Hi you guys.
Tell me: How did you get into doll life? Leave a comment or blog about it.
For me it was Indian Barbie. This was about 14 years ago:
Being at the time obsessed with India and having never grown up with a Barbie that wasn't either black or blonde, I was amazed by her. I was just walking through Target minding my own business and there she was. I thought she was gorgeous.
I named her Pria. I took a few pictures of her but without proper furniture it looked silly. And without fellow dolls, she was a useless knick knack.
For the next several years, I would buy lots of dolls and furniture, then get sick of it and give them all away to my niece. I did this 2-3 times. Finally my niece grew up, packed it all up and gave it back to me.
I did a couple of silly photostories, but mostly just posed them and didn't name anyone. I moved to NY and started doing a couple of silly photostories and making oh just the saddest looking sets ever:
Then I found Fashion Royalty. I was suddenly inspired to do all sorts of photostories. They were so articulated, I didn't know what to do with myself. Okay so the sets were still pretty sad. It would still be many years before I found the doll community.
Anyway, if I could have any job in the world, I would design store windows (with the mannequins and all). I have always thought of the doll world as an extension of that desire.
So now that I realize will likely not have time to do a full photostory for many years (because of the small children and all), I'm going to change things up a bit.
My dolls will always have a life and I will always pose them each day/week to reflect that, but the photos I put out there are going to be like store windows. Just one to five shots that tell a story without words. The lives of these dolls progress and I just don't have time to show you each and every thing that happens.
So until I do, that's what ya'll are getting.
And maybe I'll do sort of a character intro. I do still have an obscene desire to introduce you to all my plastic friends.
Ah, now I can spend time learning to sew doll stuff and learning more diorama stuff from you guys!
smooches!
dani
Okaaaay:
ReplyDeleteTell me: How did you get into doll life? Leave a comment or blog about it.
I guess I have to answer this in two parts. First I was into barbies when I was a kid. Then I "grew up" and got frustrated with how no barbie reflected "me". I ended up making plenty of stories with them but they were all definitely non-kid related.
As an adult (I use that term loosely since I doubt I'll ever "grow up") I got back into barbies & dolls in 1999 after a hospitalization. I'd discovered OOAK barbies & decided that they would work as a form of therapy for me. And they did. Down the line from there I discovered Volks Dollfies and actually did my first photostory ever using them (or any dolls).
You can see it here (And believe me Dani, I totally have you beat on crappy settings (fabric backdrop anyone? LOL)
Pizzahat
Volks will always be my favorite dolls when it comes to articulation & posing (they beat out everyone else) but when I first got them it was a hard adjustment from Babs & my scenes.
Since then I've expanded my collection to include Fashion Royalty (because I do love their faces) Takara Cy Girls, Hot Toys Action figures and yes, Even Blythe! All of them IMO have their pluses & minuses.
With regard to putting your stories on hold and not using any text or info: IMO (and that's just me) I think you're doing yourself an injustice & selling your abilities short.
If you wanted to, you could do something like I was doing before I started gearing up for the cafe (Cup & Saucery cafe & the Quinlan Confidential stories) and that is to do them in very short format episodes.
I decided that for a while character sketches (where they all took place in the same roomset, and were only a total of 1 page in length) were the order of the day.
Thus were born the Friday Monologues
Anyway, things are very unsettled here but despite that I do so much want to work on stories. (My husband is talking about us living in a camping trailer...wanna talk about putting a cramp in space for shooting stories? LOL)
Anyway, that's my unsolicited 2 cents!
Thanks Erika,
ReplyDeleteI do have a nasty habit of beating myself up and putting undue pressure on myself for no good reason. I also feel the need to justify (to you all? to me?) not working on doll stuff as I will soon have two little ones under two. Yikes.
And you remind me, the most important thing about a hobby is that it is therapeutic. No sense in making it stressful!
Thanks for your support and wonderful comments!
Don't beat yourself up!
ReplyDeleteIt's supposed to be fun, and hopefully you'll be able to take (or steal) 5 or 10 minutes a week to play!