Yellowed or just "mellowed"?

Yellowing and mellowing are really the same thing - the gradual reduction in red pigment. The change is inevitable though keeping a doll out of the light will slow it down. Most companies have improved their resin so the change is slower and less drastic - most dolls don’t turn banana yellow these days. The hobby still uses the term yellowing to mean a loss in red pigment.

 

I have always thought that the two changes you mention are the same, it is something inevitable that happens to all dolls, what I am sure is that some take much longer than others to take a more yellow tone.

I do not know if it is due to the type of resin used by each brand or if it is associated with something else.

I have known people who try to repair that but I feel that they end up making a mess or compromise the care of the resin when trying to make it stop being yellow.

 

I've always thought the two terms are the same, but some people just prefer "mellowing" because it sounds nicer.

As to your Apollo, I could be wrong here, but I wonder if BBB/RS has changed their "normal skin" in recent years. I've been in the hobby and had dolls from them on and off since 2008, and I swear they used to be a darker more peachy tone compared to the newer lighter pinkish tone. Considering your Apollo's age, he probably has yellowed/mellowed some, but he looks closer to the color my first dolls from BBB/RS were. Somebody please correct me if I'm wrong.

 

I think you're right, CloakedSchemer. I have a normal skin Tony who is quite old and he is definitely peachier than the newer dolls.

 

While they are generally the same, mellow usually is used for a less drastic yellowing. It references the "gently aged" definition part of the word mellow itself. Think of it as the color and tone resin takes when it first begins to yellow up to a deeper yellowing that's not intense. It could stay at this level for a long while before heading into deep yellow territory. It's also being seen at longer rates due to better resin batches.

Inevitably, as others have said, all resin is going to yellow. But there will be a moment when you go, this has definitely yellowed! vs mellowed!

 

I think it only counts as "damage" if, for example, it's happened unevenly due to the areas covered by clothing yellowing less than the exposed areas so. My husband didn't realize aboout the light problem with his BJD with the result that his Tan Limhwa Mano now has a dlearly defined green stripe down the middle of his chest where he was left in an open shirt an a sunlit area of the room, the same at his wrists and hands. I've disguised it as best I can by rubbing red pastels into the resin, so it only shows if you know to look for it but... it's an expensive lesson to learn. Luckily my husband is slightly colourblind and can't easily see the difference so it doesn't bother him nearly as much as it bothered me.

Even yellowing all over is more a natural function of the resin aging and can't actually be prevented. It can be sped up by exposeure to direct sunlight etc, but will happen regardless. For some very pink (or very pale) "normalskin" resins, I actually prefer the colour after it has yellowed a bit - it looks more like a natural skintone, to me.

Teddy

 

I think to me mellowing sounds milder and less aggressive, whereas I associate "yellowing" with somewhat more drastic changes in the resin tone towards banana yellow. I usually use the word mellowing on my dolls when I sell something older, because the changes in colour are mild. My dolls stay in a closed cabinet away from any natural or artificial light sources and I mostly handle them with gloves, but even so I know my dolls don't match brand new resin anymore because the red pigments fade even in darkness. Light sources and skin oils only speed up that discoloration processes. Some of my dolls definitely have mellowed over years, but none have turned to an unnatural or significant yellow tone, hence I tend to avoid the term "yellowing".

 

My home is pretty dark and secluded by design, so none of my dolls ever see direct sunlight other than a few quick moments during a rare outdoor photoshoot. So I would say, at most, they’ve just pleasantly “mellowed” over time. But I have purchased a few secondhand dolls over the years where the color change was decidedly more drastic. In every case, the sellers were completely honest about this, and the dolls were priced accordingly. In each case, I simply adjusted and rolled it into their character.

This doll is my Volks 4 sisters Megu…one of the very first BJDs ever created. Her head is from 1999, the very beginning of the hobby, and is oldskin white. It‘s so yellowed, I just gave her a healthy blush on the cheeks and she now matches a Volks pureskin normal body very well.


Another old Volks I obtained super-cheaply was this MSD F-01 from 2002. She was quite unevenly yellowed on her face and hands (at some point in her long life she must have sat in a sunny window with a long sleeved dress and a wig with bangs.) When all cleaning efforts failed, I just spray-painted her face and hands white and created the day-of-the-dead character of my dreams.


And my final example is my beloved Peakswoods Briana, who I purchased planning to redo her faceup and body blushing to cover the slight uneven greening of her tan skin. But once she arrived, I fell madly in love with her just as she was and never redid her. Instead, I folded it into her character as my faded Secondhand Rose.

 

Personally, mellowing to me was always more of a "gently bleaching out" kind of thing. So a color that gets less intense/vibrant, but is not necessarily going towards yellow territory yet.
Yellowing is what happens afterwards, if applicable (some colors just don't really turn yellow-ish).