, in my opinion, the only way to get better is to exercise, and one cannot get better at doll customizing without exercising
I mean, today's unskilled artist may be tomorrow's professional doll faceup/mod artist.
So, i wouldn't be too hard on people who make a terrible mess while learning, nor i would mock that person, but rather help them.
And i think that since doll companies make their dolls in order to, well, sell them, they shouldn't get too personal on what they sell. That'd be like if someone selling cloth would get angry at people making ugly clothes with it. I mean, what they do is sell a blank surface, more or less, for people to customize
At least this is what i think, considering that i'm not a doll maker XP

 

EXACTLY!! Lol! People can't just be perfect on the first try ^^

 

Taco (awesome name) is right. Everyone has to start somewhere.

Personally I'd prefer to start on cheap heads, like Obitsu 27cm heads, at 8 dollars a pop.

But...if I drew something just for someone, and then went and erased the bust and made it into a man, I would hunt them down and wring their neck.

 

I think it's a bit insulting...but...here goes~

For one, it's true that we all gotta start somewhere....I think the same would go for the first face-up which is most likely imperfect. It's also like if you hear a person first learning to play an instrument, and while they're practicing you say 'stop that, it sound bad!' practice makes perfect, and anyways, a lot of companies say or imply the whole 'if you have a certain vision, pursue it~' and it's THEIR doll anyways, so...yeah.

As for the body-gender modifying...I don't understand that unless the body was a limited...so unless someone can explain to me why it's done instead of just getting/trading the body or something...? *eep, is that going off-topic?*

 

I know this is a few months olde, but to assume that someone as skilled in building a profitable empire as he is is uncultured enough NOT to recognize the value of something like that is utterly ridiculous.

As for the rest, I couldn't have said it better than Taco & JennyNemesis, right on!

 

I disagree with this, and also the idea that art is something untouchable and should be dictacted to us from on high.

Art is fundamentally subjective, it actually is in the eye of the beholder. Art is created to evoke emotions, and what those emotions are and who they are evoked in is entirely up to any artist!

Also, how can one gain skills without practical application? All of the famous artists and modders were beginners at some point too.

And what looks like a mistake in one person's eye may be the perfect look for another.

 

i know what you meant...but well, it's the owner doll...

in the face-up artist case, it would be honest if the owner want to mention about the artist, she can mention that she had modified the lips...if the artist still didn't want to acknowledge, then, well, don't mention anything...it's an appreciation to the artist...
but aside from that...whatever the owner wants to do with the doll, it's kind of privilege thing...

In, 'company' case, I agree with strangeangels... "If you modify it, say so."

 

Everyone needs practice, however I wouldn't suggest doing your first major modification work on a LE doll or anything expensive. Buying a doll already damaged by a bad mod or other used circumstance is a good way of "recycling" for practice without harming a proper, limited work of art.

 

The real question is "Is it any business of yours what someone does with the items they purchase?". You don't have to like what they do. You don't have to agree with what they do. What you have to do is realise it was their purchase and their right to do with it what they wanted to.

It doesn't matter if we are talking about a limited edition doll or a less costly doll - it doesn't matter if they sawed the limbs off or simply painted over an existing face-up. The fact is the person may alter the doll to their hearts content unless they signed a contract in which they specifically agreed not to.

Finally - even when a doll is totally "destroyed" by someone who is unskilled - there are always people on the secondhand market willing to snatch up the opportunity to repair or modify the doll some more.

 

I definitely know where the faceup artist is coming from, it would make me very uncomfortable to have people assuming I painted something that doesn't reflect my style or skill at all. But I'm just one person. A company is big, and they make a LOT of dolls, which is a LOT of agents out there represent'n. :B Plus, everyone who's into the hobby knows that most dolls are customized in some way, so it's unlikely that there will be misunderstandings like that. The companies don't really need to worry about being misrepresented by individual dolls.
I guess some of the sculptors might cringe at photos of bad dolls made from their sculpts, but they probably see a million good ones too so I can't imagine that it's enough to bother them.

 

Body-gender modification can be because a person wants a more feminine or shapley male body, or a more masculine or less-shapely female body. I've seen a couple of these cases, and each time it was very well-done

Back to answering the OP: if it's a limited, I cringe at mods done. If it's a general edition that is still being produced, it doesn't make me cringe so much. Even figurines and action figures, cheaper things by comparison (and mass-produced) but still applicable as a comparison since some become expensive collector's items, are modified and repainted.

Dolls are a product sold by a company, sometimes by an individual, and are produced in multiple. They aren't one-of-a-kind like, I don't want to say 'true artwork' because even a plastic or vinyl doll is 'art' and BJDs are very much an art, but rather they are produced and sold with the intention of individualization. They are sold in 'kits' with the intention of being sanded, strung, and painted by the new owner. If the original artist didn't want their creations modified, then they would explicitly say so and/or not sell the creation at all, especially not in 'kits'.

I think it's a given that these dolls will be modified, just like it's a given that figures will be modified.

 

No because who is going to judge who is good enough to make mods?

Yes. The owner tried. Making something good is about practice practice. Most of the time a person needs to make a bunch as bad stuff before they get really good.

If I was an artist at a doll company and someone modded my mold and posted it without stating so I would cringe I admit that. I do think it is polite to state if a modification has been made to a mold in respect to the company AND because so many collectors use owner pictures when selecting a doll. But it is not obligatory to do so. I don't believe the companies can or should complain. After all a bad face up can be just as ruinous to the perception of a doll's beauty in a photograph as a bad modification. If they wanted their dolls to maintain the perfect vision of the artist they would never have created "customizable" dolls. It is the chance they take when they put the creative power in the hand of their costumer

 

In my opinion skill is just a formality, its an interpretation for those who do not understand some artists work.
Every artist is unique and as such so is their work, just because one person's modification looks like a mess to you doesn't mean it is a mess to the original artist.
For example there is a child, if she is still alive she'd be like 11 or 12 now but when I first heard of her she was 3, one of her drawings sold for almost $4,000. The best part about it is not her age but her "disability" as some would put it. She has autism, obviously it has turned out incredibly well for her.
So again skill is just a formality for those who don't understand or can't interpret the work how the artist was meaning it. But then again every artist usually makes the art for themselves and for what they feel it needs to be. There are exceptions to that like working at an art agency but even then the emotions of the artist are still implied.

 

if someone buys a doll be it standard or limited and they've never modded before and they end up trashing it, all we can do is stand back and marvel at it because we wouldn't have the nerve to do something like that ourselves. if that person wanted to do that to their doll, it's their choice. personally, i enjoy seeing dolly practice mods, seeing people developing a style and gaining technique.

on the flipside, i also enjoy seeing people make a huge mess of their doll because everyone likes to watch train wrecks, you can't help but watch and cringe and say ""ohhh my look what they've done!! lololol". it's also great to see trashed dolls getting restored by a skilled modifier. if it weren't for dolly practice, those guys would be out of a job. if this wasn't true, there wouldnt be programs on tv like 'how clean is your house?' or 'ten years younger' etc.because people enjoy seeing something awful being made to look fab again.

practice makes perfect! if it gets wrecked, they pay for it, it's nobodies' business at the end of the day.

 

It does make me sad to see a doll wrecked through someone else's bad modifications, but how is someone supposed to learn a skill before they've touched resin?

I think that Fairyland's offering sleeping heads as well as open-eyed heads is a very good idea and most companies sell parts seperately nowadays so that someone can practice on a 'junk' head before they try it out on the real deal.

It only becomes my business what someone does with their doll when they try to sell it to me, Until then, it's all entirely up to them. I do think though, that before people attempt something they should do their research and look at previous experiments. There's no point in treading old ground if someone else has tried that particular mod with those particular materials and found it ruinous.

 

It's kind of a shame if a doll is poorly modded, but what the hell can you do? It'd be nice for every BJD owner in the world to be super talented and have amazing dolls with mods/faceups/clothes/whatever to die for, but seeing as everyone has different tastes, it won't happen. Personally I don't really like animal dolls or most nonhuman mods - even elf ears can kinda get on my nerves - but if it's well done, then plenty of people who like that will be impressed. (Please don't attack me for this.)

 

It's a common misconception that every customizer is just 'super talented' at what they do. Da Vinci didn't paint the Mona Lisa when he was a beginner. Every skill that someone acquires(sewing, painting, modding) takes lots and lots of practice. If you want to be good at something you have to start somewhere. No one is born walking.

 

Art is different for everyone i guess. I have done paintings which were okay but people loved and bought. On the other hand teens are enamored with a book series which i think is only good for wiping my behind.

However, some of the mods I have seen would make babes cry and that some people do this to limited dolls in my opinion is nothing short of criminal.... to me its like taking the works of Davinchi and going over them with crayola crayons.

If you love your doll and you know you are not a master with a brush or sculpting or at least pretty good please for the love of resin leave it to the pros. Other doll owners don't need to be cringing in the corner holding a nip bottle and saying a prayer to ward off evil spirits.

I know some people will still like the "unskilled mods" but i think most of these people are young and not as exposed to art and how hard it is to make and how truly precious it is. Keep in mind just cause you can use Photoshop or take photos doesn't make you an artist.. whatever the media.. though clearly I am biased to media i can craft with my hands in a physical sense, you need skill and skill doesn't come overnight it takes years even decades of practice.

 

Man, where are you getting your Obitsu 27cm doll heads from? I can get them at $5 a pop...

Seriously though, Apart from the unique special editions that BJD companies sometimes release in very short runs, which are art pieces, the rest are just blank canvasses for the owner to mess around with.

They can do what the heck they like to their dolls because, at the end of the day, they are THEIR dolls and not ours. Yeah I have seen some face-ups that have made me cringe and think, man, I have seen hookers with better make up than that, but if the person who owns it loves it, who am I to gainsay him or her?

And anyway, who is to say what is ruining a doll and what is just modifying it?
I think the only technical qualification on that score is to do with the structural integrity of the doll after the modification has been done and little else. The Aesthetic qualification is purely subjective and what is one person's heap of cack is another's dream doll.

Of course, the more skilled you are at model making and painting, the far better your modifications are going to be. So we should just advise noobies to buy themselves a load of $5 Obitsu 27cm heads and have at them before attempting anything bigger and more expensive. Simples.

Phil.