Recasting Parts for Personal Use: What do YOU Think?

I don't see anything wrong with it as long as you don't sell it. I see a huge difference between ripping off someone's art and making money from it and merely making a part to fix your doll with. It's not something I would do anyway since I don't have that kind of skill,but I definitely wouldn't condemn someone else for recasting a part to fix their own doll.

 

No, it's not okay. "I want a different expression/hand position/high-heeled feet" is not sufficient reason for recasting. You want a part to look different? Modify an existing one from the company. You want something a company doesn't have or has but doesn't sell separately? Find that part from another company and either blush or dye it to match, or get one in a matching/close to matching colour. If you lose or break a part, buy a new one. Can't afford it? Save up until you can replace it. There's no actual good reason to recast, ever, whether you're making money or doing it for personal use.

DoA is very very very anti-recast for any reason, BTW.

ETA:Unless you want, say, two left feet or right thighs, recasting from the unbroken part doesn't work. And I'm not quite sure how sticking a limited part in silicone in order to recast it is better or safer than having someone who knows what they're doing complete the modifications. Even recasting can result in accidents or screw-ups. Nothing is 100% guaranteed to be safe. How limited a doll or part is doesn't really matter, honestly, because one way or another, you're taking a risk.

The main thing is:when you buy a doll, you get the right to own the doll and to do with it as you want EXCLUDING recasting (among other things). You do not buy the right to reproduce any part of it for any reason.

 

Honestly yes,I think it's fine to do for personal use,especially for broken parts. Not all companies sell replacement pieces,and what if it the doll was bought second hand? I'm not hunting all over the second hand market for a thigh piece,for example,that I'll most likely never find. Why should I when I can easily get silicone and resin and make the dang thing from the unbroken one? Also,I'll be quite honest here,to the person above me who says to mod/dye a part: That's all fine and well for parts/heads/whatever that come from non-limited dolls however,I'm sure I'm not the only one here that wouldn't dare try that on a limited. Yes,you can pay someone to do it for you,but things can still get screwed up/accidents during shipping/theft. I'm sorry,but I'd rather not tempt fate and have to pay an arm and a leg on the second hand market to get the head or fantasy parts replaced. No thank you.

I'm not trying to be rude or anything,but if I already bought the doll legit from the company and I want to mod it,I'm making my own parts to test on first.

 

I would email the company about recasting for personal use. The company would have the final say on the matter.

 

I think it's fine, as long as it's for personal use only. You aren't gaining a profit from doing it, in fact, you're losing a profit, because I imagine buying all the supplies to recast something costs quite a bit of money. If the company doesn't offer the parts you want to replace and such, I don't see how doing it hurts them in any way.

The only issue would be if you wanted to resell it, I think. I think selling anything with recast, whether it be a full doll, or parts is unethical. That's why if you were possibly planning on selling it in the future, it's probably better to replace it from actually parts from the company in the first place. But for personal use only without reselling it ever, I think it's fine.

 

I would think it was a very very expensive way to get a replacement part. Generally speaking, wouldn't think there is a legal barrier to fixing something that is broken but considering the cost of resin, the difficulty of matching it to existing and the complexity of the process, I can't imagine why someone would do that. It would leave me suspicious that they wouldn't stay with just personal use.

 

Just want to real quick jump in and say that right now at Hobby Lobby you can buy resin and silicone for around $50-$60 without the 40% off 1 item coupon (And bottles o resin dye are $5),so it's really not that pricey. With one pack of resin you could probably get (using my thigh piece example) like 6-7 of them? I make my own figurines and can say that it's really not that hard of a process. I will agree that selling the doll later on down the road might be a little dificult but honestly I don't think a lot of people would care that you were doing it to fix a part.

Edit: Meant to put that you can buy both the resin and silicone for $50-$60,separate they're like $20-$25. Again,that's without the coupon. (Love that coupon! > w < )

 

Hominivorax is absolutely correct. It is not OK, ever.

The other thing to consider is that commercially available craft resins are not likely to match in texture or weight to the resins used by every company (as I understand things, most companies have their own "house recipe"). Plus, someone who hasn't ever done any sort of casting work will likely go through more than one package of the resin and silicone before they get an acceptable part.

I would think that most doll companies would not be too happy about it. Most companies (so far as I know) will, if you show them photos of the damaged part, sell you a replacement (if they don't already sell individual parts). In the long run it would be cheaper, and there are no iffy questions when/if you try to sell the doll.

And, really, a doll part has to be absolutely pulverized before it becomes totally unfixable and the majority of repair materials are just as strong and much, much cheaper than a basic resin-casting kit. A friend of mine bought a second-hand doll with a huge crack in her spine that prevented her from posing - the amount of apoxie sculpt needed to reinforce and fix her was negligible - a dollop slightly bigger than a nickel.

 

I don't think there's any problem with it. It's just a way to further customize your doll and make them even more unique! These dolls are a canvas for our creativity, I'd say props to anyone who took a big challenge like that upon themselves, haha. I think there is a very big difference in "stealing" someone's art work to make money and customizing your doll even further.

 

Yes. Unless said piece is dust, someone is going to be able to repair it. I've seen dolls with their faces half sanded off repaired, and broken limbs, chests, and various other bits restored beautifully. Recasting a repaired part is not going to make it that much stronger than a properly repaired part. Generally, people do that sort of repair with apoxie sculpt or other epoxy clay and possibly pins/ other reinforcement, so it would probably end up at least as strong as it originally was. If whoever is doing the fix knows what they're doing, you don't need to recast in resin.

Also, I'd like to echo what Kymera said about weight/texture. Companies use specific formulae for their resins. It would probably be very difficult to reproduce an identical or near-identical weight and/or texture for a recast piece even if you were to successfully recreate the resin dye mix. And if the type of resin you were using wasn't the same (like urethane versus french or environmental), the difference would be very obvious, probably even more so than a simple repair and camouflaging paint job would. It's not as simple as mixing up a batch of resin and pouring it into a mold. (There's also the problem that shrinkage occurs in molding and casting. The recast piece wouldn't be an exact fit on the doll.)

I know all about hard to replace parts. I have a doll whose production ceased several years ago, whose company then closed. He has special, fairly delicate elf ears which were only ever made for whatever number of that sculpt were cast, and which are pretty near irreplaceable if they're damaged. (Unidoll Ark, if it matters.) I still don't think that that would justify my recasting them should something happen to the originals. It would suck for me, but I'd fix them to the best of my ability and live with them.

 

I'd be fine with it. To use you example of faces with different expressions;most certainly. If I'm gonna go to the trouble of giving my doll a new expression,ideally I want the original one to fall back on should I want to use it again. If I were to do this though I wouldn't recast nonlimited heads. The hands in my opinion are always open to it because come on,they're hands. However,I think I'd rather just get a pair of jointed ones. xD

And yes,coupons are a god send. Lol xD

One thing I'd like to call bull crap on though (Pardon my french) is the resin. To be quite honest I have three dolls from three different companies (Varying in price as well) and they all have the same texture and 'heft' to the resin,which is also the same as the stuff I use for my figurines.

 

Hmmmm.... in my opinion, the only time that would be OK for personal use is if it's an interior, structural piece NOT available from the original company for purchase or replacement; a piece that is required for the doll's structure, but is never or rarely seen and not an aesthetic or anatomic element.

For example: neck donuts in a Delf type 1 or vintage Volks SD.
You can't buy those separate anymore from the companies, and if yours breaks the glued fracture would not be able to withstand the pressure placed upon it by the elastic and S-hook and would most likely break again. It's tough to find them on the second-hand market, and without one it's very difficult to to change the eyes or head (a key element of this hobby). So, if you were to glue the donut together and make a recast of that part so that your doll maintained its functionality, I wouldn't point my finger dramatically at you and do a long, drawn-out gasp.

 

Hmm, I can't say I'd be upset if someone wanted to do something like that. Surely doing so could be legal under the various bits of copyright law that protect fair use for personal use? Like using copyrighted music or video to make an AMV, etc, not for personal profit. I'm not particularly well read on that though, so I could be completely wrong!

In fact, I'm almost certain I've heard of such a thing before. I'm sure I remember first learning about silicone molds and things because of it, but that would have been years ago.

I think how easy or hard it would be to fix whatever part of the doll you wanted to recast for personal use is irrelevant as to whether or not it's right to do so. If someone wanted to try and fix a hand by making a new hand for their super rare, expensive, impossible to find bits for doll rather then glue it back together, then that would be their choice.

 

So happily carving away on the doll to the point of making it totally unidentifiable as the original artist's sculpt, or ADDING parts (ears, noses, tails, a horse body, a snake body) out of sculpty or other materials - that's fine.
But making a different shaped hand or foot out of resin, that's bad?
I agree that its not cost efficient to replace parts - better to ask the company if they will do so. But if it's to make your OWN part to fit the doll you have, I fail to see the difference between using sculpty or resin.

 

If the company doesn't sell replacement parts, and there's no way you can fix it, then I think it would be okay to cast or somehow fabricate a new one. You really have no choice. But I see this more in the way of Doll Hospital, not copyright infringement or theft of intellectual property. However, it would be VERY difficult to match the resin, esp. for someone who isn't experienced with resin casting, which is complicated and also kind of toxic.

I don't really have an opinion about this part. As in above, it's going to be pretty hard to do, plus match the resin, etc. It would absolutely be wrong to cast a hand or foot, change it, and then sell it as an optional part.

NO. NEVER, EVER EVER EVER. If nothing else this is really disrespectful to the artist who originally sculpted it. It would be like going to a fine restaurant with a famous chef, ordering his specialty, and then pouring ketchup all over it. Recasting an entire head is just 100% wrong, no matter what. In my opinion- it is basically stealing.

This gets really complicated because I have seen some incredible mods that started out as all-original and by the time the owner was done, the sculpt is pretty unrecognizable. But I don't think this normally involves recasting; usually it is more modifying the original pieces. There is absolutely NO gray area when it comes to recasting a head, for any reason at all. IT IS WRONG, PERIOD.
I designed and sculpted my own head for the doll in my new book. It would have been SO MUCH EASIER if I had just taken an existing head, made a mold, casted it, and then modified it so it was unrecognizable. Since I'm not selling this head at this point, no one would ever have known. But it just seemed wrong to me. Instead, I started with a wad of aluminum foil on a chopstick and coated it with LaDoll clay to get my basic head shape. It was a real pain, and you don't even want to see what a rough mess the inside of the head is, but at least I know it's 100% mine.

If someone wanted to make their own doll and they took mine, made a mold of it, recasted it and then modified, it would really, really p!$$ me off, considering how I struggled and how much work it was to get the head made.

Actually, having dolls from I don't even know how many companies, there is a pretty significant difference in the texture between certain companies, and the color of the resin can vary from run to run, even within the same company. So matching the resin could be pretty difficult, unless you got lucky.

 

As long as there is no financial gain or sharing involved its A-ok in my opinion. If you bought the doll legitimately and you want to make a copy of the hand or leg in case something breaks, to practice modifications, or some other crazy reason its your property and you can do that. Its no different than digital copy on blue ray or a DVD, as long as you are not selling it or sharing it you are completely entitled.

Now whether or its safe, easy, or the resin will match is a side issue.

 

What you do with your own property is your business, so for personal use would probably be no issue.
however, I do NOT agree with recasting a head just to modify it. Just hunt down another head and do work on it.
That modified head could somehow end up on the 2nd hard market and that creates mistrust among buyers / traders.
If you wanted to make a copy of a hand or a foot just so you could have alternate hands with a modification wouldn't be bad though, as long as, once again it is never sold.

 

Hrm, this is a hard one for me. To start us off with, I want to say that I am completely against recasts.

However...

Hypothetically, if I were to make a pair of hooves for one of my dolls that comes from a company that doesn't offer fantasy parts (Let's say Iplehouse).

I would probably make a recast of the leg that I was then going to modify into a hooved part... Now, I don't know that I'd submerge the leg in silicone alone, and I would probably wrap it well in cling wrap first... but ultimately, I'd have a recast leg part.

This makes more sense to me, to recast a leg part and sculpt/create around it, rather than go to Iplehouse and say "HEY! I want to make hooves- so can you sell me a part of a doll you don't usually sell on it's own, so I can sand it and apoxy sculpt it and all in all, completely destroy it?"

If I were to sell those hooves, however, (Which I wouldn't- but again, a hypothetical), I would be 100% honest about the origins of them. I would say that I had made a cast of the nYID leg and sculpted onto it. I would use it as a base only.

If something broke, I'd try and replace the part first- failing that, I'd try and fix it. If those things were absolutely not possible, I would probably either replace the body, try and resculpt the piece, or recast it- and if I EVER had intent to sell the doll with the broken part, I would split the body from the head, and sell the individual parts, making it un-neccessary to sell the recast part.

After all, if I was the one to break the doll in the first place, what business do I have trying to get my money back on broken goods?