Trouble connecting with company faceups?

mood. so far company vs my own face ups have been a bit of a gamble for me. ive got instances of both loving and hating in both directions.

dunno the doll or company in question, but personally ive found that making sure i love the sculpt of the head without the faceup has helped me connect with the doll regardless. one of my earlier dolls i loved the face up, but was meh about the sculpt (this was before I'd realized i had thoughts on the matter) when i got the doll the faceup was missing all the things i loved from the photos (example brows werent as thick and they had a more healthy pink blushing. still a lovely faceup but i just never connected to him)

then on the flipside, on of the ones i got blank ive been struggling with giving them a faceup i like for years now. think ive wiped them about 5 times at this point cause their features are so fine. luckily i still enjoy the sculpt so never been tempted to just sell them like other dolls ive had troubles with.

as for connecting with the company faceups, ive got a good handful of them that just fit once i got the right eyes for them.

 

You could try looking up the quality of the company faceups to help you make your choice and to avoid disappointment. The quality of the actual faceup you get can vary wildly depending on the company. Some companies do very high quality and consistent faceups that look exactly like the promo photos while others can be quite… disappointing…

 

Can you give the face sculpt that you really enjoy looking at a very natural almost no make up look such as eyebrows, eyelashes, and a bit of lip coloring to you can still appreciate its natural beauty while giving the face a face up? I never did my own face up, but I find I look to see if I will enjoy the sculpt of the face before I buy it. I saw volks with an amazing face up, but didn't like the sculpt 100%. I think if I were to get a face sculpt that had a face up that changed the overall features of the sculpt I would like the doll, but I'm not sure. I did once buy a doll when I was more new to the hobby that I thought I liked his face sculpt, but it was actually his face up I liked. I like my doll still, but his face isn't my favorite. My favorite part of him right now would be his face up.

 

I’ve done the majority of my own faceups, and that is certainly fun and a good way to get exactly what you want out of a sculpt. But I have also purchased dolls with company faceups I loved for the diversity, and to freshen up my collection a bit from time to time. It’s worked out really well for me to have a wide range of artistic styles in my crew, so company faceups are a good option now and then. I certainly haven’t noticed any bonding issues with sculpts I didn’t paint myself. I just figure each sculpt, like their character, is unique so I have no problem connecting with them regardless of who painted them. Besides, if I ever found that to be the case, I’d just wipe their faceup and re-do it myself But fortunately, that has never happened and I’ve loved every company faceup I’ve gotten.

 

I’m on the same thought train as @PoeticSoul , diversity is amazing and wiping a faceup is always an option. I have a mix of dolls I’ve painted and ones that have the company faceup. Sometimes I even enhance the company faceup by adding a little something to it if it’s not vibing. I love each sculpt first, though, so I know the faceup can keep getting changed and I’ll still love the doll. Even though a few of them have taken years for me to paint a faceup I’ve actually loved, the process was still fun and connected me more with the sculpt. One of my grails has the company faceup and I still adore her and have bonded through other means like wig, eyes, and outfits.

 

Hmm, not with company faceups- if I'm buying a doll with the company faceup it's because i like it, and I'm not really planning on making the doll into a character other than how they're sold. But I'd hesitate to commission a faceup for similar reasons; I'd be concerned about if my ideas were well communicated to the artist enough to achieve what I wanted for the character I want to make, so I'd just do it myself in those instances. For most of the dolls I have/ want, I'm already attached to the characters they're to represent, so I don't worry so much about connecting with them with a company versus self done faceup.

 

I do usually like dolls I paint myself more than the ones that come with a faceup. If I do buy a doll with faceup (which does happen if I really like the faceup or if it's an in-stock doll ) I need to find some other customizing project because I only "bond" if if I can personalize them a bit. Maybe if you get your doll with a faceup, you can instead paint a nice manicure or make a wig or something along those lines so you still get that bonding experience.

 

I don't paint faceups myself (although I do tattoos, nail polish, blushing). But I always tend to buy the blank doll rather than company faceup and ship it off for a custom face up. Honestly the only company default face ups I feel I really love are Prime Frame's faceups (unfortunately I got my heads on 2nd hand market and were blank).

I am not sure if they still do custom but my favorite doll and favorite face up was a custom crobi doll faceup back in like 2009. So soft and delicate and fit my character well. I would buy a custom from them again.

 

Usually I’m with company faceups- however after Naran came with a strange crack I think I’ve come around to getting non company faceups (I sent her out to a friend to be repainted, she turned out so nice and it was great to not have that big of a time zone barrier when communicating )

 

So, almost all the dolls I own I have done their Faceup myself, however I have a couple with company faceups that are either comically long term placeholders by now or I actually just like them a lot, even if I feel I could do something with more personality, and some I just like completely, I don't need or want something different. Now, it's by far the minority here, still, I think you know yourself best. If you feel you're taking a risk on it why not weigh the pros and cons and the financial investment. If you feel the price for the Faceup is fair even if you end up wiping it after some time, seems like you can go for it. For myself, if I like a company Faceup that much, it can be worth it just to have it on my doll in person for a while. I can use it to get me started with my character and then as I'm feeling more certain about them maybe I want to redo it for whatever reason. Sometimes you can just repaint it with the same general appearance but it's your own work and that makes it better, or there may have been some details you prefer to change and you can modify your version appropriately. Just my perspective! Hope it's helpful!

 

I used to think I would never buy a doll with a company Faceup, but now I have two: Elfdoll Hazy and Dollmore Lacy Mio.
With the Hazy it doesn’t bother me. It’s a basic standard faceup, and it looks natural and suits the sculpt.
On the other hand, I regret getting the Lacy Mio. I wanted the glamour body and figured it would be cheaper to get the full set LE Lacy Mio rather than get clothes, shoes, glamour body, etc…. But I really don’t feel interested in the doll because of the dramatic faceup. Since it’s an LE fullest, I’m selling her rather than wiping her face.
Honestly though, I think if you are considering a basic company faceup and it’s not terribly expensive, there is not much harm in trying it. The basic faceup can be added to or completely wiped if it turns out to not be what you want.

 

It's very subjective. Some people are happy with default faceups. Personally, I find them lacking in any soul, without the care, detail, or expressiveness that a proper artist interpretation innately has. That's not to say every person understands your vision; I think we've all had at least one commission go awry, but at the end of the day, nothing compares to custom work that speaks to you on a personal level.

Good news is, company faceups are generally inexpensive, so if it doesn't work out for you having it repainted by someone else isn't any real loss.

 

I always wanted to paint and customize my own toys, so when I got my first BJD, I wanted to paint them myself. However, back then (late 2003-2004ish), there were no inexpensive companies like there are today. I was scared of ruining my first dolls, because to me the amount I paid for them was exaggerated (but I loved each well enough to find it justifiable, to purchase them). So, I ended up purchasing my first three with a custom face up from their respective companies. I felt that was enough of a compromise, to have something that was specifically painted for me, even though I wasn't the one painting it -- it wasn't an actual "commision," but part of the companies' doll sale features. I never thought about commissioning any individual artist, because then I would rather do the face up myself. Once I lost the fear or ruining a doll, by painting a lot of OT fashion dolls and Volks Dollfie fashion line, I got my fourth doll blank.

As a traditional artist for all my life, it wasn't easy for me to accept (back then) that I sucked terribly at painting tiny faces, and that the learning curve was far steeper than I had anticipated. Owning dolls that were not painted by me didn't make my feelings for them lesser, than the dolls I've customized and painted myself. My first few BJD are still incredibly precious to me, and I wouldn't modify nor repaint my first two, ever (even if they had severely yellowed fixative or chips! Which, they don't so far, thank goodness, after a thousand years in my possession). Having said that, I collect a lot of OT fashion dolls, that are mostly mass produced and all look exactly the same (with varying degrees of not exactly similar due to factory errors), so I don't mind owning dolls that are not specially painted for me, or by me. It doesn't make me appreciate them any less, However, I wouldn't pay someone else to do a face up for me now -- I would have paid companies to do custom face ups for me (I don't know if that is a thing anymore), but I wouldn't commission individual artists, because then I would feel like I might as well try myself. I will never be a professional face up artist, and my hands shake too much to do a clean job, but I don't mind that. I like painting and will always paint things even if I end up doing scribbles, squiggles and doodles. (:

 

I feel the same. My dolls represent my original characters and a basic company faceup just doesn’t capture them well. They need something specific to them. Even if that means my own faceup isn’t as professional as default would be.

if I found a company faceup that I felt was right for my character, I wouldn’t hesitate to go for it. If you end up not liking it, you can always wipe and redo it.

 

Honestly... I haven't found a company faceup yet I've really liked, or liked enough to want it on my doll. I actually ended up trading a doll because she had a company faceup in perfect condition and I couldn't bear the thought of wiping it, haha! So I traded her for a blank doll from the same company in a diff skintone.

There are definitely some company faceups I really love -- Harucasting, Withdoll, Supiadoll and Peaks Woods are a few that come to mind... but yeah, I think for me half the fun is customizing everything so I don't want to pay extra just to do more work, lol!

 

While I like doing faceups on my floating heads, for full dolls I always go with a company faceup. They look the best to me. An unpopular opinion for sure lol, but the faceup is what draws me in.