Buying damaged and poorly modded dolls

I bought a damaged SeniorDelf Bliss specifically as a "project doll" a few years back...

His first owner hadn't tried to intentionally mod him, but he was still in pretty rough shape. (I think they were just very new to the hobby when they got him, and so didn't know about things like yellowing from sun exposure or needing to add a base-coat of MSC to resin before painting it... and were either careless about handling him themselves or lived with someone else who was.) He was very unevenly yellowed, stained from an unsealed black and red tattoo attempt, and had badly broken hands and a deep gash in his forehead that looked like someone had taken a screwdriver to him.

I more or less spent a summer tinkering with him to repair the damage... These days Muninn looks pretty good. Even though his resin color looks more like a yellowed White than the RSNormal he started out when he was new. He ended up being one of my favorites, too, when all was said and done... So there's definitely something to be said for restoration projects. ^_^

 

I love, love, LOVE, damaged and poorly modded dolls! Even limited edition ones. First, they're insanely cheap and second it frees me up from the fear of damaging a doll from my attempts at modding. I mean, it's already broke so now I can experiment to my hearts content. It also makes you think outside of the box when it comes to modding. If the doll is damaged you have to find clever ways of fixing or masking it.

My favorite threads on this board are from people who took in a bad mod/damaged doll and put a lot of effort and love into it and created something great.

 

Without other peoples failed modding attempts, I wouldn't own more than half my collection, so yeah, I love them and more power to the people who try things even if they fail. Good luck to you all, at least you gave it a go and there's always someone like me willing to pick up the bits for cheap afterwards!

 

You have to learn by doing- but it's an expensive way to learn! I'm not a modder- nor do I want to learn, but I think it's great that people take on these dolls and restore them!

 

I've got a couple dolls in my collection who were what you might call "fixer-uppers." One was bought on the secondhand marketplace here, and advertised as being in considerably better condition than he actually was... he looked fine in photos, and was listed as having a "color matched mobility mod." When I got him, he was badly and unevenly yellowed, and the "color matching" was some roughly applied paint over dark grey putty. I sent his head off to a modder to have some alterations made to it (he was listed with the eye opening, which I kept, and the elf ears, which I removed, but not with the weird carving on the corners of his mouth, which I hid with a faceup), and while it was away, spent a solid month or so sanding, repainting, and in the case of his hands, replacing all the rest of his parts. (And in the course of doing that, I discovered as well that he'd had some minor body blushing that was done without any sealant at all. Seal before you blush, everyone!) With all the work done on him, along with the changes in his aesthetics, he's no longer recognizable as the original doll, and all the work I put in on him guarantees I'm not parting with him any time soon.

The other of my "fixer-uppers" was directly offered to me after I finished work on the first one; he'd been used as a practice head for learning to mod, and had leftover staining from faceups, as well as no ears. The same modder put his ears back on for me (and adjusted his eyes), and I scrubbed for hours to remove all the stains. He too now looks like a whole new doll, and likewise isn't going anywhere.

It's not the kind of thing I really want to make a habit of doing, but there's definitely some powerful bonding that can happen when you have to work for the doll in that way, and I'm glad I did it with those boys. Still, I'm not planning on a repeat any time soon!

 

It does bother me to see badly modded dolls, especially when their owners end up selling them off as "junk" dolls. I think it's a shame that the doll became junky. BUT... I do enjoy seeing people restore them into something that is loved and appreciated again. Personally I would not mod a doll that I wasn't planning to keep, because of the cost. I see it as carelessness and throwing money away.

If you want to mod, you do need to practice. But that doesn't mean you have to turn a doll into junk. I'd rather see people go slowly and carefully, and research and learn something as they go.

I've purchased a couple of "fixer upper" dolls with sanding issues or yellowed resin, and I enjoyed cleaning them up and making them look nice again.

Linda S.
galatia9

 

The way I see it, if no one ever attempted that first mod, no one would ever get good at it. I have two beautifully professionally modded dolls that I just love, and I'm really happy that the artists took that first step, even though I'm sure they probably had some failure along the way. My dolls are perfect because those people kept going after first learning.

I'll admit, I've screwed up some dolls pretty bad trying to learn to mod. I've also had some successes. I sold one my absolute worst screw ups (bad sanding, bad nose job, terrible dye job) to someone who was wanting to learn to do restoration and needed a cheap doll to start. So, full circle, I suppose--my ruining a doll taught someone else how to save a doll!

 

I would love to buy a "fixer-upper" doll as a project. So far the ones I've seen for sale, the owners are asking almost original full price for them. I don't have a lot of money to spend on dolls, so if I found one for a really good price that I could fix up, I'd be very happy.
I can see that it would be very satisfying to be able to bring a damaged doll back to life.

 

I have bought doll parts to practice modding, which someone was selling as project doll. Unfortunately I've also bought a damaged modded doll without the owner's disclosure of that information, so that was... fun. But thankfully I have the experience to be able to clean it up, & the head remains in tact which means I can hybrid on a new body later.
So yeah. When bought intentionally, super fun. Unknowingl ... pretty upset

 

It does not bug me directly, but I do have my moments of face-palming and thinking "why?" haha. The owners can do whatever they want with their dolls, and if they end up damaging it, that is their business.
I'd also love to buy a damaged doll - as long as the price properly reflects the state it is in. I have little experience but I'd try it myself too (but I would pick a 'cheaper' doll over a limited to try it out haha).

 

Honestly it depends upon what's been done to the doll and the price tag. Some people seem to think that any modification they do, even bad ones, enhances the resale value of their doll and they will ask the moon for said doll. Some mods are worth it but the majority I think the beauty is definitely more in the eye of the beholder. I've seen some dolls that were totally wrecked advertised as modded and priced way higher than they should be IMHO. I've also seen older dolls with serious flaws listed at retail plus shipping. It's pretty common. The way I see it if you irrevocably alter any doll and it doesn't look absolutely amazing after then you should be selling it for less not more. I have bought project dolls. I like them because they save me some serious money. I don't mind doing the work if the doll can actually be fixed and I am cool with mods that enhance how a doll moves and poses. What I don't buy are the dolls that you can't fix without practically rebuilding them, the dolls with heavy scarring, cut out wound or steampunk type mods. I don't mind de-dyeing, sanding, fixing small dings with epoxy, removing and re-doing faceups but I draw the line at any mod repairs that will take me weeks to accomplish or that might cost me a lot of money to repair or replace parts. I can mix paint but flesh tones can be hard and I'm not that good of a faceup artist that I can paint over a ton of epoxy probably and it will look good.

 

...You gotta learn somehow. While it's an expensive mistake, that's the risk you take. You can research all you want and still mess up after all. Knowing how to do something and actually doing it don't always follow.

 

I love to fix up dolls that have problems, but I'll admit that I cringe every time I see an elf doll that's had its ear tips sanded off! I love elf ears a little too much, I guess, lol.

 

I only ever feel bad for the person who tried to mod the doll,
not the doll itself. It's a chunk of plastic, which anyone creative enough can always make into something gorgeous again.

The person who tried must be so embarrassed and heartbroken that their work didn't pan out, not to mention now short a lot of money- mistakes can be expensive in this hobby. So if I buy and restore a damaged doll, I often try to send the original owner a pic of the finished restore-mod work I do with a thank you note, so they know that if they hadn't tried, I couldn't have had the doll I wanted.

 

While I do wince when I see poorly modded dolls being sold, it is down right horrifying to see an expensive limited that was hacked at.

"junk dolls" however, like it was mentioned, do give experienced members the opportunity to either restore the doll or modify it even more. Junk dolls are often price less and thus is more reasonable to buy.

Also!

Working on a 'damaged' head builds skills towards sculpting As I have learned, working on a damaged head did help me to start sculpting.

Here is a thread in which I had worked on a head: https://denofangels.com/threads/modded-breakaway-head-compleate.391796/

I ended up selling him for various reasons (to the same person who modded him.) and I really liked him, but when I checked back on him the buyer had destroyed all of my work on him and was selling him off.

 

I'm always on the lookout for these, for exactly that reason: the chance to experiment and learn without incurring the costs (and maybe creating another junk doll out of) a good condition piece.

 

I agree with that they are "needed" in order for people to get good. I have a pretty poorly modded doll (by myself). It's a 3 part torso mod, which isn't all too bad, except that the clay that was added on is not colour matched. I haven't had the time to redo the mod, but it doesn't bother me too much. Aaaand the point of this anecdotic story was to give an example of a misstake that was made, but not without a lesson learned. Next time I'll be sure to colour match! And besides, giving tlc to these dolls must feel quite rewarding I imagine ^^

 

It doesn't really bug me, no. Everybody has to start somewhere.
Sometimes I might come across a mod and think to myself "...wha-?" but that's basically it. I'm sure looking back at my older projects I'd have the same reaction with a few, haha.
Also, "junk dolls" are great. If I weren't so busy with the dolls I already have, I'd go hunting for some new fixing projects right now to be honest.

I bought a head to "de-mod" last year and it's been a great deal of fun. Here's my project journal about it; I'm actually more or less done with it now, just haven't gotten around to updating in forever.