Uncanny Valley

Okay, I have to retract my earlier statement. I've seen a BJD or some sort of similarly structured artist doll that freaks me out. ._.; I don't want to make any direct postings in fear of offending someone in the off chance that they're lurking about here somewhere >.>; But it's a long, thin necked doll and it's just..... so disproportionate that it scares me TT-TT;

(Oh and as for talking babydolls - Baby Alive has scared me ever since they gave her that weird anime-esque makeover and made her mouth kinda half-move when she talks. CREEPY >.< )

 

I have not experienced the uncanny valley feeling with my doll, or any other BJD. But I know that friends of mine get that feeling when around my dolls. I think that is the only reason a couple of my friends will not get a BJD. They love them, but are slightly afraid....

 

Uncanny valley, thanks for teaching me about this, I never knew the word. I think dead people are the worst for me, but maybe thats because I hate death. Oh yeah, and I tend to philosophy about those things too much so it only gets worse... There was once a soul there, but its gone now. So weird. Also are ghosts in the uncanny valley? The freak me out so bad that I can't sleep anymore. Like, is it human? is it dead or alive? is it even really there? Because there certainly is something wrong there. I am truly amazed by how our mind can trick us into so many things. If it is a trick that is... ><"

The newborns are just absurd, it's too realistic to be cute and funny.

 

Reborns/newborns whatever those dollies are scare me! Ugh, watched a youtube video of people painting veins on them. I respect people if they like them they just freak me out. I have problems with most baby dolls as a whole though.

The only minimee thats ever bothered is the Milla Jovovich one because of the way her mouth was sculpted. Something about it unnerves me.

I don't agree completely with putting BJDs in the same category as dead people in most respects but I do understand how for some people they could look at both and see the same lack of "life" within them. I find ball jointed dolls very peaceful and beautiful and I've never seen a dead body so I can't comment on that... Some bisque/celluloid and dolls of those times (when those materials were used primarily) creep me out. Usually because theres something off about their eyes. They seem empty and cold.

Having Hakon with BRIGHT green eyes and no face-up made me double take once or twice when I first got him.

I don't believe that dolls have souls exactly but I do feel we give them a sort of power or life in a way only we can really see. But that goes back to my weirdo (kids at school always ask, "Are you Christian?" "No." "Are you Jewish?" "No." and to that I get responses ranging from awkward looks to "Then what the -naughty word- are you?") religious beliefs that if you truly believe in something it validates it in a sense and makes it real. Maybe not for everyone else but that makes it true to you. Hard to describe.
I've never heard the term Uncanny Valley.

 

I was going to say something about how cold and empty eyes of deceased look too, and how it indeed isn't a puppet. And then I remembered something. There is this museum or catacombs underneath a city in Europe somewhere and they stock mummies there. Okay it's not a cute subject, but one of the mummies is that of a little girl. She died many years ago and has been preserved remarkably well, and she is just a sweet little doll. I don't know if I am allowed to put a link here, because it is the picture of a mummy after all. Just let me know if it's okay and I will look her up again. And I am really sorry if it has already been mentioned before.

You know, I kind of like the subjects you guys talk about here. This isn't a childish forum at all, you guys have some pretty deep conversations and I love it! Keep it up!

 

I started thinking about this the other day when my friend Josie was explaining her fear of dolls to me. She said something along the lines of, "I don't get why people want to recreate humans in a smaller form and... own them, have them in their house, or carry them around." She said it seemed weird and wrong to have something that looked human but wasn't.
I don't know why, but I still have trouble understanding her reasoning. People draw, paint, sculpt, and otherwise represent human figures all the time, and I can't see anything odd or wrong about it. But her thinking on it definitely falls into the Uncanny Valley idea, in my opinion.
I'll admit that when I saw a BJD for the first time, in a photograph a friend showed me, it creeped me out. I thought he was too too realistic, and his owner had painted furrowed brows on him so he looked angry, and I felt really uncomfortable looking at him. But later I found myself going back to look at the picture because even if he scared me, I thought he was beautiful... and I wanted to see more.
Now, even the most angry/vengeful BJDs don't scare me at all. It could be that I'm just used to seieng them now,l but I think it mostly has to do with the fact that I know the mechanics of them. I've handled many dolls, and I've unstrung and restrung and done faceups on dolls, so it's hard for me to have a "fear of the unknown" kind of feeling, or think they're too realistic. I mean, if I can take it apart and put it back together, it's not scarily human-like. XD

 

Well my dolls do not fall into the catogory of the Uncanny Valley. They do seem a live, and sometimes when you are experiencing the harshness in the world, they are the only one's there that listens to you. And for those who find people's doll's creepy should just keep their trap shut and attempt on not saying anything hurtful cause you can be an eyesore if you admitted that the doll looked hideous, ugly or creepy. Cause people who buy these dolls love these with all their hearts which is why they basically buy them.

And if you do recieve insults directed to your doll by idiots, I suggest you don't care. Cause it's your doll, who cares what others think, unless you are a vain person. But I personally don't think dolls fall into the Uncanny Valley.

 

I have to admit, the first time I saw a BJD, a picture online, I had a very Uncanny Valley type reaction. It was a Volks Super Dollfie (Nono, I think), with a very pointed nose and chin and oddly-shaped eyes. It creeped me out because although it looked somewhat human, it also looked very anime-esque and surreal.

After a while I found some of the more natural looking Volks sculpts and then found some other companies, and none of these created the same Uncanny Valley reaction in me. I still don't like dolls that look too anime-like (which is weird because I like anime, lol).

So I guess I understand why some people are creeped out. It's not like they're insulting your doll, it's just that they have an instinctive reaction that they cannot control. I think everyone's Uncanny Valley falls at different spots so it's not fair to judge someone just because they are creeped out by something.

I know if I had a friend who was genuinely disturbed by a doll, I would simply not keep the doll out around them, and if I took my doll out I would try to keep it away so as not to creep out people.

 

Oh you mean the Golden Girl or whatever it is they call her? The one in the glass case? If I didn't know she was a living person at one point, I probably wouldn't be so unnerved by her, but knowing she was someone's baby that died (albeit several decades ago) makes it very sad and a little creepy.

(Not sure how on-topic this is but,) I ended up watching Rozen Maiden, Rozen Maiden Traumen, and Overture in the span of two nights and it occurred to me that, for the most part through the show KNOWING they're dolls - living, breathing pieces of resin - doesn't really bother me, but once limbs start getting ripped off and those ball joints pop out, it gets unsettling. Not like someone getting his arm cut off and blood spraying everywhere, I've become a little desensitized to that, I suppose, from every action movie relying on that to some degree, but seeing the joint pop out and the lack of blood, and in the case of Traumen, the lack of Response to it, is very very unnerving to me.

Or maybe I'm just rambling. I'm not sure >.>;

 

I'm gonna check that show out soon, I've seen some clips of it and I agree it's kinda... well it makes you think. But I like the idea of it, and the way the potray it.

I don't think she was known as the golden child by the way, I looked it up. Her nickname is 'Sleeping Beauty', who died in 1920 at the age of two. She now lies in the Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo in Sicily. Her real name was Rosalia Lombardo. I just know some of you want to look her up. But please know that I have warned you, so don't go blame me if it makes you go 'eeeek'. I saw her and I probably won't forget that sweet face ever, Uncanny Valley all the way there. Don't you agree, like, what do you think?

I think I am the one that rambles, but at least it makes for a good conversation (hopefully) :P

 

I couldn't think of what is was they called her, it's just what came to mind because of her coloring ^.^;; From what I understand it resulted from an experiment in preservation involving some arsenic and other materials that no one is quite sure of anymore.

Rozen Maiden does make you think, especially if you're following the thread about if Dolls have souls. Especially in Traumen when they go more in-depth about life and death as a doll and their souls going into darkness. I'd definitely suggest watching it - I found it on Google Videos, but from what I can tell only the first season has an English dubbing.

Oh and not to stray too far off topic: I saw a picture of someone cosplaying one of the rozen characters with an Anime-faced mask.... to me, it's creepy. Eyes that big shouldn't exist in RL ._.; http://www.geocities.jp/kakkie_corner/kigurumi/kanaria04.JPG

 

I've seen images of poor little Rosalia and many other child mummies from around the world before, and while I find them sad and sometimes even hauntingly beautiful, they don't seem to trigger an Uncanny Valley response in me -- maybe the effect would be different in person instead of looking at photographs, but I rather doubt it since I've never really had a serious UV squick from open-casket funerals: they're sad, but they don't creep me out.

Getting back on topic to BJDs in particular, I think someone further back in this thread mentioned something about unnatural poses giving them a very UV sort of discomfort? I was rather interested to find something similar going on with myself recently, now that I finally have a realistic human-looking SD girl. With my anthro tiny, somehow since she's so obviously a fantastical unreal creature, it doesn't weird me out if she ends up in poses that a real human body could never hold. With my SD girl, on the other hand, there are definitely some triggers. I'm OK with removing pieces, it doesn't bother me to see her with her headcap off, or feet/hands removed, or even taking her head off entirely; any of those things seem to transform her into "doll under construction" in my eyes and it's OK; and I'm absolutely not bothered by floating heads and spare feet and eyes lying about, those are just obvious non-lifelike loose parts. But when she's fully assembled, eyes and wig all in place, and something "unnatural" happens to one of her limbs -- flopping out to the side, coming completely and visibly out of joint, etc. -- it definitely bothers me, and I have to fix it quickly so she's back in a more natural-looking pose. It's still nowhere near at the level of, say, gut-churning Reborn heebie-jeebies for me, but there's definitely an Uncanny-Valley-ish "something is WRONG here, fix it fix it oh please fix it!" edge of palpable discomfort.

 

All I remember, from the first time I saw a BJD on the net (it was this gorgeous, gorgeous doll, what I can only assume was a custom or limited, that was done up like an elf or sylph with pale skin and these gorgeous markings all over his body) was how delicate and beautiful they were. They looked like they'd break if breathed on them wrong, and I, being someone who was remarkably hard on her toys as a kid, was really glad they were so expensive, so I wouldn't be so tempted to want one.

They don't remind me of humans at all, the joints are obvious and out there, and the majority of them are so perfectly beautiful they couldn't possibly creep me out.

However, most of my friends are the complete opposite. I've got to the point where I don't talk to them about my BJD's at all, despite my excitement, because I get tired of hearing about how much I paid for something so "(profanity) creepy". I'm a geek and a gamer grrl as well, so I've got plenty of odd, eccentric hobbies on top of the abjd's, and there's only so much raining on my parade I'll take before I stop sharing my excitement.

On the opposite side of the coin, most actual porcelin dolls creep me the heck out. My mom, about ten years ago, was on a home shopping network kick for about two years and all we would do is buy dolls every week. There was one that, I swear, used to follow me around the room with her eyes when I wasn't looking. There were only three maybe out of about thirty dolls that didn't freak me out, and unsurprisingly, those were the ones that were delicate, slim and, now that I think of it, vaguely similair in build to BJD's.

 

This is an interesting topic to say the least. How strange it is though that I just started seeing the term "Uncanny Valley" popping up all over the place. Here I thought it was a comic series or something. *laugh* Personally I don't get it, but it might be my brain just works like that. The only time I ever think something (a doll, a picture, etc) is "creepy" isn't because it reminds me of something dead, although that would help, but because it isn't artistically pleasing to my eye.

Certain older dolls, like porcelain ones, creep me out simply because I find them to be ugly, stupid, or they just bug me. More often than not when I don't like something I call it "creepy" for lack of a better description as to why I don't like it and I realize there's no reason to fear such things, but sometimes it can be unnerving, but it's not like I believe that whole "murdering doll" thing or whatever other horror movie watchers seem to think. (It helps that I don't watch scary movies I suspect.)

I don't think there's anything creepy about BJDs at all and frankly I find it shocking that anyone could. Then again, as humans, we all have a difference of opinion as everyone sees things differently. Ah well, all I know is, I think BJD's are too beautiful and too soulful to be creepy or evil or whatever.

 

BJDs don't have this effect on me (although I'm sure it has some contribution to why some of my friends think they're creepy) but reborns sure do.

[Edit: not in a "they're evil" way, to clarify - just in a literal uncanny valley - like, whoa, they look way too real, but they're HARD and they don't move and that's kind of weird. I don't know why Minimees don't do that, maybe because they aren't striving for quite that level of realism. Or maybe because they aren't babies? Who knows.]

 

Whoooa. I recant. The moving about bit does freak me out. It is really cool in terms of animation, but something about the not-quite-right-movement, and knowing it's a doll that's doing it, is wrong. The limbs aren't lining up exactly right, and yet parts of it are SO right, that it's also freaksome.

But at the same time, I'm appreciating the work it took to make the feature!

I will say, though, that I think all stop motion animation is a little bit unnerving, because the frame rate (I think this one is an ESPECIALLY good example) isn't continuous. Old films often hit the Uncanny Valley -- and contemporary horror movies, like The Ring, etc, still do this -- because the frame rate runs a little bit slower than our brains process images and that tends to mess with our heads. In contrast, running faster than our brains process images often makes things look super-real.

 

I have a Lati Yellow, I've had one experience of uncanny valley with her. I think of her as a doll and have no problem with that. But when I take her eyes out to change them I sometimes have to give them a push from the front, when doing that it really freaks me out as it looks like her eyes are rolling back in her head. I definitely get a bit squeemish about that.

 

Hmmmm...! I may be the odd one out here, but there's not much of anything that gives me the UV effect. Seriously.
I have both Himstedt and reborn dolls and I see them as art. I don't get the heebie-jeebies at all with them. (I have gotten almost ALL the comments related here about them, though by visitors or observers) I always find it very puzzling when people react that way to an inanimate object.
And I haven't been around many corpses, but the times I have I simply felt sad for the loss and maybe a little irritated by the fake makeup on them. But, never scared.
I guess I'm not a very superstitious person? I am very much an artist and seem to focus on asthetics of dolls more than anything. And as far as corpses, ghosts and such...I'm pretty practical minded and know that a corpse is a corpse~~the empty shell, nothing more. Ghosts don't exist and the spirit realm has nothing to do with my dolls.
I guess you could say I've never visited the Uncanny Valley..!

 

Haha, thats a good way of putting it! When I say that reborns and certain bisque dolls scary the poopy out of me I don't mean to demean it or say anything against it. I respect them and frankly the fact that they are JUST so perfect is what frightens me. Some figurines scare me too. And also to clarify by scare I mean UV me which in some cases also frightens me.
I think the reason I didn't have as many UV problems at the beginning of my venture into the BJD hobby was because 1.) I was looking for a different sort of art form with more than one facet 2.) I had already been exposed to a lot of Blythe/Pullip and Dollcena (*shudders* I do not like those dolls) so big eyes didn't really scare me 3.) I don't get scared too easily especially not with things like ghosts/spirits and what not* and lastly 4.) I was introduced to BJDs through the whole manga and anime culture so lanky and feminine males didn't bother me as much which is what I find a lot of people say is creepy/UV about BJDs (as far as I remember, I was in early to mid grade 6, that was 4 years ago, and I have memory problems)
*By this I mean the prospect of there being such a thing. I think a UV experience sort of makes us question these kinds of things which can lead to fear.

 

I also find that what creeps people out are some of the things that doll owners take for granted, like the ability to open their heads and change their eyes, etc. For us, that's just a technical part of owning them (sometimes a really fun part of owning them! but still a technicality) but I find that most people are SUPER creeped by that aspect. Not only do they stop looking (as) human while still being humanoid with their headcaps off and their eyes out, but the idea of things interfering with the eye - people being poked in the eye, empty eyes, etc - tends to freak people out.