D is for Dolls - Ball Jointed Dolls
Originally published at K.T. Hanna - The Scribble Muse. You can comment here or there.
If you’ve been around my blog for a while you’ll realize that I adore Asian Ball Jointed Dolls. As seen in this post. In fact, I have them modified to fit the characters in my books and draw inspiration from those.
They’re so very versatile you can do almost anything with them. Although you do have to keep in mind that most of the male dolls look effeminate, and the female dolls appear slightly breakable.
You can get different wigs, eyes and clothes. And when I say different I mean in unimaginable amounts of colours and styles. Yes, I mean the wigs and the eyes as well as the clothes.
The same doll can look so very different: Mikel in his default outfit, wig, eyes etc.
And Mikel changed into his character
These are what help me with character inspiration. That, and I just love being able to find the perfect wig, the perfect eyes and outfit, not to mention sometimes having to give them the perfect face up. You can also (with a face mask) alter their resin. Some people do scarrings, wounds, and I’ve even seen an amazing Lovecraftian horror mod.
They’re definitely not the perfect inspiration for everyone. They can cost anything from $50 to $5000 depending on the rarity of the mold. Some are only released in a batch of 1-100. Others are mass produced with no set limit.
But you can make every single one of them exactly what you have in mind. I love them and I feel like, at least for me, my characters feel more alive with them.
What sort of tricks do you use to make your characters even more real than just in your head? Do you like dolls are do they creep you out?