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Origin Story/The Future of Vita Plastica

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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
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  1. corsetkitten (aka Erica)October 28, 2010 at 8:58 AM

    Okaaaay:

    Tell 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!

    ReplyDelete
  2. DaniOctober 28, 2010 at 9:26 AM

    Thanks Erika,

    I 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!

    ReplyDelete
  3. corsetkitten (aka Erica)October 28, 2010 at 9:27 AM

    Don't beat yourself up!
    It's supposed to be fun, and hopefully you'll be able to take (or steal) 5 or 10 minutes a week to play!

    ReplyDelete

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