Sculpt design issues

Old Souldoll arms come to mind. Loved the body, and it';s still my favorite over the redesign, but the wrists just had 0 movement

 

My 1/3 hybrid doll is on a Mirodoll body, and I dream of eventually replacing it. The elbows and knees aren't pretty at all, but my biggest complaint is the oval shapped wrist joints. Why someone would design a doll that can only turn its wrist by popping the joint out of the socket is beyond me.

 

I want to get a Bobobie Apollo, but I have heard that the mobility is terrible. I also 100% want to get new bodies to replace the Luts KDF bodies I have. The single-joint classic body is just not very fun to pose and the knees and elbows like to snap into full 90 degree position at the slightest bend.

 

I'm not sure if they all have wrists designed like that, or if it's just the 1/3 male body. I think it's like that because of the shape of the forearm, but wrists are definitely something that you have to sacrifice strict anatomy for range of motion on a doll. Otherwise it's a bit "get what you pay for," but rather sturdy.

 

The shoulders on the 2012 female Super Gem body. They are paper thin and have that weird extra piece inside the upper arm that when you move the arms up will cause the shoulder to break
Overall is that body garbage, same for the male one. Bodies that have the legs strung as their own thing, in order to be able to swap out legs while the rest of the doll stays strung, are usually bad. Super floppy, tension is never right, bad posing. Who the hell swaps out legs often enough that it's needed? Most people I know that order a doll with optional fantasy legs usually stick to one thing: human OR fantasy legs.

The non-existing ankle joint on the majority of the Iplehouse bodies. Why why why?
Instead of a triple combo (foot, ankle joint, leg) you have a foot that is "connected" to a barely curved tube. Impossible to not let it slide around like crazy, makes the doll extra unstable, pest to use. And on top of that there is a resin hook inside the feet that can easily break off.
Also, the old Iplehouse knee/elbow joints that instead of being regular double-joints forced you to pull out some tube shaped piece from the limb. Super weird, doesn't work well.

The hip joint on the Dollshe Hound body. You know what, most hip joints in fact. They are either a) causing the doll to widely flop around, with the belly popping out all the time or b) cannot even be used because the doll is so tightly strung the belly NEVER moves out

The Spiritdoll Proud (male) neck, and the Proud (female) arms. The neck sticks weirdly out, like \ this just more extreme. Looks super odd.
The arms are just literal sticks with NO definition, at all. I always hide them on photos because they look awkward as hell.

 

Another Iplehouse pet peeve: the weird resin pieces informally called the "butt clickers". I think it's supposed to help maintain poses where the thighs connect to the hips, but there are far more elegant and effective ways to pull it off. It looks so awful from behind (mostly visible only when the doll is sitting), so you'd better choose your clothing pieces properly if you want your doll to wear swimwear.

 

I only have one doll and am pretty new to the hobby so I don't have much to compare to but I'll give a review of my doll's movement for reference. She's a Dollipop Chu:b body type and while I am happy with her movement, if you're looking for great mobility then this probably isn't the doll for you. Her left leg likes to kick a bit when I try to stand her straight and her legs won't fully bend to a 90 degree angle. Her arms move pretty great and when posed correctly she can sit by herself without assistance but I wouldn't trust her to stand. I think the sculpt is more for the stylized body type (chu:b seems to indicate chubby and while she is more pear shaped, I wouldn't consider her chubby) than for function. Because she is pear shaped, she also has trouble fitting into the regular yosd clothes. I love her though and I'm happy with the simple poses she is able to hold.

 

Not a specific company as many do it, but when the body joint cuts across the hips, but there isn't one in the chest. It's so awkward to pose, no slouching, no leaning naturally to one side, just really stiff. Sometimes, even sitting up straight doesn't work. Plus, it ruins the beauty of the hip "V" and/or stomach! So it's not pretty or functional and I don't get the point. I prefer a two piece body with the joint along the ribs/under the bust, but if you want a joint at the hips, then why not one in the chest as well?

 

I dislike jointed necks, I just have never seen a neck with multiple joints that looks natural (exception for when the doll is meant to be a bit more fantastical and exaggerated). I just think on a doll that's meant to look realistic multiple neck joints just look a little strange to me

 

Since Mirodoll was already mentioned, I feel their joints hardly work at all. Like elbow joints that are not large enough to actually meet the cavity it fills on any side, therefore rendering the joint part mostly decorative.
I agree with all the annoying points about iplehouse already mentioned. I really don't like anything about the engineering of those bodies and I have one again only by coincidence/convenience. There are worse bodies out there and I do think iplehouse are beautiful but I would never buy one retail. The neck sizes also make a lot of hybrids nearly impossible without neck modification.
My sq lab SG 53 is also not my favorite. First off, if you have to restring it, the torso is just a one piece brick with a thin channel drilled through
My angel of dream girl has so much mobility in her ankle joint that she can't safely stand unless she is wearing boots to stabilize the ankle.
I had, last year, a Bambicrony Bellezza body (older type) and it would not stand in an appropriate posture and had really bizarre elbow joints. Really it was like half of a ball joint.
And I almost forgot the Luts Jr. delf male, which truly surprised me in how much I didn't like it. The elbows were snappy and awkward... Snappy and awkward was a pretty good summation all around.
So much of what I would say from there is just my own sensory opinion of which dolls I like and how I like them to move. There are objectively well engineered well posing dolls that I just don't like to pose. I've had SO many dolls, most of them were eccentric in some aspects if i handled them long enough, but it's usually fun to notice the eccentricities, not as often it's bad enough to be openly frustrating.

 

Probably an unpopular opinion, but I REALLY dislike the limited movability of MNF.
So I only have 3 dolls now; my first is a Myou Dietrich, which was on the old body II version (so single-jointed), I really liked the body, but hated the limited posability, so I managed to get my hands on a Doll Leaves Pearl and a Minifee Sylvia.

DL Pearl donated her body to my Dietrich and it's amazing. The only gripe I have with the DL body is that you have that weird pop-out joint at the hips, but other than that it's a dream to pose (especially after some hot glue sueding).

The Minifee, to my surprise, has really limited posability, it's a renewal A-line body, and basically can only bend her limbs at a 45* angle at a push, which really surprised me. After all the hoo-ha about Minifees I see everywhere, I expected her to be waaayyy more limber. She can only sit at a 90* angle.

 

My one issue with a doll I currently own is aimerai doll. She’s really nice overall but her elastic channels for bending her knees are too tight! It’s the MBF04 body. The joint tends to like to snap in and out of positions due the tightness. I almost cut my finger on her. Other than that she’s fine, just wanted to eat yay finger.

 

Dollmore, I am on my hands and knees begging you to PLEASE release a new kid body with peanut joints in the knees! The special “ballet” kid bodies have double jointed knees, so I know it’s possible… I don’t even care if the range of mobility stays the same, I just want knees that can bend instead of only clicking in place at a 90 degree angle!

Other than that, I feel like every single doll body out there is lacking in some capacity so it’s interesting to see these replies! Goes to show that no matter how well the body looks or is engineered, there will always be some little problems. Let me add some more notes on other doll bodies I’ve owned:

Minifee [sculpting: 7/10, posing: 4/10]: The only thing I like about minifees are the elbow joints. I really dislike the range of motion in the chest & the legs, they can’t sit naturally, the headcap doesn’t stay on without putty, I *hate* the hand magnets (they seriously need to add some kind of twist/lock mechanism or something to prevent the hands from just falling off), and I would say the head/neck mechanism is clever- but it makes it about 100x harder to restring.

Doll Family H (in general) [sculpting: 7/10, posing: 7.5/10]: Elbow peanuts are square and thus the lower arms can’t rotate, makes it very difficult to get natural poses & limits the range of movement a lot. The 56cm 1/3 boy body also has crazy outspread hands that do not look natural at all and are impossible to make natural poses with.

Dikadoll 1/4 body [sculpting: 5/10, posing: 7/10]: When the head is positioned looking up, you can see the neck hole in the chest piece. I’m not usually the type of person who’s picky about joints that need to look totally natural, but this took some getting used to.

Angel of Dream old 1/3 boy body [sculpting: 4/10, posing: 2/10] The wrist joints were the absolute worst. They were weirdly oval shaped & could only bend at 90 degree angles even when sueded. I don’t know if their new 1/3 boy body suffers from the same design flaws, but at least it looks a lot better, sculpt-wise.

Luts kid delf body (the older ones) [sculpting: 6/10, posing: 6/10]: The single jointed knees are pretty wonky, the elbow peanuts are square and unnatural, and sueding is basically required to get any range of motion in the hands.

5Star Doll 1/6 bodies [sculpting: 5/10, posing: 5/10]: The wrist movements left a lot to be desired, and some fantasy parts were not very well engineered.

Fanff_11 Model 60 [sculpting: 10/10, posing: 7/10]: No forward movement in the chest joint, and no mobility joints. Also, the hooks in the hands & feet tend to scrape out some of the resin on the inside if you don’t orient them in a certain way when pulling on them. Feet also can’t rotate much.

Edit: These all sound so negative but I really do like most of these bodies a lot lol

 

I only have three different bodies. The Maskcat 1/3 is by far my favorite, enough that I have two of them, in different colors! Gorgeous sculpting, very elegant posing, incredible stability. Since that body was my first, that's pretty much the standard by which every other body I owned is measured.

The IOS Class 50 body I own is probably the one I dislike the most, though it's got more to do with aesthetics than poseability. I am not a fan of the three-part torso, and I think the body tends to flop forward. That said, it's still a pretty good body IMO. I don't have issues at the ankles or wrist.

My Argodoll plus-size body is the poorest poser and was initially the least stable, though to be fair it's still an incredible body (and it's forte lies in its aesthetics: plus-size body are uncommon and it's a particularly gorgeous one). I think it's a bit of a shame that the knees are single-jointed, though. I am not a fan of the hands either, though I plan to replace them with Maskcat ones, which I like better and has a ball at the wrist to increase mobility. I replaced the feet, which are IMO too small for such a huge body, with Maskcat ones, which are bigger, and it seems to have helped stability.

 

The legs on the Luts Honey Delf type 3 body are so obnoxiously, unnaturally stiff. They are fixed at shoulder width apart, which massively limits posing. I was SO sad when I realized that a lot of the new Luts bodies seem to be like this.

 

Calling out my Broken Maiden Moth and Giddeous Project Baughn (two of my FAVORITE dolls!!!) for the nearly unforgivable sin of having a hole in the neck of the head instead of a slot. So I have to remove the s hook (risking the whole doll coming unstrung) every single time I want to remove the head.

I never would have thought it would be such a pain, but it's caused me so much frustration over the years. If they weren't both very limited artist dolls I would seriously consider modding a slot in there myself.