Well, I'm at that stage in my sculpting, where it's time to start fleshing out over the core. Everything's going as well as can be, considering this is my first doll~ But I've come to a stopgap with the upper torso... Boobs. You'd think that since I have a pair of my own, I'd be more adept at sticking a pair onto a doll. But no. I cannot for the life of me make this dolls boobs look natural. I'm very sad/frustrated. I have already sculpted and destroyed at least four pairs of boobs. I feel like some kind of evil mastectomy surgeon. D8 So, all you sculptors out there~ What are you boob techniques? I'm already using references and so on, but I'm wondering if there's any special tools or process to use that would keep these jubblies from looking like abnormal balloon tumors. No matter what I try, I just can't get the aesthetics right. Please help!
Boobs are hard. Well, not literally. You know what I mean. It helps to consider them as drop-shaped, rather than spherical. I usually start out with forming a drop shape, then press it down onto the chest by the pointy half, and then blend the top half while keeping the bottom half mostly round. I add the nipples later, because trying to put them on at the beginning stage just confuses the general shape of the breast for me. It also helps to keep checking the silhouette of the things from different angles. Sadly there are no special tools that I know of-- I do all my sculpting with my fingers and an x-acto knife. Do you have any pictures of your works in progress? I'm assured that folks here would love to help you out.
It might help you too look at 3d wire frames versus regular reference... http://www.juantwo.com/post/Pimp/3D/girlwire.jpg My best trick is to keep adding to the bottom to change the shape and size. Here's a website that uses the same trick, but describes it much better then I ever could! http://www.polymerclayfan.com/changing-the-design-of-the-breast-2.htm
I'm sculpting my doll's breasts with the torso piece of another doll (with breasts of a shape I like) on the table. It helps to have a 3D reference in your hands that you can study at different angles. Although the breasts on my project doll started out like this, I made them way too large. Right now I keep making them smaller by sanding the upper part of the breasts flatter and by cutting away from the bottom. Pretty much the reverse of what Renzi suggest (adding clay to the bottom to make them larger). I keep drawing the location of the nipples with a pencil so I can check if the shape is correct. Then I sand off some more.
Sailor:I try to keep the shape in mind when sculpting, but the clay just doesn't seem to want to cooperate. XD; But I'll try your technique~ Making a drop-shape first sounds like a really good idea. Thank you! And yes, I do have some progress pictures. :3 I'm going to be putting them up later this evening, I hope. (I'm at the whim of my little sister, though. She's the photographer, and without her, all I have is my phone.) Renzi: Thank you for the links! I browsed over them last night and they look super helpful~ I'm going to look at them more thoroughly today before I get back to work on my doll. Arabidopsis: Keeping a model around to look at is probably a really good idea! I should find something to pose for me~ :3 Not entirely sure if I have anything other than old Barbies, but maybe one of my friends has a BJD they can bring over. Thank you! With all this advice, I feel like I'm a little more prepared to take on the boobie challenge! I shall do my best, and hopefully submit some WIP pics for critique in the very near future.
Maybe one of the reasons that breasts are so difficult to do is that we all have stereotypical images in our heads of what the breasts look like, rather than an image of how they actually look? Breasts are attached to the pects, and the muscles blend into the breasts at the top. Breasts are wider than high. There is a short fast curve under the nipple, and a long slow curve above the nipple. Someone has already mentioned the drop shape, like a drop of water on a windowpane. So yeah, gravity and weight are also factors. The chest cavity is round, so breasts do not stick straight out in front, but they stick out from the round chest, so they are at an angle from the spine, so to speak. Don't forget the mammary fat forms an auxiliary tail, like a comma, on the side, going up to the armpit. Check out some Art Anatomy books for more details. Also, if you can find a live model, make a plaster bandage mold of her breasts, then cast a plaster reference to study. EDIT: This is a link to galleries of non-sexualized images of normal breasts: http://www.007b.com/breast_gallery.php
Kwmelvin: I think you're right, on that note. Dolls are very stylized, and the human body itself has got a lot idealistic images set to it. I try not to pay much attention to the 'perfection' of supermodel bodies or stylized dolls, but that's just an image that I automatically think of. I need to get out of that mindset (at the very least, for this particular doll I'm making.) Thank you for the link, and for the tips! These are things I will certainly keep in mind while working on my doll's chest.
You're most welcome. I'm pleased that I was able to help in some way. As far as dolls being stylized, there are also the technical aspects which must be kept in mind when modeling the doll; such as the final material, molding, casting, and so forth. If you are making a doll that will eventually be molded in silicone rubber and cast in resin, you can do more undercutting than if you are molding a doll in plaster piece molds, and casting porcelain slip. This is a link to an Art Models web site (>>>>>Caution: Contains Artistic Nudity<<<<<): http://www.posespace.com/posetool/Default.aspx The cool thing about this posetool is that you can view contact sheets of each pose. Each pose is rotated 360 degrees, with 24 photos taken, 15 degrees apart. If you grab the contact sheets (a & b) you will have a complete rotation. For example: (>>>>>Caution: Contains Artistic Nudity<<<<<) http://www.posespace.com/img/contact/jenb004contacta.jpg http://www.posespace.com/img/contact/jenb004contactb.jpg That pose is of art model JenB, standing, in a contraposto pose with one arm down and the other arm raised. I have a suite of free graphic image tools called ImageMagick. ImageMagick is a free, open source, cross platform suite of image tools. Using ImageMagick, I can lasso each individual photo in the contact sheet, enlarge it 2X and save it, then make an animation of the 24 individual photos. I end up with a rotating pose that shows me the model in 3D (almost). It is very useful for seeing how profiles change as the model is turned. So anyway, if you think something like that might be helpful, then I encourage you to try it. The first time you do it, it might take some time, but it really isn't too difficult to do, and it doesn't take that much time, once you figure it out. You may already have a graphics program that you can do that with? That site is very nice because there is such a variety of models and poses, and all the poses shown have contact sheets, which are free to view, as far as I know. There is a good variety of boobies, that's for sure, from almost flat chested (Susan), to large (Lisa), and many in-between. There are also male models, and ethnic models as well.
KWM knows the score :XD Also: A.: A few people have made the space between the breast armpits completely straight and it looks kinda freaky. B: A more curvy shape around the pits which looks more flattering for the breasts. Kinda difficult to explain without pictures.
