Moral/Ethical issue with having a doll of someone else withOUT them knowing it?

I don't think it's as bad as having a doll that's supposed to BE someone. You're just taking the shape of their face.. that's not nearly as personal as taking their personality and style and keeping a little doll of it for your own... pleasure. O__o;;;

But anyway.. I still probably wouldn't take the face of someone I didn't know, (maybe I'd be inspired but I wouldn't sit there with a photo and copy it - this is if I were to sculpt the face myself, btw) but I'd love to make many dolls based on all my friends' faces. XD It WOULD creep some of them out, but it would be funny. And some of them have really nice faces. And of course I'd ask them before I sold copies or anything. They would get to say what I did with the dolls. They could even have the only copy if they wanted. I just want to make them, I don't want to keep creepy voodoo-friends around for secret reasons or anything.

 

If I found out that someone had worked a doll with the specific intent of it resembling me, I'd not only be creeped out, I'd find it incredibly disrespectful. Most people who know me know how I feel about myself and my appearance - I avoid mirrors like the plague, and I almost never allow pictures of myself to be taken (or seek to have pictures taken of myself) unless they're for the purpose of showcasing something else - a costume or my dolls or a horse. Someone making a doll of me would be akin to saying, "Well, I don't care how uncomfortable you are with it; your feelings and right to privacy aren't as important as my desire to have an image of you." I'm not someone who really wants to restrict what other people can have or do, but my willingness to offer that freedom stops where it starts to infringe on others, and that's definitely something I'd consider a personal infringement.

I'd actually be more comfortable with a pre-fab doll that just happened to end up looking like me than I would with a MiniMee - the MiniMees are very impressive and skillfully done, but at the same time, that's also what turns me off of them - when it comes to reproducing a real person, they're too accurate to be attractive to me even in the rare cases of an individual I might otherwise find appealing. They look strange compared to stylized BJD that lack the flaws of flesh-and-blood humans. With someone like me, they'd only exaggerate how ugly I am.

I'd also be uncomfortable with it for personal space reasons - I have serious issues with human contact and being touched (even in the most innocent of ways), and if someone were to make a doll of me, I'd have to wonder if they were using the doll to get what they otherwise can't. I've done that with dolls myself - albeit dolls of concepts or characters rather than real people - so it's something I understand, but it's not something that sits well with me when it's a real person (unless that person is okay with it, in which case, that's a different story).

I've always been someone who's more interested in characters than real people anyway, but when it comes down to fanworks, attachment, and comfort levels, the issue for me is how well it's possible to get to 'know' an entity. With published characters, particularly main characters from intense or long-running series, you kind of have a chance to do exactly that - and with minor characters, there's room for you to use your imagination. The original creators may or may not have specific thoughts about the unprovided information, but most times, you're not really infringing on anything by adding to (or even changing) it yourself. With real people/celebrities, that's not so much the case - they're just too complex to get to know through media clips, no matter how much said medium tries to cover. Even when you know someone personally, you don't always know them (if that makes sense). The unprovided information does exist. It's like someone else said - you're forcing a proxy of that person into a role that may have nothing at all to do with what they'd actually want, and it just doesn't sit as well with me. (I actually have a custom Jack Sparrow plushie myself, because that character resonates with me so much - it's not just a fangirl lust thing. I dearly love Johnny Depp as an actor, but I don't know him at all, so cuddling up with an artificial JD at night would both be really odd to me, and not evoke any sot of emotion whatsoever.)

The one exception to character dolls being kosher that I could see would be in the case of something like a private, non-fandom RP character - those aren't 'published' in the same way that the cast of a book or movie are. With the people I've known, they tend to be fairly personal. Mine definitely are, so if someone were to make a doll of, say, my Elfwench or my little devil girl, I'd be unsettled in nearly the same way as if it were just a doll of me. To that same end, I've avoid doing certain things with Phase that would cause him to resemble a character someone played for me. The character in question fit my favourite 'type', so there are some fairly strong similarities anyway, but if I made those changes, I'd know I'd be doing it so I could have him back, and I don't think it would be right.

On the flip side, I'm also a writer (albeit not professional), so the characters I put out that are just for my stories, I'd be more able to look at as fair game for dollification. That, I'd be able to take as flattery!

 

I think the same. My heart beated faster when I heard that DIM decided to do minimees, because my first thought was that I could have a doll which looks like my favorite singer. But I couldn't do it in the end.
So many people own a Kyo minimee now and whenever I look at them it makes a little sad, because I think it goes too far. He (and any other celebtrity) never had a chance to agree or disagree to the production of these dolls. I'm conviced that he would hate the idea. I also ask myself if these people like him so much, why are they doing something that maybe makes him angry and much likely gives him the creeps?

I'm sometimes surprised to see how well certain Minimees turn out. But it's not right to make dolls of somebody who never had the chance to protest against the use of his/her image.

 

Now, while I would have to say that yes it is pretty creepy... would there be a difference between getting a doll with features similar to somebody you know personally because you want that doll to be them (which holy crap, I'd find that sooo creepy xD) and getting a doll with similar features because you want a doll that looks like that person? Would turning something that looks like your friend into a completely different character better? I feel like I wouldn't mind so much if somebody needed a doll with features like mine for a character that happens to have features like mine, and so had a minimee of myself made. As long as that dolls wasn't ME, I think it would just be a little odd looking at a dolly version of myself xD I'll be perfectly honest, I have friends with perfect features for dolls of my favorite OC's, and while I'd feel incredibly weird getting dolls of people I know, I can understand it if you're doing it for a character completely separate from that person. But it still feels a little weird... so I'm not sure what I think of even doing that xD

 

As someone has already mentioned, when people post for minimee heads they usually are wanting a character that the actor/actress has portrayed, not the actor themselves. As an example Johny Depp as Captain Jack. When they costume the doll it will be made to look like the character.

I, personally, don't see anything wrong with this. In Depp's case he's obviously given his permission for dolls to be made of the Captain Jack character. The only difference is that he got paid by the toy company and he didn't for the minimee heads that have been made.

I don't find it creepy either. To me it's the same as buying a commerical doll, only much more expensive!

Yes, it was done without his permission and he didn't get paid, but if I wanted one (which I don't) I would do it. Is it ethical or moral, probably not. Would he object? If he did it would probably be for monetary reasons and not because someone wanted a Captain Jack doll.

Now creating a doll of someone you know or of a stranger is different. They're not characters, they're people. I think creating a doll based off a total stranger is weird and not something I'd do. I can't think of any reason I'd want to.

As for creating a doll that represents a family member, that's a very personal decision. When my daughter got married I made a doll the represented her. It was a porcelain doll and the face didn't resemble her that much, but it has the same eye/hair color and the same hair style. I duplicated her wedding dress and gave it to her as a gift. She was thrilled.

As for making a doll look like a friend, I wouldn't unless my friend was model beautiful or drop dead gorgeous, then I might be tempted. But I would ask them first and tell them it was only because of their physical beauty. They would probably be flattered. And, of course, I wouldn't do anything weird with the doll. LOL!

As for wanting a doll of a deceased relative, that's also a very personal thing and a person would have their own reasons for doing it. They may find having a doll of their departed grandmother a comfort, or they may want a reminder of how much that person was loved. I wouldn't do it, but that's my own choice. I wouldn't find it creepy though as long as the person wasn't doing something weird with it. Even that wouldn't be any of my business.

A hundred years ago people took photographs of their deceased family members sitting up in chairs like they were still alive, even babies in their cribs. Today these photos creep most people out (including me!) and I'm a little horrified when I see one, but it was a common thing to do. The photos were displayed as the only way to remember the person and, I suppose, as some kind of tribute.

I'm getting way off topic, so I'll shut up now! LOL!

 

Here in Germany where I live it can be considered against the law to request such a doll without the consent of the person in question. A person has the rights to his/her own appearance (like in "copyright"). I don't see a problem with having such a doll after asking the person and getting a "yes", though ^^ In my eyes the issue is less an ethical or moral one, rather a legal one.

 

Getting a doll of a celebrity may be a bit weird, but I think it's less so if you're intending to treat the doll as a character or persona they portray, or if you think they look like one of your characters or a character from something you like that's never been in a movie or anything, and not as the actual person themselves. Even though the order may say "Johnny Depp", some people may want Jack Sparrow, some may want Edward Scissorhands, some may want the Mad Hatter, and so on.


What if you want a minimee of a character that you've based on one of your friends that they already know exists? My friend and I write each other into our stories all the time. I'd personally rather help them pick out an existing sculpt that looks like me then see them make a minimee of me, but it'd still be based on me. And I'm thinking about getting a doll to be a character that's completely based on myself. I think it might end up being a bit weird, and I'd probably never put them in things I'd never wear, but I might still do it. And I trust this friend enough to not make my doll do anything I wouldn't do, which they wouldn't if their character is based on me anyway. I think it would only be okay if it was someone you really trusted though, and who you would expect to remain friends with for a long time.