Switching characters

I did this yesterday!

I got my Zaoll Luv in February. I planned for her to be a punk rock girl named Roxxi, gave her a few traits but nothing too deep. Lately, I’ve not been feeling drawn to her character at all, but I still love the doll, so yesterday I randomly decided to wipe everything and paint her like one of my long term but I shelled characters, who is s cousin to one of my oldest dolls. I tried different wigs and eyes on her, and now instead of being a 23 year old rocker with blue hair and brown eyes, heavy makeup and tattoos, she’s a sweet blond haired, blue eyed 15 year old ballet dancer!

 

I'm in the process of doing this!

I bought my Mystic Kids Francis because the sculpt fit my one OC named Morty. I even got him blank so I could get him a character faceup and bought him multiple outfits and a wig and a new pair of eyes specifically for the character. Well, long story short, he didn't fit Morty at all. Just looking at him in his "complete" state (aside from the lack of faceup) made me upset because I couldn't bond with him like that. I decided to use him as a guinea pig for some Victorian patterns I was working on and changed his eyes back to the blue ones he arrived with and I realized how perfectly it fit. I made him a black yarn wig (which I will be replacing cause it's horribly done) and realized that even though his sculpt might be a little too "cute", he would make a great novella accurate Edward Hyde. So now my little Eddie is slowly getting period accurate clothing and a faceup to match and i've been able to bond with him much more than I could before.

 

I didn't have much of a character behind one of my dolls besides decora/Nagomu inspired. Try as I might, I couldn't bond with her.


Then after some extensive reversible modifications and a new wig, she became a character with a complicated family and a doll I enjoy.

 

Yes, I've done this many times, although I went in the opposite direction of the original poster; I had dolls made after characters and later just reverted them to dolls. I realized it's better for me personally to attach a character to a doll after receiving the doll rather than attaching a doll to a preexisting character (though there are exceptions to this).

Probably my most "extreme makeover" was my Souldoll Tiffee, who went from being a prissy blonde girl to a melancholic black-haired boy. I also swapped characters with a Sleeping Elf Bonbon; she began as a good fairy and ended as an evil one when the doll just wasn't working for me with that particular faceup/wig/eyes anymore.

Overall, rehauling has been a very positive experience, and reminded me in many ways why I fell in love with a particular sculpt in the first place. Also it's just fun as heck to look at old photos and marvel at the difference!

 

My doll first came with the company face up, I named her, then change her face up, I changed her name as well.
It wasn't a dramatic change like new body or modding the sculpt, but only the face up and some body blushing.
Giving her freckle and new colour of facial hair (brows and lashes) made her change a lot, I couldn't believe how I felt like it's like changing a race of someone. It was really satisfying to see all the changes assemble (new wig, clothing style, I also brushes freckles on her body). I think the idea of making character up is really fun!
When you have a character for your doll there maybe more limitation (e.g. you love this certain clothing so much but it won't fit your doll's character), but that makes the things 'fit' your doll more rewarding. That 'THIS IS IT' feeling is great

 

I kind of changed characters with my doll! When I got him, I established his character but it didn’t really click and I wasn’t bonding with him. I changed his personality and story which helped so much, but his aesthetics remained mostly the same!

 

I've changed up my dolls so many times. They'll stay the same for a while until I come up with a new idea and switch them. Sometimes their personalities and names change, other times they don't. It really depends on the doll.

And sometimes the new idea doesn't stick and they revert back to what they were previously. Until I get a new idea that is The reason I do this is because I feel like it keeps my collection from getting stagnant without having to purchase new dolls for new characters. As much as I would love to get dolls for all the characters I have whims about, it's just not a reality. But if it's a character that can't be made with dolls I already have, then I consider getting a new one

 

A couple of times, yeah.
My second doll, a Mystic Kids Milo, was originally housing my main character, but then I tried putting that character into my third doll, and used the first doll as the main guy's brother. Been the same since.
My third doll, a Mystic Kids Mandel, has been through 2 or 3 different characters. At first, I just played around and gave him a bit of a personality. Pretty soon I tried a different set character for him, the one I stated above, for like a month or two, but it just did NOT stick. I then dove in and made up a fully new character for him that has stuck forever since and will always stick solely for him. :3
I swapped out different eyes, wigs, and clothing styles for each character swap. I feel like they settled right in and developed accordingly, set into their proper sculpts.
I actually plan on getting another Mystic Kids head for the character I tried using on both, settling that issue out finally.

I have a floating head that I plan on using for a specific character, but if it doesn't stick for her, I'll happily figure out other plans. I feel like a doll won't mean anything to me unless it feels like it really sticks. If it don't feel right, I don't feel a connection with the doll and it's a sad feeling.

 

I've overhauled a character before, like within the past year.

I used to have this transfem girl named Emilia and I'd given her a flat chest body too because I had this idea of doing photostories of her transition, which never panned out. I was super attached to her, until I came back after deciding to leave the hobby and found I wasn't attached to her character anymore. So I gave her a new faceup and instantly decided she'd be genderfluid instead. Now she's on the flat-chested body most of the time and wears a shorter wig (still meets her shoulders tho).

I know some people experience the doll speaking to them, and this was kind of like that. There'd always been something that really didn't feel right with Emilia, but the second I gave her black "lipstick" and changed her name to Emery it was like suddenly everything made sense. There's not this heavy cloud hanging over her anymore, and the new character I changed her to is just overall more joyful and it's easier to imagine her as such.

 

I bought my first doll with the idea of making her a particular character, but I went through a lot of pain with my housemate that I thought was my friend but ended up stealing from me (long story, I won't go into it).
My doll's wig went missing somewhere in the process and she stayed in her box for 10 years.
That character just brought back painful memories for me, so I changed her eyes and got her a new wig, so she's eased me back into the hobby after so long.
I don't know what her new character will be, but I'm enjoying the process of discovering it while handling her. she's already decided she really likes her current wig - if I try to take it off, the wig cap and the back of her head comes off with it!
I'm glad I decided to give her a new character rather than sell her. We've been through some tough times together!

 

Yes, I have. After spending 12 years with my main couple of human dolls and a long time feeling like their characters didn't click with me anymore, I changed them both and, even if it took courage, it was truly for the better.
I had to change their face-ups, wigs, clothing styles... almost everything except their sculpts, which I still love like the first day I saw them. Now they really bring me that same joy that they gave me back in the day and having them inspires me to create and be more active in this hobby.

 

I’m pretty determined to never buy a doll without a solid character in mind first, which has worked out very well for me over my many years in this hobby. I have a large-ish collection of 55 dolls, and it’s only happened once! But boy, when it did, it DID! I purchased him to be a delightfully fun and cute fem boy and figured his sculpt was absolutely perfect for that…or so I thought. But once he arrived he refused, as in completely and utterly refused, to become that character. It came as a total shock to me and I had to rethink everything from wig to faceup to wardrobe. This blank doll was utterly determined to be an older adult, nature-inspired, forest hippie instead. Now all my female dolls swoon over him.

 

I reshelled 3 dolls: The first two I ever bought and one I bought second-hand.

Originally, I told myself that I just needed two dolls, one boy and one girl, and they'd be my time-hopping characters who can have multiple looks throughout time and it will still be canon. Think "Good Omens." But some time last year I decided that I want to shell them into other characters that I've written. I figured it would be cheaper than me trying to get two more new dolls for those characters especially when they work out so nicely.

The process involved having a plan in mind. I knew who the "new" characters would be and what they would look like. The first step is to wipe the old faceup and start fresh. A new wig also helps to completely hit that reset button. I am still looking for clothes that will be specific to the new characters, but just a new faceup and a new wig can go a really long way to get you to see your dolls in a different light.

 

I totally overhauled all my dolls in 2020. I was sad and isolated, and all my dolls were from a very bad point in my life, and from a story that was written between me and an ex I had to go scorched earth with. So I was surrounded by expensive recreations of characters from a very damaging time in my life. Which was less than ideal.

I sold an absolute ton of them, but I overhauled some. My Iplehouse Kamau became a different character with a faceup. My doll chateau adult body got a new head and some mods to make it femme, and became Mallory. My impldoll/loongsoul hybrid became Acyra, again, after major mods took place. My Withdoll Adriana became Vidania, and got a different body, and my Withdoll body got a new head and a trip to the dye pot. I don’t think I kept much more than that, truthfully. I had a Twigling gamine head that I’d been lost on what to do with, that ended up getting a Twigling body and working as Ness.

To do this, I basically took everyone apart, and tried new heads on different bodies, and new eyes and wigs until something clicked. And I Still do this. Valentine was never supposed to be a doll at all—he stole a head and went on a floating body. Glasya came together with a traded head that I didn’t really have a plan for, and a body I just knew I wanted. The count stole a head and a body as well—I just knew I wanted to paint his glorious beard. My collection is constantly in flux, and now that I do my own faceups, any doll really can be any character as I see fit. I do find some dolls lock into a character—Syn and Ouranos aren’t going to shift any time soon, for instance, but Aura hasn’t locked in as any particular head yet, so we cycle.

 

I have in the past, but with my current set I don't think I could? Particularly for the four that are original characters, they've been them so long that I don't think I could separate the character from the doll.

 

I had to do a complete overhaul of one of my dolls in the last year+ after being dumped by my former best friend/roleplay partner. The doll was based off of one of her characters that was part of the friend group we’d created years ago. Couldn’t bring myself to keep the character around, but still liked the doll and didn’t want to get rid of her, so I dusted off an old OC of mine I hadn’t done anything with in over a decade (so she was basically a blank slate bahaha), and got the doll a new wig, clothes, as well as got her repainted. Course that was after keeping the doll shelved for several months since I couldn’t really bear to look at her for a while.

I also more recently changed my Dollmore Narsha Zihu to a different character since I decided to reshell the character I originally got the doll for to a different sculpt. Worked out well for me since i was previously tempted to get another Zihu to create into the character I made the one I already had into. Pretty nice when you can basically recyle a doll to something else you’re interested in.

 

I actually have a plan to overhaul one of them, it's a Migidoll Cho. I became detached from the character that is currently being shelled and have already written a new character for him, new wardrobe, etc. I still need to buy those items when I get the chance, but the hardest part is to finding the right face up artist that I believe will capture the new character best. I have a couple in mind, but I'm still deciding! My goal is to completely reshell the doll by at least next year