You ever feel like your dolls are obsolete?

I feel less like my dolls are out of date than my photography style and story telling abilities are out of date. I was super involved in the late 00s/early 10s when the style of photographs and photostories were vastly different than they are now. Add in 8 years of being out of the hobby and taking basically minimal photos during that time, and so I'm still kind of stuck there in that style.

 

I tend to like a lot of older sculpts better than the new stuff! Sure, there are new dolls that I really like, but many of them have odd proportions or fantasy aspects and just don’t fit in my crew. I like a lot of older heads and bodies! The only downside is that some are hard to find if they’re discontinued.

 

When I went into this hobby back in 2006, I was focused from the very beginning on building a collection with great diversity. I wanted the freedom to choose whatever struck my fancy, and not have to worry about things like popularity or cohesiveness. (Think of creating an eclectic fantasy world somewhat like what Tim Burton did in his film “Alice”.) I collected slowly but steadily, about 3 dolls per year on average, so I’ve wandered happily and unaffected through many trends over the years. Now that my crew is finally complete (I actually ran out of characters and room) I prefer to think of them as “timeless” because that’s how they feel to me…as a part of a fantasy world “lost in time”. While they’ll inevitably age, they’ll always remain forever young and “on trend” in my heart.

 

"Obsolete"...
"Out-dated"...

Wow.

I prefer to think of them as Old School. You know, classic sculpts that represent the hobby's early days and original inspirations? And, yes, there are still people here who honestly do prefer that style over the current New Hotness. I'm one of them.

Granted, a collection of old CP/Delfs and early Volks sculpts probably won't get you thousands of Likes, a flood of Followers or proverbial heaps of social media attention these days, so if that kind of recognition and feedback is an important part of participation in the hobby for you, then you probably will need to update the collection to match current trends... But if not? Don't worry about rather or not your crew is fashionable or on trend. Keep them if you like them, replace them if you don't. Your collection, your call.

 

Not really - I got them because I liked them. Some of them are from companies that no longer exist, so I guess they're obsolete in that way, but to me they are the dolls I liked the look of and got because of that. They have taken on the characters that seemed to suit them as I got to know them they're still current to me.

I've never really felt it necessary to keep up with all the new releases form al the companies. Every so often another doll will catch my eye - sometimes it's one I can't resist, more often it's a case of liking it but...when I ask myself how they'd fit into my existing families/groups of dolls, the urge to buy dissiptes.

Photographing them was never part of my reason for gettign them - I don't enjoy photography - it's more of a "necessary evil" if I want to share my dolls online, so I snap simple pictures of them way more than I do elaborate scens and carefully posed pictures. I am all admiration of other people's elaborate settigns and beatifully crafted pcitures, but it's not the point for me, and my appreciation of my dolls.

Teddy

 

After being in the hobby several years ago and now recently returning, I see a definite difference in the hobby. Like you said, there are so many more artist dolls out there than there were when I first became involved in the hobby. I see a shift in countries of origin of many dolls. However, I was surprised at how many familiar sculpts were still being sold. As they say, “the more things change, the more they remain the same”. The older sculpts are definitely not obsolete. There is room in this hobby for all the dolls. Not everyone has the same taste, or for that matter, the same bank account. Different styles and sculpts will always appeal to different people, for different reasons. I know you love your dolls and have some you would never part with. They are expressions of us, and each are beautiful and relevant in their own way.

 

Most of my crew is older-Elfdolls, DIMs, an older DOD, Bobobies. And I have a few others that are much newer. I love them all the same. My crew is so eclectic that I have sub-crews in my collection. I've never worried about what is popular, just what I like. I appreciate the posing ability of my newer dolls, but I can work just fine with my older ones. Wish I took better pictures though-I'd probably put a lot more of them up.

 

I've been collecting since 2005. Whenever I think about selling some dolls, I realize that very few of my dolls are desirable (and some weren't popular even when they were new), so that's when I feel my collection could be considered "obsolete".

 

As someone who got a lot of their early interest in dolls from antique dolls, the idea of an obsolete doll is just all kinds of strange and wrong. It's not like a computer that will loose it's ability to work with new programs and devices over time or a law that may become superfluous when anothe law is updated to include the first one.

There will be trends. There are trends in antique collecting too, even if it changes more slowly. But that does not realy make the dolls falling outside of thet trend any less. They still have their own worth and charm.

There is a piece of advice that is often given to people just starting out with antique dolls that I think applies equally to contemporary dolls: "Buy what you love, what speaks to you- and you will never make a bad purchase."

 

But they ARE desirable - because you desire them enough to want them in the first place.

Too true - I've seen some large rises and falls in the prices that antique dolls are going for over the last 15 years (and occasionally kicking myself for not scraping together the money for a pretty 32 inch porcelain headed girl when the prices were the lowest I've seen them).

Teddy

 

I don’t think dolls really work that way, but I do understand your feeling, OP. I used to have it when I was attending meetups regularly and the population that came to them was very focused on always having something new to show off. It really depends on the kind of feedback you’re getting, I think, because if say you’re on all the Fairyland lists with last month’s minifee when it seems like the discussion has moved on, you might feel left out and like your dolls aren’t shiny enough to keep up. If you’re hanging around a list devoted to older dolls (the Delf list comes to mind) people are still cheerfully flipping out about dolls made 13 years ago, so the attitude is completely different.

I do think that whatever dolls you have on hand, if you value them, people respond to that energy. I still see a lot of positivity around photos of those old Volks standards on social media, because old dolls remind us of ye olde early hobby days. They’re comforting, even if they can’t touch their faces without wiring.

 

There's something really lovely and nostalgic about older dolls. I feel like I've cultivated my own style over the years, and what I like is what I like, regardless of what is trending. I do feel sometimes that I'm just not interested in the newer styles that are coming out, sculpt wise, but that only makes the ones that do have aspects of my aesthetic all the better. What I do think is neat is the modernization of pictures, clothing, faceups, and all the ways that the hobby has evolved in the past decade. I love seeing old school CP Delfs on Instagram with artist done faceups and hand sewn clothing. It's a long way from where we started on Flickr and the like!

 

Hm, I don't think of my older dolls as outdated exactly...and I'm not trying to keep up with them, but I do admit that I'm more quiet with them. People aren't really discussing many of the older dolls very much, there is no rush to hybridize them, and photos become few and far between. It actually makes me smile quite a bit to see a picture of an older doll I love and remember fondly from their height.

My oldest doll is an original Volks Nono. I'd guess she's from a year or two after her release or something like that, so she's quite aged in this hobby. Her knees wobble, and her feet are too round to fit in modern shoes. Her resin is yellowed, but feels nice under my finger tips. She is heavy and solid, and she feels strangely suited to hugging. Her nose is sharp. Bits of an old faceup refuse to be removed from the crevices of her features. She has cute little creases sculpted in the skin of her torso, near her arms. I don't really think she needs to be anything other than what she is. She is lovely and always will be lovely. But I've always loved old things that show their age. Worn wood, tarnished metal, cracked glaze.

Some new dolls are amazing. Some don't suit my tastes. They too will age. So I don't worry about it.

 

I have a fair few older 'old skool' heads, recently been selling some of the smaller 1/4 scale where I can (mainly because I am more of a 1/6 & 1/3 scale person), but haven't with majority of the 1/3 - there is a mixture of still fond even though looks the complete opposite of my current tastes, like my Dollzone Recall which takes 20mm eyes (massive!) and even though the sculpt is really dated: a massive head with massive eyes really dates a sculpt, unless it is the anime kind.
Then again, I do have a couple older anime style heads and they don't fit into the current trending anime-look either. They aren't obsolete per se, just really dated with their styling, so you can't win either way

Currently having a rummage /refresh through my floating heads and older bodies and came across my Demon Garden Basil head and still felt that wow, what a great sculpt feeling, as some I think have a classic look which can stand the test of time for me... and some haven't.

Note, Basil has that resin hook in his head, no magnets, something I really don't miss, so yay progress for head magnets

 

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I haven't been into BJDs as long as some (my first BJDs are 8 this year), but a number of mine are discontinued. I was into mature 1/6 dolls from the beginning and only recently have they gained popularity. The DIM Alana I got during my first year in the hobby is in the older more stylized aesthetic and she was discontinued within a year of being released. She's yellowed considerably, but is still fun to pose since she's double jointed and looks good in anything that fits decently. I'm always excited to stumble across an owner photo of another one. Several of my dolls are from the Lumedoll company, and all of them have been discontinued, so its also cool to find owner pictures of them as well.

 

I don't really understand this. There are times I feel like my doll KNOWLEDGE is behind the times because there are too many new companies and artists to keep up with but a doll is a beautiful work of art to me, if I like it I like it. I don't get dolls to be trendy or popular or something. Besides, that trendiness will fade and the next craze will take its place making the new set of dolls "obsolete" again if the goal is to be trendy.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding though and the concern is losing interest in a style of doll you once liked. I can definitely relate to that and have managed to sell all but one of the dolls I no longer like (really need to get around to trying to sell that last one now that I think of it) and am happier for it. Our tastes to change over time and there's nothing wrong with moving on to something else.

 

It is literally impossible to keep up with the "trends" in this hobby. First, it's way too expensive (and I'm saying as someone who has a lot of dolls - I can't afford all the dolls. I'm not sure too many people can lol), second, there are so many people in the hobby now trends come and go at light speed, and the hobby moves slower than ever. By the time you get that doll you've waited 6 months to a year for, it's "out of style" already and the trend is moving in another direction and has literally forgotten what the last obsession was.

And, the truth is, that's really just on the surface of the BJD hobby as a whole.

Newer, more realistic sculpts might seem like they're the only thing that anyone cares about anymore, but that's not really true. Maybe here, because the greater number of active users are more excited about newness, that's what you see the most, as it's what keeps getting bumped to the top. Maybe on social media you follow people who have more realistic dolls, so that's what you see the most. But the other day I was looking for an elf eared head on instagram and literally all I saw were more stylized, "old school" molds. Tons of them. They're everywhere if you just dig a little deeper than what you look at normally.

So really nothing is obsolete here as long as you know where to look.
I have old dolls and new dolls and stylized and realistic in my group, and I love all of them. I tend to gravitate towards doll owners who have similar styles as I do, so I see plenty of people who have a mix of styles, and people who just have one or the other, and I have never felt my dolls are lacking, or obsolete...because I tend to see what I've already got.

If you are feeling meh about your own dolls, it's best to get to the root of that issue.
First, if you still like the dolls you have but aren't happy with them, give them a makeover. Faceup styles are something I do pay attention too, more so than the sculpts themselves anymore, and faceups have changed a lot over the years. Way more detail, realistic shading, skin textures, makeup styles derived from IRL makeup trends...it doesn't have to be just eyebrows, eye detail, a little blush and lip color anymore. Putting a fresh faceup on an older doll totally give them new life.

If you just can't bring yourself to get excited about your dolls anymore, it happens. Plenty of people have overhauled their whole collection before. If you need to sell a few and / or add a few new ones to the group, there's nothing to feel guilty about, they're just dolls.

 

Oh I know my dolls are mostly older dolls. Which is good because I really, for my tastes, hate the new popular [ Two Knees Per Leg type joints- I'll take even a single joint over that.
Lir? There in my avatar pic? He is one of 3 Soom Lupins I've ever seen owner pics of. He was rare when I got him and now he's unheard of. I actually enjoy owning some odd, old, unique or very rare sculpts and dolls. Lir's lady friend is a Unidoll Suri. I've seen two, anywhere ever off their old site, because I owned two and sold one.
So Obsolete? Heck nah. They're rare and special, often with features I love that newer dolls don't have. Everybody collects what they love, and that's the fun of the variety.