The Joint - Blogs

Excitement Plus!!! oh and Some people are total asses

whitewings — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 12:02:00 GMT

Sooooo, My website is up and running and its been two months open this week.... I've sold 14 tails and only two of them have gone to English speaking countries... cant tell you how JAZZED I am - or how confused... its been difficult translating queries from Belgium???

As of this week I now have the funds to finally get my Alexis into silicone and get on with her debut to the world... I'm so excited about it I could Barf LOL....

After fighting with her for so long I am really looking forwards to posting some pictures of her WIP and so-on.... I love her to death and cant wait to have four of her in different skin-tones and candy colours!!!

Last week I lost a dear friend to me and I buried myself in clay to let all the toxic feelings out of my system... the result was a teeny tiny that I've named Rose in honour of my dearly departed friend Michelle Rae Cook-Rose b 9th July 1961 d 19th August 2010 she leaves behind her three children Kane 11, Brittney 9, Travis 5 and beloved Husband and my friend Jason. When I feel ready and my newly planted roses first bloom I'll share some pictures of her. God bless you Shelley - gone but never far!!

To add insult to injury and rub salt in the wound I was competeing in DoA's recent Birthday events which were a fantastic distraction from my grief and stopped me from landscaping the entire block (gardening is my therapy) but then some ass decided to take a crap in the threads after the winners were announced.

The result was me going ape-sh*t at some cretin in a PM and Aimee giving up the first prize that she won fair and square!!! I have to say I'm disgusted at the conduct of some people and I'm not above putting it out there that I hope Karma sends them a message in some way.

After reading that Aimee had given up first place - I cried my guts out, abused the insensitive idiot who cried foul in a PM and prayed to God for some sign of retribution.... I know it doesnt work that way but man-oh-man after the fortnight I had it didnt seem fair that so many people dear to me were suffering....

Anywho, my beloved husband of near 10 years (YAY) has informed me this evening that he intends to take out 4 yo son on his next 10 day business trip so I can get Alexis finished - I've been on an emotional roller coaster so the appropriate reaction was to cry... a lot!

So today the 1st of September 2010 I toast to the love of my husband, the friendships I will cherish after they have gone, the faith that everything happens for a reason and that I will get my 4 year project finished.

And now I'm going to spray tan my Soom Monzo......

Second entry - my Sculpey prototype

Jipsy — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 02:57:57 GMT

I decided to make a prototype of a BJD before I started on a serious BJD project for several reasons. Part of it was because I was still testing out how well/badly original Sculpey performed, but even more because I wanted to get a feel for how BJDs worked, in practice. (I had never handled any BJD except for those wooden artist mannequins, I only ever saw one in person, briefly, at a distance at a con I went to many years back.) He's sort of like a 3-D sketch or rough-draft.

I'm kinda embarrassed to post pictures of him because he is so clunky and rough and has all kinds of proportion problems, but I never meant him to be a polished doll anyway... So here he is.

He is about 3.5 inches or 9cm tall, strung with sewing elastic. I tried to make him as articulated as possible and I think I went overboard :p

Those shoulder swivels were not necessary. And since I'm criticizing it, those arms are especially ugly, his hands are huge... etc :pout

I made an... um, "eye-holder part" to hold the eyeballs in place:

It holds them in place while still allowing you to roll them in their sockets. It works pretty well.

Conclusion: Original Sculpey is indeed weak. Stringing him is fine, but he has small chips from falling over from a standing position. And it would be even worse if he were a bigger size, I think.

I've learned a lot about sculpting and joints, and I'm coming up with a lot of ideas just from playing and posing him.

This was a really good experience. I would recommend making a non-perfectionistic prototype doll to anyone who is a total newbie at BJD making, if you think you can handle the extra work without being discouraged. He's rough, but he still took me a few weeks (of random free time) to make.

I thought I might lose interest after making a prototype, but now I'm pretty sure I want to sculpt another one, something more planned out. It's fun! I have to order real materials, so it'll be a little while... could be over a month (sigh).

I'm thinking of getting some Cernit. Oh and an oven thermometer.

Going to work on ym first Sculpt today ^^

Rozga — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 17:54:55 GMT

Yuppers going to start sculpting my first head today. I have Super Sculpty, and have been lurking about the forums a lot. Search does not work so well though -.- Going to try and sculpt Kimari from Final Fantasy 10, if that seems not to work out so well, maybe work on a Hyena head ^^
Need to do a few more sketches before I really start working today. Now if I only have a stereo in the construction room .......

~Rozga

First entry - Testing out original Sculpey

Jipsy — Sun, 22 Aug 2010 21:56:56 GMT

First, hello everyone! It's great that there is a community like this on the web, I look forward making friends here and learning all this new stuff!

The public blogs were especially nice to be able to look at when I wasn't a member, so I'll try to make a point at keeping my progress on here as well as whatever I post on the forums.

So since I've never done anything like doll-making before, being mainly a 2D artist, I thought I'd start out playing with the one pack of regular original Sculpey I had on hand, left over from making my wedding cake topper. If I liked that well enough, I could invest in stronger materials. This is also because I would have to mail-order anything I needed, because of where I live.

So after researching a bit I kept reading not to use Sculpey because it is so weak?

Therefore my first project was to test out how well original Sculpey held up to stringing. I made a few sheets, getting a feel for how easy it was to break them at different thicknesses.

Then I sat down one night and made a very simple bunch of tiny tubes and beads (so as not to use much of my Sculpey) and a little kitty smily face, baked them, and strung them together with sewing elastic to see how well they held.

Here he is, I called him Boots, and he is about 1 inch or 3 cm tall:

The test was a big success: he did not break in any way and has fallen down numerous times from the height of a table (my cat likes to steal him, bat him around) and Boots is still unscathed.

When I thought about it though, I figured that his durability may have a lot to do with his size, and his pieces all being rounded, so I decided to make a larger prototype, with proper joints (Boots joint are very wonky and have a mind of their own...) and body parts, and even eye balls. That would be a better test of the Sculpey and a bit of a better practice for me before I launch into my real project.

More about my prototype (close to being finished as of this writing) in my next blog post.

Just joined the Joint

Rozga — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 18:23:07 GMT

I am kind of overwhelmed by all that is available on The Joint.

Though wondering about the website, just looking at what peeps are making, and what the have made is very inspiring! I can't wait to work on some sculpts! And Maybe even make my Hyena Man! **starts to day dream** Man sometimes my obsession with hyenas is kind of scary. ><

Al though today I am going to return my Paperclay I picked up yesterday and pick up some Sculpty. Might have to travel to Joann's to pick up a foam ball. >.> I think I will just work on sculpting first. I know the price of silicone >< Maybe I can ask my fursuit friends where to get a good deal >.>

Man I am thinking to far ahead. Need to think about what type of a head to make. >< Kind of want to make a Kimari Doll for my Boyfriend ^^

Well till next time ^^

~Rozga

Cernit -_-

Mitchi — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 12:45:31 GMT

I haven't been working on my scupting in a while, but I got back to it this past week. I opened up a pack of Cernit that I bought for dollmaking, and I'm still getting used to it. It's so soft, and it gets distorted a lot easier than what I'm used to using.

In good news, I was able to get my most recent head sculpt about halfway done. Unfortunately, she's coming out a little smaller than I intended, so she's going to end up around the same size as a barbie.not too bad, but next time I need to watch my proportions so it ends up the size I want.

Hopefully I'll be able to get this current one to look how I want. Oh well, she's more of a practice one anyway.

And I started again.

Hemre — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 12:51:47 GMT

I finally got my hands on some Ladoll, cost me a pretty penny but I guess I just needed to have it :dead

It's nice I really like it, I like that you can reconstitute it too, very super helpful! I'm going to get some more, but this time I'll use a coupon.

anyways I started on another doll based off one of my dad's favorite artists paintings, don't really know if he's my favorite but his paintings sure taught me alot. I'm not talking about subject, but things like value (in colour), anatomy and dynamics in drawing. I need to take some better pictures of the body.

I plan on posting once I get back from The Pancake Hell.

Before I even owned a doll

mayday — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 04:07:32 GMT

Hello, I'm Mayday and welcome to my blog! I'm a 31 year old, jack-of-all-trades artist. I've done everything from pixel work to portraits. After trying all sorts of mediums, I think I've finally found my calling in dolls. It all started way back in 2004...
I lived in a 1 bedroom duplex run by a slum lord, I didn't have a computer and rarely was online. Also I didn't own a single doll at that time. Back then, my boyfriend let me surf the web at his parents' house, while I waited for my laundry. There I saw OOAK sculpted fairies on ebay, intrigued I wanted to try my hand at it. Many many MANY tries later I ended up with my first little sculpture, The Traveling Mr. Timble.

(please excuse the terrible picture that was taken in 2004)
He's made of sculpy with a wire armiture and all of his clothes were hand sewn and made from scraps, I didn't even dream of owning a sewing machine then.
A year later I saw my first BJD, and fell in love. Some how I ended up with a huge collection of Pullips though (I got sucked in by Alice). Then just over a year ago I got my first BJD a MSD Triya, who I love to pieces. Now I'm inspired by the artist made BJDs and want to try my hand at it! I thought that for the first doll that it would be fitting to make Mr. Timble into a BJD.
He really is quite the traveler as he's moved with me 4 times in the last 6 years!! He now sits above my bed on a shelf with a ton of other brick-a-brack. Hopefully I'll have time in the next weeks to sit down and draft up a plan, I would like to keep him about the same size as the original sculpture, which is 5 inches. There will be some changes of course, but I'm going to try and keep the overall look of him when I make the new sculpt.
Next time, sketches!

Down in the dumps

Hemre — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 14:09:00 GMT

I hate mold making so much...

I'm hiring someone to do it for me next time, or do it as I go along.

I also can't think of what to sculpt next.
and I have no time to sculpt right now...

I'm tired, and I need a break.

The chosen one..... LMAO

whitewings — Wed, 26 May 2010 09:15:13 GMT

Soooo Yeah, Matrix quote there.... I had an inexcuseable f*ck up today..... I mixed up the catalyst from the wrong silicone to pour into my matrix mold today and the damned thing disintegrated.... 4 days worth of laying up a matrix mould that was "indestructable" and I do this... *head-desk* damn damn double damn....

Soooo.... After I cried... a lot.... I re-did the plaster outter for one side this evening and then did an emergency casting of one of my Tinies., (Narn).. he's going to ebay tonight to raise the funds for the next lot of silicone... 2kgs now wasted and missing catalyst from the second lot.... bloody hell!!!!!

I have to laugh really... I think its time to start tinting the catalyst for my various silicones so they dont all look the same, that OR I could actually read the label before shlepping it onto the scales and subsequently flushing about $100 down the loo... (figuratively speaking - I had to scrape out the goo then dumped the lot properly...)

So... GO LOOK AT EBAY!! NAOW I'll even include a discount voucher for your next purchase Bwahahahah :)

Going to have a Jack Daniels now and pretend I'm not stupid.... :sweat

Oooh shiny... distracted

whitewings — Wed, 12 May 2010 04:16:47 GMT

Well.... Alexis hasnt had a look in since I go tht ball rolling with my new project...

My Mermaid tail *loves* I got the idea from playing with a plastic fishing lure.... well thats my story and I'm sticking with it!!!! :o

Anyways - I had already made a rigid tail and was at the "where do I cut it?" stage for the ball jointing.... and decided a translucent tail would be so much more fun and different.. I like different!!

So ensue lots of experiments.... In the end hubby and I tried everything from Locline doll armatures to wire... the wire won. Many thanks to the team at Arte Tokio who revealed a few trade secrets about the wire armature in their soft bodies.... so now I have this wickedly awesome fish-bone armature embedded in a super squishy tail... we're still working on the tints and stuff to spray them with..

Thats the down side to casting in silicone - you cant paint it uneless you have the right materials!!! Well queue in smooth-ons wicked paint at $100 a bottle :sweat and you have silicone paint for silicone... it sticks.... it bends... it stretches... its frickin expensive!!!!!!!!

Sooo right now I'm going to demould mah fishie and post some pictures of the process

Sooo coool - dont know why I didnt think of this ages ago....

Duck!!!!

whitewings — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 10:55:26 GMT

Well its almost Easter school holidays now and I'm still moving at a snails pace just for something different!!

Alexis continues to sit in her foamy grey capsule staring at me vehemently - almost daring me to get my bum into gear and clean her off - but I was having too much fun with her peanuts ;) read knees and elbows.... Gawd :pout

Anyways - I'm stoked to report that my casting setup is finally complete, the built in bench and cupboard (that is now insulated and externally vented to keep the noise of the compressor right down) and the first test run was a hoot - I laughed like a kid when the slicone in the bottom of the pot (to level it out) cured to perfection under pressure.... Sadly the second one resulted in a trip to the emergency room as the hose running from the compressor to the pressure pot was faulty and the valve erupted sending a long black rubber hose flying into my noggin..... It missed my eye by about an inch hitting my brow bone and leaving me with the biggest - purplest most revolting looking "no-really-my-husband-doesnt-beat-me-with-a-cricket-bat" black eye.... it made achieving any symetry while painting a real pain in the ass!!!!!

That all over and recovered from - I have made some awesome progress with my flexible urethane mermaids tail - I found this wickedly awesome armature stuff called loc-line thats saved me from the hell of coil-wiring - and its only about 100 times the price but its a no-fail works every time sort of stuff.... I'm sending my prototypes to a couple of mates here in Australia after school goes back in April to try it out and send me some feed-back on it....

Anyways... off to bed naow :p

A photo

Edgar — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 02:37:44 GMT

I got a nudge last night to post some photos of the dolls I'm working on, which I thought was very sweet. Here's one photo, I'll put more in the critique section of him, and take some of LM later on.

I've only got heads right now, as bodies either broke or were just too wonky and I started over. I'm trying to do this without a doll of my own, so I'm only working from photos to figure out the mechanics of the body. I started to get something right the other day, but then I ran out of clay. :sweat Will buy more tomorrow. Hey, anyone know how to make your own creative paperclay???

Well anyways, here's a photo. Yeah, he doesn't have any nostrils or nuthin' yet, but he manages. I'll post more in the critique section and uh, yeah. Cheers. :love

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i2...osefox/bb2.jpg

:arrr

He's supposed to be Big Boss from Metal Gear Solid 3.

fuzzyheaded ramble... needs a pot of coffee

Rad Inana — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 13:00:00 GMT

So after the last few weeks of 9 a.m to 10 p.m school days, plus academic exams, other projects, work, and regular all-nighters, I finally crashed. Lucky me, it's spring break. So I haven't had time to work on my doll the way I've wanted to, and I'm now at the tedious stage of sanding and evening things out. I've decided to just accept several flaws in her design, and finish her, so I can have some practice casting, and get on with the fun of making another! I'm new to sculpting - clay is one of the only materials I never took a class in. Hah. Plaster, wood, large and small metals, fabric, alternate materials? Done it all, at least a little, although my focus was always primarily 2D. But not clay! I graduate at the end of this semester, and I really wish I had. (My school does not make you pick a major, so you can continue to combine media/ classes however.) I'm itching to start again, make better dolls. I have so many faces in my head! Well, maybe more like 4 or 5, but they are very clear and specific in my head and their driving me nuts, I really want to try and make them real and touchable. I'm definitely more passionate about the character/head of my doll than the body, but there are also other joint systems I really want to try, that I think will be more stable and more fluid than what I've done, and I'm going to try and consider the aesthetics of the body in relationship to the personality of the head. I want to work bigger too, in either standard 42-45 cm or 58- 60 cm scale. Actually, I think it'll make the joints so much easier to make. And clay! I'm dying to try different sculpting materials. Super Sculpey's not bad, but I want to know what the gray firm, or an air-dry clay like ladoll or even a putty like apoxie is like. I hate the sort of translucent color of Super Sculpey now that I'm sanding... I'll think something's smooth, then spray it with Krylon, and it'll be randomly pocked by a dent left over from zealous filing that I couldn't see.
I'm actually really embarrassed at this point by the doll I'm working on. It's my first though, and I've learned enough to make my next one better.

The blacksheep's wool is all right behind my eye-sockets. This is such a directionless ramble bramble like the thorned blackberry bushes that the blacksheep think are so sweet, their gums stained purple-blue.

Here's to getting some sleep this week. I've made a sanding schedule, and I'm sticking to it!

Lantern - Sanding

Devilfloss — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 19:51:49 GMT

Still stuck in Kirkby, with limited supplies and work-surfaces, so I decided to stop mooning over not being able to sculpt her arms and started sanding instead. Her face is now a lot smoother, and her lips have been reshaped quite a bit, but her many-times-baked body is refusing to sand anywhere near as evenly. Hopefully I'll be able to prime the surface with gesso or spraycote and work some of the remaining kinks out. Her legs, as ever, look dreadful, and I might end up just sculpting her new ones from scratch.

Also, feet are fun!