let's see what's down this road

[[woah, maybe I shouldn't have casually scrolled through the threads here right before posting. Some of the work shown is intimidating as hell, haha :dead]]

I am posting here to have a record of my newbie attempt(s) at sculpting a doll head, and perhaps (hopefully) get some feedback : ) The whole process is new to me, but I am excited to learn simply by doing. Feel free to throw in some suggestions on method or anything that pops up, really!





[HR][/HR]

Got started with polystyrene and paperclay a few days ago; sculpted the basic features-to-be-improved-upon (hello weird winky eyelids) and a lone right ear.



--

The proportions ended up pretty wonky -too much face, too little skull- so I've added quite a bit of clay to give the back of the skull and forehead more volume.





--

I feel -other than the obvious problems in symmetry- that the space between nose and top-lip is a little too extended for comfort. Will try to add some more volume there to see if that makes the head look more appealing to me as a whole. Figure the jaw might need some adjusting as well after that. The one ear I sculpted has now turned out too small after the addition of skull and forehead mass, so I'll definitely have to fix that too! Other problems that I am missing?

 

Sleep of Reason: thanks for the encouragement and tips!



Instead of adding clay, I carved at the cheeks, nose, lips and jaw to give a bit more definition, and as suggested I've slid tiny lines across the face to help with proportions and symmetry. From the front it doesn't seem like a lot has changed, it's mostly the profile which has grown sharper.



--

Next, to make the feature's a bit stronger, I've added clay to reshape the nose and add a bit of volume to the jaw on one side.



--

Maybe for you guys as a public it's a bit excessive to see all these tiny steps and changes recorded, but for me they're quite significant to get an idea of what I'm doing and why I'm making certain choices.

 

In the past two weeks I've been too busy to update but I've been sculpting a tiny bit in between work, and this face has gone through a range of features in the meantime.

[HR][/HR]

Shaved the chin down a bit, added a bit of wonky eyelid. Wasn't really enjoying the result.



--

Carved the nose off completely and resculpted it into something more soft. Playing with eye shape.



--

Cut off the back of the head and did some sanding.



--

Cut open the eyes and shaped the lids some more.



--

Aaaaand now we've finally arrived at where I'm at. I added a bit more volume to the top lip and sculpted one ear (and a volume-dummy). Need to start hollowing out the eyes from behind to continue (will hopefully buy a tool for that tomorrow) and maybe give the cheeks a bit more volume (face is too much of a triangle from top view), but all in all I think I'm quite happy with the combination of features now~ The head looks quite big in the last picture, but that's phone camera distortion.

 

Sleep of Reason: thanks! Actually, I wanted to make a head with the ears sticking out, I secretly think it's awkwardly cute. I'm not sure if I'm going to keep the shape as it it though

Cleave: not sure if I'll make a body. If I am, it'll probably be another year or so before I start (I'm studying abroad in Korea right now, until July, so sculpting a body feels like too big of a project to handle within this time). I really didn't think about gender while sculpting, I think the head turned out to be quite nice for both? I didn't have a plan for it's size either. I'll try to take it's measurements next time, see what it might compare to.

 

I measured it's skull today, it's 18cm, or 7 inches. Brow to chin it's 4cm, or 1.5 inches. I think it's comparable to-, or compatible with dolls in the 50-55 cm range like zaoll, souldoll vito, and perhaps dollstown's elf body. Will try to create the neckhole based upon their approximate measurements. I sized up the eyes as well, will be making an eyewell for 8mm eyes (though I think 6/7mm would work best, aesthetically speaking).

 

Haha, the ears on this head still look generic-evenly-curved though, now that I'm looking at them!

Bought Mr. Surfacer 500. Maybe it's too early a stage to start with primer, but mostly I just really wanted to get to know how the stuff works and reacts. It was fun to play with! Also, I cut off the neck-part for now. maybe I'll make it a faceplate system, maybe I'll re-attach a neck-part later. And getting eyes symmetrical is the WORST.

[HR][/HR]

 

the eyes are very small. actually, if seen from the from the front, the spacing between them seems balanced compared with the space on the sides of the face at the outer corners. I think the lids of the highlighted eye actually protrude more than the other's, and it's placed a little too high in the head? (also, I have no clue what the jaw is doing at the second angle, or how wide to keep the mouth)

give critique all you want! the attention feels like love, haha < 3

 

Sleep of Reason: yes, as is the outer corners of the eyes are not aligned, and their shape is still too different OTL. I use the pictures like that as well, but they're not a 100% reliable since there is a distortion from the camera lense (phone pictures, too lazy to pull out my DSLR all the time and drag it to the workspace). Though sometimes I use a ruler and a light-source to cast shadow lines directly onto the face.

Cleave: you and me both! I'm using primer for the first time, but like Sleep of Reason mentioned, it really helps spotting imperfections! And the thin layers of paperclay I'm using on top luckely stick to it well enough.

greymalkin: the more symmetrical a person's face is, the more easily they are perceived as 'beautiful'. In a hobby that is based on creating attractive visuals, I find it no surprise we tend to focus on symmetry? But you're right, hardly anyone -dare I say no-one?- is perfectly symmetrical.

I too am now finding myself mindlessly trying to fix this little face into something genericly pretty and in the meantime, growing less and less excited about it. Which is why I took a bit of available plastiline and tried to play around with it in a far more free mindset.



I must say, I like this head a lot? It even got me excited about working on the other face again (whose progress is not picture-worthy). Perhaps I will attempt to make a plaster cast of it and press into that with super sculpey in order to seriously work on it. And since I am growing tired of waiting for the paperclay to dry each time I try out another feature, or adjust something, I might attempt that for both heads. At first I ruled out super sculpy as a material because at this moment, I live in a dormitory without an oven. But then I figured; we have a microwave~ and after I ran a quick google search this popped up! So yes... I'll definitely be trying out sculpey next~

 

Quick update from the last few days. I tried to balance the eyes (almost there), gave the little head a cleft lip, opened it's mouth and sculpted a tiny teeth part. (After tomorrow my semester is finished and I'll have the time to buy and start working with sculpey. Hopefully I'll be progressing a lot faster!)

 

Quick super sculpey mold and a raw test imprint. I am so excited about working with this material~

 

Testing super sculpey firm with something tiny. (casting the white plastiline face in plaster was a hilarious disaster, so this little fellow is lightly modeled after that head instead)



shit I LOVE this material ;; Since this head was small enough I just sculpted it solid, then put it in the fridge to stiffen, sliced it open and hollowed it out before cooking it in the microwave. When it comes to shaping and carving, this material works so much better for me than the paperclay I was using before (this head just took a couple of hours - maybe I shouldn't have started used a 900KW paperclay in the first place OTL).

Now I'm testing a paperclay and a wooden core for making a larger size head (since the usual foil won't be very friendly on the microwave and making it solid will be a waste of material and hard to cure). I'm afraid sculpey will stick to the wood, but hopefully a paperclay core will sludge and dissolve in the water during the boiling process.

 

Whehw, it's been a while. Despite the lack of updates I have been working!

--

A quick fly-through: in the end I just created a face-plate by using the above mold and shaping the sculpey around a smooth wooden core. Once I cured that, I used the face-plate and the wooden core once more to sculpt a rough headback.



By shaping the soft sculpey around the core, the new face became a lot slimmer than it's original paperclay form! (such a blurry phone picture darn, apologies) I had also reworked the mouth and eyes a couple of times at this point. They look quite different from each other!



Ears.



I have also been working on the inside structure. Three pairs of magnets because everyone hates loose face-plates, no?



--

I have also sculpted a fast neck-and-shoulder stand-in to check proportions, based on the measurements of dollstown's elf body (neck circumference and shoulderwidth). I will be taking pictures of this -and the sculpt itself- in different angles with an actual proper camera next time!

 

Alright, better pictures as promised!





and on the neck-shoulder mock up: neck circumference 8cm - shoulder width 11cm

 

ghostdollie: thanks! It took long before looking remotely good but I learned a lot, haha (yet still not satisfied)

sailor: honestly, the ears are on the headback because I started sculpting without plan or design and it ended up being more convenient this way, haha. but you are right! though I think that if I were to be sculpting more heads this size, I would start over from scratch in order to get better symmetry.

 

Sleep of Reason: yep! It is supposed to resemble a cleft lip, although it became heavily stylized. It was hard to make it look both realistic and convincing. I fought with the shape of the mouth so much it wasn't even funny anymore :'D (also because of plain bad anatomy/symmetry of the sculpt)


--

Ah, past month was slow for this head. I broke the eyelids of the right eye, resculpted it like, 5... 6 times maybe? (still needs a bit of tweaking) and carved&resculpted the mouth an equal number of times. Though I'm glad to say I finally figured out how to work primer to my advantage, and the head is getting smoother and smoother. A few more layers of priming and sanding and I think I'll be where I want to be~

blank face



-
and an up-nose shot with teeth and 6mm eyes (gonna be hard to find OTL)



I'm thinking of having it cast in a very small number but ah, not sure if it's worth it... imperfections of first try vs having efforts rewarded, tough one!


--

I have also been working on new projects like this little fellow (wave at the camera)



and this brat (not sure if on-topic?)

 

new face in the making. (I used to own a glorydoll lucy, now I'm sculpting to reshell that character. perhaps you can see how I referenced some of the features)



--








eyelids warped and crumbled during and after boiling, they're gonna need quite some work. but the rest of the features I'm happy with~ (except for the ears, I give up on ears. How does one get them to look similar I just... aaaghk!)

Perhaps I'll go back to paperclay for the headback, sculpey is making my palms itch these days ;;

 

I'm contemplating getting the split lip one cast, despite all it's flaws and the rather rough inside of it's headback and plate. Mostly as a self-reward for the effort put in, with it being the first head and all that drama~ (what to do with eight extra heads of sub-par quality though OTL)

This last head, in the 'flesh' toned sculpey, I'm definitely aiming to finish her to a high standart and having her cast as well!

Thanks for the tip! Now I attempted to work in very tiny steps on both sides simultaneously, but it still became uneven. Maybe I'll cut off one ear and try again!

 

Thank you so much! My friends too have managed to convince me into casting, so I've send Haru Resin an email to inquire about casting the split-lip sculpt, whom -since reading your post- I've decided to name Sen. Haru responded that they did not mind the master sculpt having a rough inside or headback, so I'm working on the final few layers of primer, and then the head will be on it's way soon!

 

double post bc finished. omg o_o

 

Thank you so much guys! HaruCasting said that if all goes well, they'll be ready to ship the heads back to me by tomorrow. So excited

 

I am just, like, gonna leave this here (... ;_; )

 

Yeah! I am currently studying in S Korea so that leaves out about two months of shipping/customs I guess (bless. not looking forward to returning to europe in that sense!)

I do have plans for a body now! Finishing this first head gave me confidence to tackle the idea~

 

I arrived back in the Netherlands, and since all my face-up stuff appears to be trapped in boxes on my mom's attic for another month I decided to start working on the body I have in mind \o/

There's nothing to look at yet, really, but hey



my estimate is that the body and head together will measure about 52cm in height. This kid will be a hell to dress.

 

getting more shapely. this body will be a variation on intersex, leaning a bit more towards the female side. since I still have only little experience with sculpting and there is so very few visual references on intersex bodies, I have a hard time figuring out if anatomy is off or simply unfamiliar. trying to figure out if I want a flat chest or small beginning boobage.

 

it's been a while again! school is killing me in lovely ways and made me put the 'body' project on the backburner for now. I have, however, worked a tiny bit on head n.02 (right) and sculpted a head n.03 (left)~ I resculpted the latter head three (four?) times from scratch before boiling the sculpey and am now reworking the eyebrows. I must say, making faces is getting easier with each attempt!

 

thanks, ChocoDecadence!

I've been contemplating trying out the digital sculpting processes as well, so I've spend a couple of hours in Sculptris yesterday to get a feel for it. It's kind of like a simple try-out version of zBrush and there's not a lot of options to fix mistakes (like the ears in this picture, the mesh has somehow inverted into itself there and I kind of had to give up on them). It was fun though, I am planning to export this into some more elaborate programs and see what I can fix/see how far I'll get.

 

finally took a bit of time to continue on the body I had started for my 50cm heads! I tried working with Premier for the first time, dang that stuff feels good to touch. Just some rough leg shapes and lower arms (not on the picture). I am wondering what the rate of shrinkage of Premier is. I'm hoping the legs won't dry completely out of proportion :'D



and impatient with the waiting, I started a tiny dude for fun fiddly frustration.
He's balancing nicely on the ends of his wire frame. I hope I can keep him that steady! With head he'll be 23cm/9inches.

 

I got impatient or excited, whichever you prefer, and ordered a tiny version of the sculpt I'd made in sculptris. I wanted to test how detailed the cheaper nylon12 material could be, if the tamiya primer I am currently using would hold well on it's surface, how it'd behave when drilling/sanding, etc.

The test print arrived yesterday, and I am so happy with the detail! Even on this mere 3x3x3.5cm print the head still has it's double eyelids

(yeah, it still has the messed up ears too, will fix that by hand I think, once I've printed it in SD size)