Ever feel like abandoning your stories?

I feel like abandoning my stories all the time, which is exactly why I don't want to make dolls of my characters! I want a doll to have exactly enough backstory to give context to looks & photo shoots, and no more. Makes for more versatility and freedom. And if the slim backstory I came up with doesn't suit my goals anymore, I have no problem changing it (I've had my Unoa, Charlie, for 2 years and I've already retconned several things about her, haha.)

 

I'm almost the exact same way. I only really have one doll that I have a real story with because he's my D&D Character that I've had for years. I started out having stories for all my dolls, but as time went on, it became a little frustrating because sometimes I'd just want to switch things up! I, too, have just enough backstory/character design to make them their each character, but not enough to write a full story about. It makes is so much easier to change things if the mood strikes.

That, and they're all more or less "one-offs" in that each doll has their own thing going on so I don't have to worry about shelling a bunch of OCs. Some of my current dolls have connections to each other, but nothing like, "Oh I have to make them work perfectly together."

 

I often feel like abandoning stories as I'm writing them. I've learned to embrace it and just put things on the backburner, and years later I'll re-read out of curiosity and rediscover my love for the universe I've created. But we're talking about dolls here, so let's see...

I do have inspiration photos, mostly of dolls, for my novel characters but I don't think I'd be able to stomach having those characters who are already very vivid in my mind in an actual, physical form in front of me. I've had a devil of a time trying to find one that suits my main character, and while I did eventually find one recently, I know I wouldn't be able to stand having a doll of him. I'd be far too picky about how he looks and the clothes he wears and even what his nude body looks like (something he's extremely scandalized to discover I've put thought into), and I feel like that's unfair to the man I've grown to love as a treasured (imaginary) friend.

So instead, I have dolls that are 'character sketches'. Just vague, ephemeral ideas of what the character should be, but nothing concrete in terms of their looks and style. I'm blessed with a creative process that allows me to fill in the blanks later, and often times they'll fill themselves in when I'm just going about my day. Atropa, my pocket fairy, is the only one who has had a concrete sculpt and style picked out before I ever purchased the doll - she's been with me for twenty years now, and her doll for less than 5. I'm still working on styling her to look exactly the way she wants to look, but she's actually changed personality several times over the years, from a stoic coldness to more of a blunt but charming person, and now she's somewhere in the middle.

Teasel was a complete accident. He never existed until I saw the doll, and all of a sudden this spunky little guy was born and running amok like he owned my cerebral cortex. I imagine in several years time he might change a bit too, but at the moment I'm still learning who he is. He's still learning who he is, so we're in it together, I suppose.

In terms of the story of these two, though... the world around the characters is changing just as much as they are. I feel more as though I'm just on the outside glimpsing into their world than having any hand in creating it. So I don't suppose I've ever felt the urge to abandon it, because it isn't something that belongs to me; it's theirs, wholly, and I'm only able to glimpse it when they feel like sharing it. There is a sort of 'timeline', in that the characters do have age groups and relationships through the passage of time, but at this point the character that documents their histories has not revealed themselves yet. I know they're out there, though, just as I know several of the other inhabitants that do not yet have dolls.

Long story short: Rather than have characters with established stories, backgrounds, and relationships, my dolls are designed to be adaptable to my everchanging whims. That way, when I do inevitably find myself bored with a story, I can change it without feeling as though I'm abandoning the character; I'm simply changing the environment they're in, or discovering a part of their past that was previously unknown.

 

Mmmm well most of my dolls are Tolkien inspired characters. So they are quite happy to play their roles. Some of my elves haven't figured out if they wish to be part of the Tolkien world or a separate fantasy world I built around my Volks Hewitt - he is a human transported to a fantasy realm. So I feel like they all have a solid character but no actual documented stories by me haha. Now I have two dolls whose characters I could change if I wanted to keep the dolls...that is certainly an idea...but I am not rushing to sell them just yet.

 

Some of my 1/6 custom Volks and Obitsu started off as characters for a story that ended up not going anywhere but giving that batch their names. What ended up happening with their personalities that developed over time and I recognized patterns in my work is they became actors in a sense. Think of an ensemble manga/anime where you can look at hairstyles and how they dress and get a pretty good idea who is going to be who. Some times Bram is the handsome hero, sometimes he's the long dark haired handsome villain, he's just not allowed to cut his hair.

To keep it on topic I only have one doll who's based on an existing character, Jareth the Goblin King and David Bowie impersonator, but he's also adopted.

 

How do you handle your dolls versus your/their stories?
I am pretty meticulous when it comes to writing my photo story. I've improved on how I handle the script so that each photo strip can work more like a small beginning and end that continues into the next segment of the story, but can be read like a comic individually. I designate times to write, times for the photo shoots, and then comes the editing pictures if necessary, followed by making each panel, the picture, and the words on it, sometimes editing the original writing while I go along. It's a lot of work, but it is a fun hobby to make a web comic. I also like seeing myself improve each year in both how I handle the segments of the story and in my photography.

Have you grown out of your stories - have your dolls grown out of theirs?
I think my current story only has two more seasons at best. It started with the characters in high school and most of the main cast will be graduating in a year. While I did bring in younger students, as some of the older ones already graduated, I don't want to focus the story on the younger students. Whenever I watch a high school series and it runs for years after the main cast became adults and all the students are new it just doesn't seem as good.

I am planning a series for the future. The same cast of characters. But, it will no longer settle around the starring five boys and school life. It's going to be in a hotel and have a lot more supernatural elements to it.

How much do you stick to your "blueprint" when styling your doll or letting your characters interact?
I make all of their clothing. I want them to look as if they belong in the setting. My first year was rough, the clothes weren't great, some were bought. I look back at season one of my series and laugh at the poor quality of clothing. Most of the characters are in their late teens. I want them to look like teens.

Sometimes when I sit them between photoshoots if they constantly lean toward on doll or shove away another doll. I will write parts of that into the story, if it's appropriate for the next part of the story.

Are you storytelling with a timeline, i.e. dolls falling in love and getting married later … ?
They do. One of the teens is getting married right after graduation, because his parents pushed for it because of business reasons. It's a good thing he likes the other person. A lot of them are settling in to become adults, most will be going to college. I don't want to set the next story around a college though, that they are in college and what they study will be mentioned but not the forefront.

Many of them are settling down. A lot of the teen romances are falling apart after graduating from high school as the characters learn more about themselves and grow into adult people, sometimes away from their former romances. My story is very slice of life.

Do you feel obliged to stick to your story because you shared it with BJD community friends?
Not at all. I stick to it, because I wrote it. Because this is the story I wanted to tell. I let it go in the direction it seems to flow to.

The only reason I am going to change it up is because the characters outgrew the setting. They need a new setting and story to work with so that the characters can more fully grow and develop.

I am already cooking up plans for their next adventure.

Great questions! I enjoyed answering these, and writing about the creativity behind my story.

 

How do you handle your dolls versus your/their stories?

My dolls exist in a pocket dimension, sort of a land between universes that each of them was pulled from. This allows me to explore my dolls in multiple capacities (writing/art, video games, and dolls) without feeling like I have to unify all of their forms and behaviors into one defined "canon" depiction/interpretation. I have certain traits and events that are integral to their characters and remain true in every universe, but many other things are negotiable or negligible depending on the universe/timeline.

Have you grown out of your stories - have your dolls grown out of theirs?

I have many, many times! Part of my soft collection reset of 2021 was coming to the realization that the stories/universes I wrote as a teenager and young adult are almost wholly uninteresting to me as a proper adult with a mortgage and pays taxes. Several of my current characters are spiritual successors of my previous ones, if you squint and know what to look for.

How much do you stick to your „blueprint“ when styling your doll or letting your characters interact?

As I said previously, my "canon" is pretty loose when it comes to the doll forms of my characters. Most of them would never meet in their universes of origin, so they're free to interact and dress as I see fit within their broader characterization. Ingrid is an alt/punk/goth girl, so her fashion reflects this character trait, but she may wear outfits that lean more y'allternative when she's hanging out with Marcie, who prioritizes function over form due to caring for the grounds and horses. Aiyu and Eden are foils, so they often draw attention to each others' best and worst character traits through novel interactions that they miss out on in the universes where they are protagonists.

Are you storytelling with a timeline, i.e. dolls falling in love and getting married later … ?

I'm not really storytelling on a timeline as much as letting my characters grow and evolve together. I write relationships first, as I think many of our most interesting behaviors and beliefs take shape from the ways in which we interact with others, and it is interesting to see where friction arises in happy relationships as well as where peace manifests in hostile ones. One of the stories I'm most looking forward to telling is Aiyu attempting to process her grief regarding Nysus's death in her universe of origin while having to coexist with a version of Nysus from a different universe, particularly when this version of him starts developing romantic feelings toward her as well.

Do you feel obliged to stick to your story because you shared it with BJD community friends?

Not really! The whole "pocket dimension"/torment nexus thing is incredibly flexible for a backdrop, so I can spin off and explore as many alternate universes as I want without having to scrap my starting point, which was the whole reason for choosing this story in the first place. If I want to explore a different story and shell characters from it, bam! Just yoink them out of their "real" story and stick them in the Library for doll shenanigans.

My little troupe of dolls is, at the end of the day, for me to play dolls with. I chose my doll story with the explicit purpose of giving me the maximum amount of creative freedom possible, whether I'm making them fight or smooshing their heads together and making them kiss. The most fun I have with my dolls comes from not taking it too seriously, just having them do silly little things until something clicks in my head that makes me go "Aha! That's it!"

Thank you for the wonderful questions!

 

Well, I actually had to do the opposite. While the dolls will always be physical representations of the characters, they come with huge limitations. I decided to stop trying to have the characters match the dolls perfectly.

The cost of making the dolls match the characters would be insane. I need a lot more minor characters that I'm not willing to spend hundreds of dollars on each. I can match their hair to their wigs but this is also a huge limitation. The static faces of dolls are also a huge limitation. You can work with them with tricky angle work, but their expression can never change. Also, drawing is nearly free!! Dolls are stupidly expensive to complete!

In a way, I made my characters as dolls. I want to be able to change their hairstyle as easily as I can change their wigs. I want to play dress up with my drawings. Maybe someday I'll be able to match the current dolls to their characters a little better or even buy a couple more important characters. But right now, I can't chain myself to the dolls if I want to complete this.

I did abandon the characters for a long time. I thought I was over it and was moving on to something better (fan work?! ), but I picked my boys back up again when I got Hina and I've been obsessed with them and completing their story for years now.

I like to keep my dollfoto to the characters, but it's not a solid rule. For example, Hina will only meet Alois once, and will hate his guts immediately. I will still take photos of the dolls together, but I don't try to imply they're friends.

 

I'm a bit past Year One into BJD hobby and admittedly, I joined for the sole purpose of shelling my OCs—just the two main characters in my avatar who have my whole heart. Their story is akin to a contemporary fiction novel with a clear beginning and a resolved end. However, I continue to develop my characters through slice of life moments and challenges sprinkled through that space of time. I've found that working on their doll counterparts keep me loving them and engaged with my imagination.

Amara and Cori each have their own distinct aesthetic, but I would be lying if I said I stay strictly to textbook canon when styling my dolls. At first, I was adamant about Amara's wardrobe being strictly black, no colour. So when I introduced gothic outfits with some colour, I reframed this as Amara growing from her hurt and allowing herself to feel joy. I got Cori a pirate outfit which is as far away from canon as possible—reframed as going to a dress-up party being silly and theatrical because of course she would. Amara in one of those sexy backless sweaters with the heart-shaped boob window? Scandalous! Cori knew exactly what she was doing when she gifted it to her on Valentine's Day.

Outside of doll hobby, I also brainstorm AU versions of my characters. One of such is a DnD-verse where Amara is a half-elf sorceress and Cori a tiefling arcane trickster under her tutelage. In a romantic horror AU, Amara's the heart-eating corpse bride to Cori's detective-turned-serial-killer. In a supernatural rom-com, Amara is the Victorian ghost failing to scare Cori, her latest tenant. By tomorrow, they could be space cowgirls for all I know lol This is because they are enduring personalities living rent-free in my mind. But here is the key: they are still fresh and exciting.

You see, I have a lot of beloved OCs from stories as old as my young childhood to having started 15 years ago (I'm 36 years old now)—OCs I once obsessed over and loved as hard as I currently do for Amara and Cori. There have been times where I considered shelling some of my old favourites, but ultimately decided against doing so because I've long outgrown my love for them.

I've matured through age so my old OCs seem juvenile in writing compared to my new OCs no matter how much I've updated the former through the years. There simply comes a time to admit when the good run is not as it used to be—that it's fine to just let go of these characters and stories. Otherwise, you end up trapping yourself in nostalgia induced creative burnout. When it comes to that, I believe it is sign to start something new from scratch again.

 

I've described how I develop OCs for my dolls in these posts - here, here, here, here. Basically, I don't shell pre-existing OCs into dolls; I "grow" a character out of the doll I bought. I see character dev and storytelling as a collaboration between me and the doll: I do define some boundaries and overall "shape" of the character, but all details within the shape are open to change, and I play with the doll and dress them up to discover what kind of character they are. If I can, I incorporate IRL circumstances around the doll into the story. In turn, I daydream about the character, and that informs how I play with and dress the doll.

Doll and character are one and the same for me: re-shelling a character or "repurposing" a doll doesn't happen here. (Or rather, it hasn't happened yet - who knows whether my attitude will change in the future.)

As for the story, my doll OCs are one single ensemble cast with a definite story. I envision it unfolding like a TV or anime series: there's a timeline and a defined plot with an ending, and all the characters have character growth arcs. But I move up and down the timeline as I please, and everything is rather elastic in the way an ongoing anime series can be. So if I play with the doll and discover something new about the character, it gets introduced or retconned somewhere into the story timeline.

Most of my dolls were bought within the last 3 years, the characters and their story are still very much live in my imagination. Time will tell whether I'll outgrow them. Aside from their original story, I've been imagining them in alternate universes: they're the same character archetypes but in different settings and story plots. So if I get tired of their original story, I can see myself moving them all over into an AU to begin something new.

An example from actual media is the Ghost in the Shell franchise: all the different media - manga, anime series, movies - are, at heart, retellings of the same characters and relationships in a similar but also varied set of themes and settings. I would like my dolls to be like this - same/similar characters and relationships, but in different settings and exploring different themes. I think they're getting there. In fact, my past OCs that could move into different AUs have all been very enduring (the oldest ones lasted over 20 years), so I'm hopeful that my doll OCs might also be long-lived.

And no, I don't feel any obligation to an audience. I love my doll characters, I think they will be around for a long time, and I'm touched that other people like them too, but my highest priority is to remain creative. If I'm to stay creative and keep producing creative works, I gotta go where my passion and interests lead me, even if it means putting an old story to sleep and pursuing something new.

 

The storytelling angle is a compelling side of the hobby and I like it when there's a story woven around someone's doll crew, or the dolls are made after someone's own existing characters. I thought of doing the same. I like to write short stories, and I made comics for a time, and never had issues getting creative. But with dolls? I can't do it. I have to start from the doll first, I can't shell. Also, they're dolls! They're grounded in my own living space. They're here, not there.
And I think there's nothing wrong with it. I love my crew dearly, and they have plenty of personality as they are without an overarching story tying them together. Perhaps that will change in the future as I expand my cramped doll space at home, get more props and furniture, and become more comfortable making them interact, but I think it's completely fine to have dolls exist as dolls and fleshed out characters at the same time, without embedding them into a story.

 

I also found this thread interesting to read, because everyone comes at "shelling a character in a doll" differently. There are so many different approaches to how much the actual, material resin doll represents the OC and gets "involved" in the storytelling for that OC. There's everything from the dolls being actors acting out OCs in photostories, to dolls being kinda like AU versions of their respective imagined OCs, to dolls who are blank slates to dress up in archetypes or representations of the OCs but aren't meant to have a fixed identity. So very interesting!

I am very strict about the look of my OCs that began their existence on paper, not as dolls - it's why I don't shell them. As a newbie, I tried shelling my most significant OC with my first doll, and the experience was frustrating because the doll simply couldn't match my imagined character perfectly. I was so discouraged that I sold that doll and swore to never attempt to shell a preexisting OC again. However, I have thought about trying again, 15 years (with a long hiatus in between) after that experience. I think there are more BJDs now that stylistically fit my vision of this OC, and I'm also having a better time in the hobby than I did as a newbie, and will probably be less vexed by imperfections. So I'm no longer resistant to the idea, but they're just idle thoughts without any serious intention for now.

As for my OCs that grew out from my dolls (because I buy a doll first, then figure out their character afterwards), I observe that I develop them differently from my other characters in RP and novel-writing. These doll OCs are unique in that they began in an external material form - dolls meant to be dressed and customized, and it was the trial-and-error in my playing that ended up informing my character development. The doll's appearance and clothing style does get set-in-stone the more I play with them, but since BJDs as a medium are meant to be dressed up and changed, I feel that enables me to stay flexible with their appearances. Whereas all my other OCs existed firstly in my imagination before I started trying to externalize them and "nail them down" in writing or drawing. So if I try to shell them, I'm already approaching the doll with rigidity baked into my imagination. I think this is why I couldn't shell my preexisting OC as a doll -- the medium didn't work out.

I think for me, this progression of character development matters, and the fact that the doll is a physical medium matters a lot too. They're meant to be dressed up and customized and played with, and that definitely influences how I create my doll OCs and their story.

 

I’m interested:
How do you handle your dolls versus your/their stories?
Most don't have stories, or "shell". Other people are passionate about it, but that hasn't hit me. I look at a doll and ask if the sculpt "moves me" and I go on from there.

Spoiler: Skip!

(Something that's more important for me now, after having a job where I was not allowed a point of view. We were all required to do this for the team to succeed. Remember employees: "Everything you think and feel is always wrong". I still may have problems with creating stories because "my doll's likeness has to match THEIR vision?".)

I look at dolls, wonder who they might be and decide if I want to work with that. And, once I make it, do you also see what I've made. Creating characters is more difficult than in the past. I'm "out of practice" or something...yeah.

Have you grown out of your stories - have your dolls grown out of theirs?
Maybe this question doesn't apply to my dolls? I need to start making records of the short story boards that I have for them.

How much do you stick to your „blueprint“ when styling your doll or letting your characters interact?
Quite a bit, I guess. Then again, all of my dolls have a personality that would make them interesting when going into a dungeon together. One big old happy dungeon family. Even the one bjd that looks drunk. And, the one that's a baby, too. They are all interesting...except "Little Guy".

Are you storytelling with a timeline, i.e. dolls falling in love and getting married later … ?
No real time lines, yet. Maybe just one for one bjd and that's why she's driving me crazy to make. Is she 10yrs, or 13yrs, or 15yrs, or 19yrs old? What a girl wants what a girl needs and the personality changes are different at those ages.

Do you feel obliged to stick to your story because you shared it with BJD community friends?
Nah.

I am not really sure how to properly describe any of them. One's just an actor. One likes to be a trickster, here and there. One experiences an event that influences her relationship with money and power. One has style and is intelligent and stern and it's hard to see if he has a heart and he rarely compliments and "his grumpiness" is somehow beautiful and there's a gag where others mistake him for being 12 years old.
Then, I find some story that could branch out from the personality. Like "his grumpiness" is the "young master" looking to get married (again?? Yeah, I don't know if he should be a dad either. Do you think that I should work that angle? It's harder to decide without a full cast), or could be the hot selling couture clothing artist, or a b-boy, or "that really young guy in a suit that is carefully watching for you to mess up so he could get you fired".