Adventures in Dollmaking
Jun 26, 2016 8:30:19 GMT -8
Post by kitnkabootle on Jun 26, 2016 8:30:19 GMT -8
Hello everyone!
As most of you know I've been commenting a lot about wanting to start making porcelain BJDs. Well yesterday, I finally bit the bullet, found a tutorial at Woodland Earth Studio by Allison Mecleary. I'm going to be going through the tutorial with baby steps and any tips and tricks you pros can offer me would be so, so helpful. I want to put my experiences down here in this thread as I go along so that I can look at the finished product and see where I came from. I also think it will be helpful for other newbies like me that want to see what I've done and how they can do it themselves.
Alright so first thing's first: The drawing. I used the tutorial at the WES on doll proportions. Factoring in shrinkage for porcelain, I decided a tiny bit over 18 inches was where I was going to start. The doll is likely to be 15 inches, ish, I'm assuming by the time the process is done. Anyways, I looked at the reference photo on the page that shows that proportions of the female body divided in to eight sections. I divided my paper in to 8 sections of 2.25 inches a section. Then I labelled the sections to show which body parts are level with each section. This helped me to figure out proportions. I sketched first to match all the regular proportions for the ideal female form. Then I went in with artistic liberty and made things smaller and larger where I wanted to. Finally I found a few drawings of BJDs on the internet and their different sections and it helped me to figure out where the pieces would be cut and roughly what double joints looked like.
Then, I tried Sculpey. Sculpey, sculpey, sculpey. You are one challenge I anticipated but never realized until I began. It is much messier than I realized! But it's also very soft and holding the piece while I sculpt it leaves little dents that I have to go back and fix. I would love some tips and tricks on working with it. How do you get it smooth? Using the pads of my fingers in a certain way eventually slicks it down but surely there's an easier way. The tools I bought, like styluses, tend to leave little lines in it when I try to smooth with it. It's fun but infuriating at the same time. I just messed around with creating the lower torso yesterday:
I'm obviously nowhere near completion even at this stage (I don't even have the correct size of wooden balls for this yet for the thigh joints). I don't know what I've gotten myself in to, but I'm really excited. When I'm keen on something, I'm keen! So... good lord. Let's get this show on the road. Also, I will need to buy a kiln at some point, so could you all who have experience making dolls, could you suggest a good kiln for me? Obviously not too small, and I want it to be automatic. The easier to use the better and preferably under $1500 US. Thank you thank you!
As most of you know I've been commenting a lot about wanting to start making porcelain BJDs. Well yesterday, I finally bit the bullet, found a tutorial at Woodland Earth Studio by Allison Mecleary. I'm going to be going through the tutorial with baby steps and any tips and tricks you pros can offer me would be so, so helpful. I want to put my experiences down here in this thread as I go along so that I can look at the finished product and see where I came from. I also think it will be helpful for other newbies like me that want to see what I've done and how they can do it themselves.
Alright so first thing's first: The drawing. I used the tutorial at the WES on doll proportions. Factoring in shrinkage for porcelain, I decided a tiny bit over 18 inches was where I was going to start. The doll is likely to be 15 inches, ish, I'm assuming by the time the process is done. Anyways, I looked at the reference photo on the page that shows that proportions of the female body divided in to eight sections. I divided my paper in to 8 sections of 2.25 inches a section. Then I labelled the sections to show which body parts are level with each section. This helped me to figure out proportions. I sketched first to match all the regular proportions for the ideal female form. Then I went in with artistic liberty and made things smaller and larger where I wanted to. Finally I found a few drawings of BJDs on the internet and their different sections and it helped me to figure out where the pieces would be cut and roughly what double joints looked like.
Then, I tried Sculpey. Sculpey, sculpey, sculpey. You are one challenge I anticipated but never realized until I began. It is much messier than I realized! But it's also very soft and holding the piece while I sculpt it leaves little dents that I have to go back and fix. I would love some tips and tricks on working with it. How do you get it smooth? Using the pads of my fingers in a certain way eventually slicks it down but surely there's an easier way. The tools I bought, like styluses, tend to leave little lines in it when I try to smooth with it. It's fun but infuriating at the same time. I just messed around with creating the lower torso yesterday:
I'm obviously nowhere near completion even at this stage (I don't even have the correct size of wooden balls for this yet for the thigh joints). I don't know what I've gotten myself in to, but I'm really excited. When I'm keen on something, I'm keen! So... good lord. Let's get this show on the road. Also, I will need to buy a kiln at some point, so could you all who have experience making dolls, could you suggest a good kiln for me? Obviously not too small, and I want it to be automatic. The easier to use the better and preferably under $1500 US. Thank you thank you!
