Do you have a Smart Doll?

I don't have one yet but I will be buying your Harmony Dark skin Smart Doll when she comes out. I have watched the You Tube videos of the dolls and Can't wait to own one. I think they are off topic here on DOA. So they may remove your post! They are great dolls and Danny Choo is great!

 

I don't have one, but I have seen a bunch at the Central and South NJ doll meets. They're pretty interesting! I like the tripod stand solution they thought up. The joints are really substantial, too. Holding poses like mad.

 

I did, a little bit. I have Dollfie Dreams, and I love my two DDs, and the Smart Dolls are pretty similar in aesthetics. Their bodies are pretty cool. What were you not fond of in your Obitsu? I've never played with an Obitsu, so I don't know how they would compare to a DD, but I'd see a DD owner liking a Smart Doll.

 

The Dollfie dreams forum is a great resource for Smart Doll info: Dollfie Dreams • Index page
Look in The Lounge, there is a section devoted to Smart Doll

 

I'm kind of in love with Ebony Futaba...I've been looking for a more durable adventuring doll for when my fiance and I go hiking and such. The Smart Dolls seem like they'd be a fun option to bring out and about, as they seem solid and meant to be brought into the world.

 

I got a Mirai last year and I really like her. She's light weight and poses really well. I consider her my "Convention Doll" because I can set her on my shoulder, and walk around. She's lighter than my MSDs even. She fits in SD clothes, but vinyl dolls stain super easy so if you get one invest in some white shirts and light pants for when she's just lounging around.

 

I'm saving up for an ebony. I really love Danny choos smart dolls. He just released the make one so now there's another on my list

 

Yes, I love them, someday I will go for an Ebony, her tan skin is so cut, also I am curios about Chitose!

 

I have both Kizuna and Ebony, and they are some of my favorite dolls that I own! Their quality is top notch, and I'm not afraid to bring them out for photoshoots because they were built with that in mind.

 

Thanks for sharing Taintedrose! I am saving up for one now...

 

Thanks for this thread, and all the input on it! I recently discovered these beautiful dolls myself and have been eyeing them, so it's very nice to hear some owner feedback on them.

 

I'm so glad to hear about Smart Dolls, I really want one! I really love all of the accessories you can buy from Culture Japan for them.

 

They are ADORABLE! While I'm more partial to DDs, these are just precious. I really enjoy seeing their pictures!

 

They're cute dolls - and the lighter weight is a nice selling feature.

I don't have one yet, but that's because I'm torn between picking up Eiji Seiun versus Ebony Futaba. I've been joking that maybe that just means I should get both, but I'm not sure I need two more big dolls... One of these days I'll make up my mind and take the plunge though!

 

I had been impatiently waiting for the official release of Eiji Seiun, and was finally able to order him around Christmas time. He just arrived about a week or so ago, and I'm very pleased with him!

I also have an Obitsu whose female chest has been swapped with the optional male chest piece, and while I love the doll, I can't say I care for his Obitsu body. It's kind of too squishy and sort of flappy in spots, and I don't like the way his stomach/hip joint gaps.

Eiji on the other hand, doesn't seem to have any gapping joint problems. Also, while he is of course squishy-er than the resin dolls, he is not nearly as squishy as my Obitsu. He feels a lot more solid and better put together than the Obitsu, more similar to my MDD, or possibly even better.

Best of all, he is an actual male doll, rather than just a male chest piece put on a curvy and leggy female doll!

 

I'd love to get a Smart Doll at some point! - I'm kinda torn between Mirai and Ivory at the moment. Eiji looks pretty cool - I don't think I'd get him as I'm not big on male dolls, but he looks fantastic.
Glad to hear they're so light-weight - I'd never take my 1/3 resin dolls out anywhere; they weigh a ton!

I was looking at getting a custom Dollfie Dream, but when it comes down to it I really prefer the Smart Doll body - the DD's waist kind of scares me! Plus that Smart socket looks really clever!
I've seen the Essential editions starting to appear without the outfits which I'm pleased about, but I want those jeans!
They're the only piece of clothing that I'm really interested in from the default outfit but they're not sold separately! Argh!

 

@Panduhh if you still have your Obitsu, you might want to look at Parabox. They sell heads with eyes/wigs you can change. Junkyspot carries them too.

 

@Dezarii for some reason the Smart Dolls don't appeal to me, though they are very cute. I haven't really looked at the boy. You'll be the first to know if I do cave & order one, you horrible, horrible enabler!

 

You can see the SM doll body here next to other DDs, the head is not Eiji though.

There's one of Eiji next to a 60cm obitsu boy here (for those that might be curious).

I wanted to get him but I found out that Danny is going to release 1/6 version of Mirai and Eiji soon and as a fan of tiny dolls, I will wait for the 1/6 line. =)

 

I'm so happy to have a place to talk about this! I am saving up for ebony and have been wanting to talk to someone and learn more. I have followed Danny's blog for years and the 1/6 piqued my interest. . So I think I will try to buy one big girl and a few of the little ones ^^; does anyone know an expected release date for Pocket mirai?

 

I placed an order for Kizuna Yumeno yesterday and some extra clothes. I don't have a DD for comparison, but I have an Obitsu 60 girl. Most DD's and other super cartoony kinds of dolls usually don't appeal to me, but for some reason Smart Dolls do. It was hard to choose which one to get.

 

I'm in the boat with people waiting for 1/6 release wondering how it will end up looking.

For awhile I thought I'd buy a 1/3 doll of Chitose. I adore the character, but as the sculpt/ face was revealed my enthusiasm fell flat. Looks absolutely nothing like her..
-_-

Coincidentally, though, Obitsu is due to release a very much improved 1/6 body in the very near future. That's bound to be far cheaper than SmartDoll, and I haven't been let down by Obitsu (small scales) so far.

 

I'm not familiar with the characters, where can I go to learn more about them? Is there a tv show/Anime or Manga to read?

 

As far as I know, Danny plans to release 1/6 Mirai and Eiji sometime during this year (I'd hazard a guess towards the second half of the year but don't quote me on that). I want one of the 60cm girls but I don't know about the smaller ones; I have a couple of Azone/Obitsu hybrids and as cute as I find them I'm not sure 1/6 dolls are the right scale for me. I'll have to wait and see until they're released.

@Lokinta I agree with you about Chitose. I love love LOVE the illustrations of her but the doll version just doesn't look quite right to me, which is really disappointing. I can't quite work out exactly what it is that's off either.

To any folks who have Mirai (or one of her wigs), what is the actual colour of her hair? I keep seeing some photos where it looks more brownish, and then others where it looks more of a light auburn or strawberry blonde shade.

 

I believe there's an anime planned (called Mirai Millenium) but I don't think it's finished yet or know when it will be.
The characters are created by Danny Choo and several of them now have 60cm vinyl Smart Doll versions of them. - Danny is also planning to make robotic versions of the dolls in the future that can move and do other things, but they're still in development at the moment (and will cost a lot more than the normal 'Manual' doll versions!)
If you want to find about more about the characters you can check out the website: at the very bottom of the page there are little animated pixel images of each character - if you click on them it'll take you to their individual profiles.

 

Re:Chitose's sculpt vs. character design.

I spent some time thinking about it and looking closely.

The eyes and faceup of the 3D sculpt land the edge of her irises at the inner edge of her upper eyes, making her appear cross-eyed. On all the illustrations, her inner upper eyelid extends farther, and with a fairly flat curve - a slightly heavy-lidded (sleepy?) or little bit "tsun" look about halfway to Kizuna's (whose eyes also got rounded way up in 3Dification.) She appears cross eyed and surprised.

Maybe it's just the way Danny has his example model's eyes set up, (I wonder if he'd humor a request for a Chitose side-eye photo? maybe it would change my opinion.. a little..) but there's also the chance that the shape of the eye wells doesn't allow for too much change.

Tiny nose, relatively flat face shape - in my opinion, are par for the course for this doll line. It didn't transgress expectations (though maybe some peoples' hopes for more defined features.)

Then there's the "pout" - Her character sketches do show a tendency to go slightly slack-jawed when in thought, thus the tiny mouth showing teeth is not a deviation from concept, but the execution of it on the sculpt seems to leave her in a constant expression of "whoa" or "uhhh" or as in Japanese, a rising "eeeeeeeh~?" It doesn't look intelligent, thoughtful, or like anything we saw in her character art.

On a personal aside, I owned a doll with this facial expression before (Parabox Petite Hime) and it did bother me a lot. I tried erasing the mouth, then ended up trying to reshape the whole lower face..) the more I tried, the worse it got.. maybe Chitose's tiny frowny mouth bothers me by association with a negative past experience.

The shape of the jaw is pretty good, as well as setting her apart from Mirai and existing sculpts so far. And what we see as far as character hair color, clothing, eyes, it's looking really good. Hair cut and clothes are yet to be seen..

Don't get me wrong, I think she's absolutely adorable and innocent looking, but it's not the character they were trying to portray. I'd love to own her someday maybe, but it would take modifications to make her look like Chitose as we fell for her.

 

I have a Smart Doll Mirai and I absolutely love her. She's really easy to pose and photograph.


A Splash Of Color by R u b i n ✿, on Flickr

@Zaliayn I'd say her wig definitely looks more light auburn than brown in person. It's very high quality and soft to the touch. Never gets tangled or frizzy even though I handle it quite often. ^_^

 

I got Mirai for my birthday, I love her! The posing is fantastic! I picked up the dark brown wig and the medium bust for her a few months ago and that dark wig is very nice on her.

 

Oh interesting! I see these dolls a lot lately, really like them, but I didn't even know they don't qualify as BJD

 

Gotta say I'm very disappointed in Chitose's sculpt. It really doesn't look like her to me. :/

 

I am a little confused as to why the new DD3 bodies are allowed and not the Smart Dolls?
Anyhow, I hope to get a Mirai so I can have a doll I won't be afraid of dropping/yellowing and have a new little buddy to go traveling with.
I was going to wait for the robotic version but it looks like the new Smart Doll Plus will be way too big to take traveling haha.

 

I believe the original dollfie dream was strung and qualified as on topic. When dd2 and 3 came out they were "grandfathered" in (I believe the rules may have updated as well) but there were so many people already talking about their dollfie dreams the mods didn't want to suddenly make them off topic. They are an exception and though Mirai is the same as the new dollfie she is off topic. I hope that made sense!

I just tried to place an order for ebony, but ran into a technical difficulty with the cart. Hoping to order her today so that she will be a leap year baby!

 

I'm not sure Smart Dolls are my cup of tea, but I think the website is the best doll website I've ever seen. I'd love other doll sites to be so articulate about their doll ethos as Danny is. (I'm sure there are enough bilingual bjd fans out there willing to do a translation in exchange for bjd gifts‽)

 

Thank you very much! That's exactly the answer I was hoping for!

In my opinion I think you've done a pretty good job on figuring out why she looks off and I think I agree with you, especially about the makeup - the upper eyelid line definitely needs to extend more to counter that cross-eyed look which is perhaps my biggest bugbear. (On the subject of being cross-eyed, I can't work out if Ebony and Ivory have a touch of it, or if it's just me?)
I'm one of those who would have liked to have seen a little more definition in the face shape and the features, but I accept that that is the style of the dolls so it doesn't bother me overly.

It's interesting how you mention that facial expression bugging you in the past because I've been wondering if I could put up with it on a doll permanently, and I'm not sure that I can. It's cute for a while but I think I'd tire of it eventually. Definitely something to think about there.

There's a new photo of Chitose on Danny's instagram but I don't think there have been any changes to the makeup, so she's probably pretty close to her final look now seeing as there's only a couple of weeks till the release date. She definitely looks lovely (actually she makes me think of a cute little mouse) but I just don't see Chitose when I look at her. We'll have to wait until March 14th to see how she looks when she's finished, but I don't think she's going to be for me.


On another note, there's a photo on Instagram of a Smart Doll home workshop kit. It's going to be trialled in Japan first but it looks like a pretty great idea to me - especially since I won't be getting to one of those workshops in Tokyo anytime soon! I wonder how much the price will differ from the complete, assembled dolls.

 

I keep waiting for news on the 1/6 dolls. I really adore the Smart Dolls but 1/4 is a hard limit on size for me. I'm super exciting about the two smaller dolls. Hope the release date is soon.

 

I have kind of avoided looking too closely at them so far because they all look like the exact same sculpt.
The face paint differs, but otherwise I am lost about what sets them apart... It looks like he made separate "null" characters (Harmony, Ivory, Ebony) to appease calls for skin tone representation while protecting the ethnicity of his characters as he established them from being changed.
Not a fan of that thought. I want to be wrong. Someone, please convince me that's not the case.

It made me look again at Chitose, fearing her head is another iteration of the same five existing girls with new face paint. Her mouth appears to be painted onto the lower lip, the mouth itself looking just like the existing ones if the faceup were to be wiped. But her face is definitely rounder than the other mold. Unfortunately, to me, it's very quickly becoming a case of "the more you look, the less you see."

I see mousy, too! The prior sculpts make me think "squirrel" so the smallest addition being "mouse" works.. wahahaha.

CJ will probably have a good easy time of Haruka after this.. yeah, in fact.. oh, no. Look at Haruka's eyes!
..I think they are about to release a frowny Haruka as "Chitose"

 

Still not sure how to feel about the exception but I suppose it makes sense as the DD1 body was strung regular.

FYI to all, Mirai is on sale just for today because it's her birthday in Japan time! Some goodies are on sale as well! If you want Mirai now is the time to pull the trigger!

 

I'm excited for the 1/6 Mirai. I'll definitely be adding her to my collection. I also saw that Danny mentioned 1/6 Eiji is going to be released sometime this year. Hopefully Mirai will be out before Eiji.
Also, if anyone is interested in getting Mirai while she's 11% off for her birthday: Culture Japan Store

 

The picture of Eiji was reassuring. It looks like he is considerably thicker and more seamless looking than the obitsu bodies. That's the biggest thing I have been wondering about.

 

Ivory, Ebony and Harmony do seem a bit generic to me now that you mention it. And they don't have character profiles like the other dolls do - Ivory & Ebony's icons just lead to their sales pages.

I don't think it's the case that Danny doesn't want characters of other ethnicities and I'd be incredibly surprised and disheartened if he's only releasing the other skintones just to appease everyone.
I don't know the process of making vinyl dolls, but I know that darker resin is harder to create reliably so I'd imagine getting the colour consistant for vinyl isn't overly straight forward either. If he created the characters with the express idea to make dolls of them he may have shied away from other colours of vinyl in case it wasn't actually viable to produce them to a high enough standard. Now that he's worked out the process, other characters may start appearing who use the other skintones. There's only 6 actual characters so far and that seems too few for what's planned, at least to me anyway.

I think that Ivory, Ebony, Harmony and the male doll in tan ('Crimson' I think is the working name) are really more of a basic doll to allow people to build their own custom characters onto. Vinyl dolls in darker skintones seem to be something of a rarity - even with 3 skintones, Dollfie Dreams don't really offer any variety - and I feel more like Danny wants to make it possible to create characters that span a much wider ethnic range than currently possible.

Chitose is definitely a new head mold, although just how different is hard to tell. I'd probably have to see both heads blank and side-by-side to see the differences clearly. I wonder if her head will also be reused for other dolls like Mirai's is. Perhaps that's why it doesn't look much like Chitose - so that it can be used for other characters without being overly distinctive. If she can be painted with a smile, then I can see the head being used for Haruka too.
I wonder how a doll of Kanata would look - there aren't a lot of illustrations but she also doesn't seem to have the roundest of eyes, and considering her personality I'm not sure 'cutesy' would work for her either.
I have to wonder if having all the female dolls use the same eyes is a bit of a limitation on how the heads can be designed. 22mm is quite a large size to work with if you want a narrower eye shape.

At the moment I think I will likely end up choosing Mirai when I get a Smart Doll, although I have thought about perhaps hybridising with a Volks DD head. I know I'll be changing Mirai's eye colour at the very least anyway.

 

I'll try to keep my chin up about the skin tone thing! It IS an improvement over Volks' and Obitsu's limited range, you are right! Barbie and fashion dolls in general have got the system down pretty well for a couple of decades now though, so the technology is out there.

Seems like slight makeup changes make the difference between characters so far. I wonder if many people have customized the faceups to look more like the character's concept art. Some faceup artists can work magic! Definitely looking forward to seeing Chitose out in the world and in owner pics! Only a few more days now ^o^

 

That is true about fashion dolls and their range of vinyl colours, although Mattel and other fashion doll companies probably don't have to worry so much about production costs, especially when manufacturing large quantities of dolls.
Smart Doll seems to still be fairly small at this point so maybe the cost of production is a factor too. And their doll components and parts are all manufactured in Japan, so the costs are already higher than if they were being made in China instead.

Yeah, Chitose will be the first female doll to use a new head mold. Seeing as Ivory, Ebony and Harmony are basically non-character dolls I think you can just about get away with using the same head, but any more actual characters using the Mirai head would probably start to wear a bit thin.
I've seen a couple of repainted Kizunas who don't look so frowny anymore, but I haven't really come across any custom faceups yet. I'm sure they exist though, and I imagine that someone will probably repaint Chitose at some point.
It will be interesting to see how she looks - I am eagerly awaiting March 14th!

 

I have decided to get a smart doll to shell as the main character of my SD story. Im not sure which I want yet. Ivory/Ebony have the right hair color but I like the look of chitose.

 

There's a blog post up about Chitose's release tomorrow here. She comes with the standard S-sized bust rather than the SS, and is the same height as the other dolls, which I know will disappoint some people. She's also going to cost 62k yen rather than 60k and the Essential Edition is 50k yen. (It makes me wonder if the price is about to rise for the other dolls too...)
I have to admit I do quite like how she looks, although I still don't see her as Chitose.
If I ever bought her though, I'd have to paint her mouth to look a little happier lol

So the default outfits will be changed for all the girls soon? Gotta admit I'm a little sad at that - the corduroy trousers are okay (and easier to put on apparently!), but I'd much prefer having the jeans, they'd be far more versatile. But I really don't think I can stretch to getting a Smart Doll right now *pout*

 

I love reading everyone's opinions about Smart Dolls. This thread is really helpful and informative that I plan on getting Eiji. Thank you everyone for posting so much about them.

 

I have an Eiji! He was actually my first 1/3 doll. Or first doll bigger than a 1/6 azone. I thought I'd be a bit intimidated by the new scale but it's so much fun! I got to pick him up from the Mirai store itself when I was in Tokyo last month, which was pretty exciting.
I made him into Kaito - it was the reason I got him. I changed his wig to one from Dollce (it's been cut though, it originally had long ear-tail things not unlike Chitose's wig) and his eyes are Volks eyes in 20mm.


Really looking forward to the option hands.

 

@Torino your Eiji is fantastic, and he looks perfect as Kaito! His wig is great - I love that blue! Seeing Smart Dolls that have been customised is so brilliant I'm glad you like the 1/3 size too!
I wish I could visit the Mirai store, but I think I'd be in there for hours and end up coming back with so much stuff, so maybe it's a good thing I'm on the other side of the world!

 

@Torino I never cared much for Eiji but yours look great. He makes a good looking Kaito. Congrats on getting him.

 

I keep hoping to see him release the manual version of the 120cm Smart Doll Plus but he hasn't mentioned her on his blog since April of 2015. I hope they're not abandoning the project. I have an 105cm Dollmore Trinity Lumie and I love her, but she is very hard to pose and kind of floppy. All I can do is have her sit in a chair, really, because she's so heavy. I don't trust her on even Dollmore's heavy duty large stand. The Smart Doll Plus looks like it will be much lighter and amazing to pose! The only thing I would worry about are stains (and whatever the price might be.)

Smart Doll Plus

 

I'm pretty sure this was an April Fool's joke...

 

I've read that it was not.

 

I was under the impression the larger doll was not the joke. The joke was the house protection stuff.

 

I don't think the life size Smart Doll is a joke. I think Danny decided to release the 1/6 dolls before continuing with the project hence the lack of updates. I personally would love to have a giant Mirai but I'm afraid I wouldn't know what to do with her. I barely have enough space for my 1/3 dolls as it is... And I move quite often so, you can imagine the nightmare of packing and unpacking all those dolls. xP