Glue Testing for BJD Wig Making

After being inspired by the “Crafting your own custom angora wig” tutorial thread on DoA, which is here if you are a member, I started to think I might like to try to craft my own wig too. I read through the thread about what glues to use and etc.. and then I thought to myself, why not try to use Loctite’s Vinyl, Fabric and Plastic flexible adhesive. It is waterproof, completely transparent, and FLEXIBLE! On top of this the base of this glue is type of polyurethane which in theory should make it safe for use on our polyurethane dolls. I have also used this glue in the past to plug up holes in the heads of Monster High girls, so I already know it’s safe on vinyl and doesn’t have any bad reactions to saran hair.

So, the first thing I did before going whole hog on making a test wig, was to test the glue with the material. I used power mesh fabric which is the fabric I bought for making wefted wigs a while back. I wrapped a highlighter with saran wrap and using rubber bands I stretched the test fabric onto the saran covered highlighter. Then I applied some glue to the test strip and spread it around with my smallest palette knife. I left it for 2 hours to dry and here are my results below.

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I was really happy to find that the glue peels right off of the saran. That was my first concern, that possibly the glue could bond to the plastic thus not being a viable option for wig making since nobody wants a layer of saran wrap inside their wig. XP Thankfully it does not and it also peels off with ease. The above picture shows the side of the fabric that was pressed against the saran. It’s a little shiny, and because it’s a rubbery material it provides some friction which is an added bonus because that means it won’t slide off the dolls head as easily.

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This is the top side of the fabric that was not in direct contact with the saran, note how you can’t see any shininess from the glue. 😉 This glue dries perfectly clear and it will stretch a little bit. There is a decent amount of stretch along the grain of the fabric, but much less stretch against the grain. Stretching too hard against the grain (to the maximum you can stretch the fabric before ripping the fabric) will cause some warping of your fabric and you run the risk of tearing the glue. My suggestion would be to use two coats of glue for added stability before you even begin applying any hair.

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And here’s a final shot of the tube of glue that I used next to my little test strip. So far one of the potential drawbacks to using this glue is the wait time. You have to wait around 2 hours for it to dry. Another drawback is that with excessive stretching the wig cap can become misshapen. I am going to continue on with my tests since snow storms are keeping me inside and I will continue to report my findings as I go. My next step is to create a full wig cap for my Zaoll luv and then I should have more information for you.

Dollstown Elf Body Arrived!

Kyaaa-h! I’m so excited that my Dollstown elf girl body arrived today! It was actually a little bit torturous because I had to go out to get my hair cut this afternoon right after the package arrived so I had to wait until late this afternoon to open the package and then I was interrupted by the need to fix dinner. Anyhow enough preamble, lets just get on with the pictures!

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I didn’t actually take too many box opening pics and what I did take are with my cellphone camera. I was really wowed though after taking the bubble pack off the first hand how delicate the fingers are and then I immediately went to open the second packet of bubble pack encasing the second hand and I had a sigh of relief that nothing was broke, lol. The hands of the elf body are slender and each finger is separate, but despite their delicate look, they are not tiny, in fact later when you see the comparison with the Zaoll body you will see they are close in size to the Zaoll hands.

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Here is a resin comparison between Dollmore’s normal skin and Dollstown freshskin. They are actually very close, but Dollmore’s resin has a slightly warmer pinkier cast, however this difference is not horribly noticeable which hopefully you will be able to tell by all of the comparison and hybrid photos I took. In the end if I blush the dollstown body with some pink I think that the difference will be imperceptible, so if you were thinking to make a Dollstown/Dollmore hybrid, this is a very viable option for you.

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And I thought I’d throw this in here, but it’s a Zaoll / Dollstown freskin comparison. As you can see, Zaoll is very pinky, so if you wanted to do a hybrid with a normal skin Zaoll, you would have a lot of blushwork ahead of you. ^^;

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Ok, so here’s my Dollmore Mio head on the Dollstown elf body. The first shot is me just popping the head on the body…unfortunately the elf neck is a bit short so I added some cool temp hotglue to the inside of Mio’s neckhole. The after shot is after about 1/4inch-ish of hotglue applied to Mio’s neckhole. I think it’s a pretty big improvement, but I think in the end I may order one of those neck ring things coolcat sells after I get back from vacation. The hot glue essentially suedes the neck joint and I feel it makes it a little more difficult to move her head and takes away a little bit of mobility, at least in my opinion. Size wise I’m happy with the size of the head on the body. Zaoll and the Dollstown elf body have just about the same shoulder width measurements of a little over 4 inches or between 10 and 11cm, so it’s not much different than she used to look. I know a lot of people have their own preferences for body to head ratios, and some people may consider her “bobble headed”. but to me she is fine. 🙂

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Here is a quick comparison shot of Mio on the elf body next to Zaoll. My apologies that my Zaoll has no eyes or face-up. ^^; I need to wait for a warmer day to give her a face, and at this point it probably won’t happen until after my vacation. So in comparing these two bodies, the elf body is a little bit taller than Zaoll and that height comes from her legs. The torso’s of both dolls are about the same length. Zaoll of course has curvier hips and a bit larger bust, her legs are also a bit thicker.

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Clothing wise, the elf body can swap clothes with Zaoll, BUT, because Zaoll has more width in her hips, clothing like underwear and pants will be a bit loose.

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And she can still wear the Dollmore SD girl top I bought for her when she was on the Zaoll body. Oh and I should also mention that Zaoll shoes also work for the elf body as well. 🙂 Though I only have the white mary janes from their website. Well, I think that’s about it for the info. Overall I’m super happy with this hybrid, though on occasion when I glance in her direction I think her neck may still be a smidge too short, but overall I’m just super smitten with Mio in general. X3 I can’t wait now for the weather to stop being quite so bitter cold so I can blush the new body and I think I also need to re-do Mio’s face-up since she was blushed to match the Zaoll body. For the time being though she is fine.

Doll wigs, SD props and a Customs retention.

So a lot of doll related things have been happening, but I just haven’t had the time to blog since it’s been the holidays and I am trying to get everything together to go on vacation in January. The first thing that happened is the wig and headband I ordered in a For My Doll GO arrived. Here is a shot of Lulu in her new wig and Sona is wearing Lulu’s old wig.

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I have to say that this is the second wig I have ordered from For My Doll and I couldn’t be more pleased with the quality of wigs from that shop. Frankly I consider my FMD wigs to be of better quality than the one Leeke wig I own. Anyhow, I really like this wig on my Lulu, but I’m not sure how I feel about Sona in Lulu’s old wig. It’s cute and looks a bit more mature over her old pigtails, but I think I may still be questing for a wig yet for Sona. I think maybe I also need to try to buy other colors of wigs besides brown, but I just can’t help it!! I love dark brown hair and FMD’s “mild black” is the perfect deep brown.

Aside from the wigs, I’ve begun working on creating an SD sized bed for the first piece of furniture for my room box. I have my plans all drawn out and my wood bought, but I’ve only just begun cutting and painting. I really hope I get a chance to work on it some more before my vacation because I’d love to make a blog posting and share my progress, but I also have to double up on my work so I don’t have anything due over vacation AND I also have to finish hemming my dress among other vaycay prep.

Lastly the Dollstown elf body shipped a couple days ago and I was super excited to follow it’s tracking until suddenly after arriving in Chicago today it was detained by Customs saying “customs retention: other” D: I’ve never had this happen before so I popped on DoA to see if anyone else had this trouble before and sure enough there is a thread dedicated to it in the buying and shipping section. After reading through the thread I feel a little better since another user said that packages are processed through Chicago’s customs very fast. I’m really hoping that it only has that status since it arrived after 6pm on a Saturday and it just waiting for Monday’s work week to come around. I am going to be a bundle of nerves until this body arrives since I will be leaving on the 17th for vacation and it must arrive before then! D: I’m going to keep my fingers crossed that my package clears customs on Monday. The last thing I need is for it to get stuck in customs for a week or more and then ship when I am gone. I’ve heard where EMS packages won’t be kept for any longer than 5 days even in vacation hold mail. Oh man….I just don’t think I can say this.. D: enough…lol. If this has taught me anything it’s to not order things before vacation, even if it is in stock and will ship within a week and you still have a month left before vaycay so it should be “safe”…because apparently everything will go wrong.

BJDs that look Asian.

Since it’s kind of difficult to search for BJDs that look Asian without most of the search results in google being about ABJDs on a whole and not necessarily ones that look particularly Asian, I decided to start a collection of images of Asian looking dolls on Pinterest. Each pin lists the sculpt, maker and size of the doll so you can easily find them on company websites. I’ve only just started my list with around 19 pins, but I plan to continue adding to it in the future, especially since right now I am of the mind to own a 60-65cm Asian looking male BJD to be a companion to my Mio. So, without further ado, here is the link to my “BJDs that look Asian” pinboard. 🙂

http://www.pinterest.com/tsukiyono/bjds-that-look-asian/

Eye types for BJDs

I had gotten into an interesting discussion on DoA about the different types of eyes available and peoples preferences and such which I thought might make for a good blog topic. A lot of this information might be common knowledge to someone who has been deep into the hobby for years, but I think it might be helpful for people just starting out or even for people who have had dolls for a while but never investigated the different types of eyes available.

So the first type of doll eye we have are glass eyes. There are a few of mine in the picture below. I have others but I wasn’t about to go removing eyes from my dolls or anything, lol. Glass eyes are naturally, made of glass, and by many doll owners are considered to be the best type of eye. Glass really reflects light the best and can really make an eye light up, but often they will be less realistic than acrylics, silicon and sometimes even resin. It also pays to keep in mind not all glass eyes are created equal. Cheap glass eyes are just that, cheap and often they cannot even rival a good quality acrylic eye.

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The blurry set of eyes in the foreground of the pic above are Mint on Card eyes, which were a free gift. The flatback eyes are Miniworld, and the black and brown pair sitting on parts of the pink box are both Dollmore. The black eyes, which if you look closely are actually a very dark charcoal gray are really very good quality. Rather than being straight black, the deep charcoal will give a slight hint of depth in the eye. They are a bit tricky to photograph though as often they will appear just black. The other pair are special Dollmore eyes and are extremely pretty, they have great clarity and the brown glitter in the glass really makes the eyes sparkle. Both of the Dollmore eyes I consider good quality.

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Now on to the lesser quality eyes. Above is a cheap pair of glass eyes from Miniworld. Inside them there is a dotty print in a low lpi of an iris. Of course it has all the transparency and glossiness of glass eyes, but because the iris is some sort of print, it does not really refract the light.

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This next set of eyes are from Mint on Card, they are just their basic glass eyes that they sell. These were a freebie so I shouldn’t be too hard on them, but on the other hand, buyers should be informed. These eyes are not as bad as the Miniworld ones, they are all glass and they light up quite nice under the right conditions, BUT they are certainly a very goofy color of blue and the threading which you can just barely see in this shot is irregular. They also seem to like to cast their blue color into the whites of the eye at places as well. If you compare these eyes with the Dollmore eyes, there is no comparison, Dollmore wins.

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Next up are silicon eyes, this pair in specific is eyeco A113 I belive. The benefits of silicon eyes are they they are rubbery and therefore can bend and be pushed quite flush in the eye wells of a doll. Their irises are basically a print encased in clear silicon. Because they are a print they can be as detailed and as real looking as a human iris. However because they are a print, they can’t refract light, all sense of light from a printed silicon eye comes from the high contrast of light against dark in the print itself. Another drawback of silicon eyes are that because they are rubbery they can collect dust easily and may need to be wiped with a damp cloth periodically. Overall I do like silicon eyes, you can get some really nice variations of irises and if you have a doll with an odd or irregular eye well it’s easy to squish the eyes in there so you no longer have any hollow spaces around the eyes. I haven’t tried any other silicon eyes besides eyeco though, however people do seem to praise Soom eyes as well.

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So now draw your attention to the pair of eyes in the middle of the shot above. Those are acrylic eyes and this particular pair happens to be my default unoa eyes in a dark blue. This isn’t my best pair of acrylic eyes sadly and they are just dark and don’t offer much reflection at all. If you want to see a better pair of acrylic eyes then have a look at my Lusis here: http://www.genkigirl.com/dollyblog/?p=1168 Her current pair of acrylic eyes can light up a little bit similar to glass, but not nearly as well as glass. So, acrylic eyes usually also rely on a print of an iris that is set under plastic. Occasionally you can also find hand painted irises, but those are kind of rare. Another benefit of acrylic eyes are because it’s a print, many different types of eyes such as cat eyes or fantasy eyes with symbols embedded in them can be done.

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As with glass eyes, acrylic eyes can be good or bad quality. In the above pic you can see the worst quality acrylic eyes I have which came standard with my AE Yara. They are little hollow flatbacks in an odd shape that you can really play with to angle up, down or side to side because usually you wind up seeing the side of the eye and having a gap. On top of this the iris section of the eye is a completely different plastic part and there is a visible seam between the iris and white of the eye. The print of the iris isn’t anything to write home about either.

The last type of eye I will talk about are resin eyes. I do not have any resin eyes yet, but I do know that they are the best at imitating the reflective qualities of glass. Their only drawback is that like your dolls, they can yellow over time, that and they are often very expensive. Enchanted Doll sells eyes for $50 a pair, but they are definitely beautiful and something I might like to own one day.

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So, in the end basically remember this….you get what you pay for…If you buy a cheap pair of eyes, that’s what you are often getting, something cheap. A really great pair of eyes can make a big difference in the way you doll looks and is photographed.

Here’s a quick list of the eyes in this post: Miniworld glass flatback, Mint on Card glass eyes, Dollmore glass eyes in Y03 (black), Dollmore Special glass eyes ET27 (brown), Asleep Eidolon acrylic, Unoa default acrylic, eyeco silicon A113. I will also be posting the “group shot” of eyes on my flickr and annotating them.