Feats of Engineering

Fun question!

My least favorite example would be the knees on the Iplehouse EIDs, that piece of resin shaped like a tuning fork that always gets stuck up in the joint.

Most favorite would be the Fairyland knees, the cap piece that slides out to cover the slot when the knee is at full flexion.

 

My favorite engineering has to be Fairyland's work. Absolutely inspired. Not only is it great construction but it looks so smooth and works so well with the body shape of the doll for a human feel. Those, and Soom's jointed hands. I still drool over the engineering on those things every time I handle them.

My least favorite is RS/Bobobie. They're great dolls, lovely sculpts, but just not well thought out when it comes to engineering. My RS 58 cm girl can hold basic poses, but looks kinda stiff doing them, and cannot hold any pose in between those poses. It's bent, straight or nothing, which was not working for her sensual character I wanted her to portray. I ended up getting another body and making a hybrid.

The other engineering fail I can think of is my Domuya Flexi 1 girl. She needed SO Much extra work to function the way the sculptor surely had in mind. Her stringing channels were impossibly narrow, and I had to dremel her out entirely. Even so, she has lots of joints and almost no locking points, so she's pretty slinky and needs restringing often to get her to hold poses well. Still, now she looks very natural in her poses.

Edit: for a shout out to a less known doll, my Aoi Tuki Tukihime has some of the most impressive waist/under-ribs jointing I've ever seen, in two parts that lock into each other. She can arch her back like a dancer and hold it too. So gorgeous. I am in love forever with her hips. They are ginormous and just big ball joints, perfectly shaped to rotate to simulate the human hip curve.

 

I absolutely love the brain and eyes of the Soom dolls. Their eyes fit into little resin optic nerves that fit into the eye socket on the doll, and the string goes around a resin brain that fits on a shelf inside the skull. Awesome!

For sheer posability, my Granado dolls are amazing. The curve of the line of the back when bent, the delicate ball-jointed hands, and the way the knee works means I can get the dolls to stand or stretch or balance with a minimum of fuss. Definitely my most good-natured dolls.

I have some kicky dolls that tick me off, but they're all under 15cm, and just cranky like mini dolls can be. But my Dollzone flower fairy can at least stand with its petal "hands" holding it steady.

 

My favourite natural posers are Dollzone minis and Iplehouse EIDs (although I have to agree about the knees). They also stand like rocks and have a low center of gravity.
The Soom MiniGems have those little bumbs in their hips, to prevent the legs from dislocating. That's also very nice and helps a lot.
I don't quite like how thick the crotch part is on my AngellStudio Senior Girl. Her legs are too far apart and her knees don't touch without adjustment when sitting and fixing that with clothes on, is a little difficult.
The faceplate on my AS 70cm is very nice. I can adjust stringing without taking the whole head off.
The others are soso. I like the torso joint to be in the middle or under the breast, prefer double jointed torsos, though.

 

My favourite these days in terms of engineering would probably be Volks. The more I see them, the more I appreciate their simple and graceful lines, there's something about them that just looks well-planned and put together. Fairyland come at a close second, they too have some really nice shapes and I like the way their joints are shaped. I have never owned dolls from either company though, so my opinion stems from what I see at dollmeets and online

My least favourite would be BBB/RS, though they appear to be improving quickly. My first doll was a RS Long, and the joints and body weren't really put together very well; they didn't look very good, didn't fit together all that well and so functionally it wasn't that great either. That was three and a half years ago though, the bodies appear to have improved a great deal since then, although I haven't yet handled them to be able to tell.

Out of the dolls I currently own, my favourite is a tie between Luts KDF and Popodoll 68cm body. Both aren't that pretty at the elbows or knees, but they pose really nicely. My least favourite out of the dolls I own now is the Soom Littlegem body - the extra caps in the elbows tend to stick funny and looks unnatural a lot of the time and the thighs though they have little cuts/grooves for swaricco sitting, they just don't really work all that well somehow.

 

Ahh my favoured topic!

CP, hands down, no question, OWN BJD engineering for me. Even the older Delf and B line MNF's can and do out pose damn near everything else I own, but the A-line female body and LTF concept are just strokes of engineering genius meeting aesthetic beauty in its purest form. It remains my greatest BJD related wish that FL get their arses in gear and sort out upgrades for the Delf bodies along the same lines because I don't think I'd willingly choose anything else again if they did. I've yet to find a pose a human can make that those bodies cannot copy, they're all kinds of resin miracle to me.

They're closely followed by the newer Pipos Junior PI animal bodies because that thing is just a work of posing art that can pull off stuff I wouldn't expect out of such a tiny thing!

In terms of MSD, Dollmore, Bluefairy and Dollzone have incredibly smooth, natural movement and posing, in fact the Dollmore kid body is my second favourite following the MNF's.

If we're talking SD's, then the DollnDoll King body is just AMAZING in it's posing ability and natural look, second again only to the CP lot.

Engineering dislikes are an easy one to say too, sadly, and so these come with a YMMV disclaimer.

I have no time for the Iple mobility bodies, they're just over engineered to my eye and the amount of modding they require to be anything like useful pains me; about 90% of the Resinsoul bodies (although they are improving); the hideous flicky torso joint on the DIM minimee body; the Domuya flexi's that needed a degree in astro-physics to pose and demonstrated beautifully that more joints does not always = awesome; Bambicrony's Ciao Bella bodies that just are a kicky, hideous mess; ALL the Dollzone animal bodies that are incapable of much more than stand and sit...I could go on, but I'll stop there *kaff*

 

Interesting topic.
I would say that Oasisdoll seemed rather well engineered although I don't own one. Hujoo clockwork dolls are amazing too (including the on topic Cora) and could be bend into amazing positions. I don't own one either but based on photos online, she can do extreme poses that only a flexible gymnast or contortionist can do.
Interested in seeing other replies~

 

Dollstown. Hands down. Game, Set, Match. I have to get my act together and get one of the 15-year-old bodies before they stop producing them! The 18 year-old ones are just too big for me, but they're equally if not MORE GORGEOUSLY engineered.

My dollmore bodies are also excellent posers- even when strung loosely they are really really awesome- particularly the judith girl body- fabulous!

The worst would be the old Lati Red body I had before they redesigned it. It had a hip joint (seconding the awfulness of this) and he could hardly sit properly without a huge gap! I think the newer bodies are probably nicer, but I never owned one.

 

Shiny Doll has lovely posing.

I have never found my doll with that body in an ungraceful pose.

 

For me it's the Volks SDGr bodies and the Fairyland FP65 and LTF bodies. Not only do they pose well, but the nice thing about those bodies is that the joints look nice and natural when bended.

However lately I've found that posability isn't what is most important to me, it's more the overall look and the details of the body. I like natural, softly curved body lines and elbows/knees that look as normal as possible when bended. With other words I'd rather go with a single-jointed one-piece-torso body that is perfectly sculpted though possibly not so good at doing different poses, then get one of these double-jointed bodies that have those rectangularly and edgy looking elbows.

 

Chiming in again about Fairyland. The engineering works beautifully in the smaller size dolls, but once you get into the Feeple65 size, not so much. The weight of the resin starts affecting how well the joints work. For that reason, Fairyland doesn't get my 100% vote, even though there's much to love about the dolls.

Sometimes well-designed basic joints are better than fancy over-engineered ones. SD-sized Granados are flexible yet stable with their basic double joints.

Isara, seconding your vote for the Soom brains.

 

As some have already said, Fairyland is amazing. I only have one Feeple, but I have handled other models, and they have all been wonderful to pose. Not only do they pose well, but they look smooh and sleek. It seems to me that many of the super posable dolls are kind of knotty or have joints that are unattractive in other ways. My least favourite is single jointed locking knees, like on my DoT body. While I realize the locking knees can help a doll stand, I find I can make my dolls without them stand just fine if they have a little sueding. Locking knee joints irritate me when I'm trying to pose a doll.

 

What a cool thread!

Dollzone is a win for me, even over Fairyland. Both my LTF and my Edward are excellent posers, but the DZ Edward is the more impressive to me. I'd say he's ever-so-slightly a better poser.

My AE Kina is the worst poser of the dolls I currently have. She's so stiff that I accidently cracked her kneecap when I tried to bend her leg!

 

For me, it's Granado 64cm male body the best for sure.
He has simple joints, but his mobility is great, also, he is stable, which really surprised me when I received him.
I like things that are developed and fine-tuned, but not when it's over done.
Fairyland's Feeple 65 can also move smoothly, but in my opinion, it seems over done on joints, especially on its legs and knees.

 

My favorite is strangely an old AoD male body, the 60 cm one--it's not very handsome, but it's not ugly either, and maybe because i am so used to them I can get him to pose and balance without support, sueding or wiring in almost any pose. The A line Fairyland girl body is also a little miracle of posing and beauty, though sadly mine has some resin casting issues--but the engineering is lovely.

My least favorite has to be the Domuya bodies--the channels were too narrow for elastic large enough to support the weight of the Domuya resin, and the limbs would actually spin and twist. The old Bobobies were wretched too--the legs just would not lock and stand since the pieces themselves weren't shaped to grip each other, and the upper arms were so short they looked like T rex arms. (They have gotten MUCH better since then!). The Minimee boy bodies are also nasty with that torso only moving forward if you twisted the whole upper body, but I did like the look of the sculpt and I would get one again just for it's nice lines..but I would also mod that torso joint

 

Mine is FairyLand and obitsu they can pose like no one business.

 

I throw in resinsoul as well for my least favorite when It comes to resin posing. The joints just do NOT have enough contact with one another! it's really sad for me becuase I like several of their dolls faces but their bodies are just a big no for me ;_; .

One company that often doesn't get mentioned but, has really good joint engineering are impldoll. For their low price they pose very well but their aesthetic and proportions may leave something to be desired.

My personal favorite vinyl doll to pose has to be the Obitsu 50cm, hands down. There is almost nothing that body can't do and the joints are strong enough that I've never had to worry about sudden knee collapse. It may not be the prettiest body around but once you get it in a pose it stays there!

As far as beauty goes it's dollfie dream for me. I love their long anime style legs and they really aren't bad posers.