40–49cm Dolls Sculpting My First BJD - Rain!

Hello!

My name's Monique, and for the past year or so, I have been sculpting my very own MSD ball jointed doll. You can see more of my progress shots on Rain and my other bjd sculpts on my instagram: @monique.xplorer.dolls

She started off as a simple blueprint to tide me over as I waited for my first bjd to arrive, but ended up being a long, laborious process of sculpting and sanding, filled with highs and lows.

Rain vs concept photo by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

I think she is the piece of art that I am most proud of and love the most in my whole life. I don't think I have ever spent so long on something as I have on her.

Rain (early stages) by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

I put 14mm eyes in her (that came with my minifee) and think they look better than the 12mm eyes I made.

Rain (14mm eye) by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

Rain (12mm eyes) by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

The thing that I have found most difficult (one of many) is her knees. They are so important for balance and standing, but also for bending her leg, and looking nice while bent .

Rain - strung by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

For her knees, I should've done what I did for her elbows and other joints, and used wooden beads, but I decided to make them from clay. Now I feel like I've progressed too far with them to change to wooden beads and start over, but I don't know. All effort is worth it in the end, I guess?

Rain (body) by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

Also made her some underwear, which I thought turned out cute

Rain modelling underwear by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

And finally! In the last couple days I've started priming her! She's not done, and her knees still need work, but priming her has made me get out of the artblock I had with her and motivated me to get her finished. It's exciting! I can see the light at the end of the tunnel!

Rain - priming layer 1 by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

 

Also, her measurements so far are:

Height: 42.5cm
Head circ.: 17cm
Neck: 5.2cm
Chest: 15.7cm
Waist: 12cm
Hips: 21cm
Thigh circ.: 12.5cm
Leg: 22.5cm
Calf: 8.2cm
Feet: 5cm

 

Thanks! It was such cute Peter Rabbit themed fabric, I knew I needed to make doll underwear out of it! I'm planning on her having magnets in her hands, so I can't glue the magnets in till she's casted, so its hard to pose her with hands

I'm using DAS paper clay, because that's what is available to me in shops where I live, and it works for me even if other people sometimes struggle with it. And I do definitely plan on having her casted! I'll hold a preorder for her once she's done, hopefully in the next couple months, but if nobody orders her, I'm still going to cast her just for myself because I've been saving up and I can't wait to see her in different colours in resin! It's so exciting, I just can't wait!

 

Thank you so much! Yeah, I did, and it's taken a lot of time and effort to get to this point so that means a lot

 

@sammu Congrats on starting sculpting a BJD! Rain's going ok, I'm in the home stretch so there's a lot of tinkering and finessing and not much big progress, but lots of very slow (but important) progress. I'm hoping to get her done soon! How's your BJD going? Do you have a thread here on DoA, or an instagram, about your sculpting?

@Wolfina5 Thank you so much!

 

@sammu Cool, I went and followed you! What does you doll look like? Have you drawn a plan for what you want it to look like finished?
Aw thanks, I can't wait to see her finished either! It'll be so cool to see her in different resin colours, I literally cannot wait

 

@Jules December Thanks so much!

 

Some updates! It's been a while since I posted those other photos, so here Rain is after some more sanding and work done on her.

Lots of priming! So much priming so much sanding, oh my gosh.

Power stance by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

Standing! by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

She can still sand after priming, which is a good sign haha. I still absolutely love her proportions and her different parts, but still not 100% happy with her joints and posing. She is supposed to have double jointed elbows, which are great and I like, and knees, which still need a LOT of work. I'm keeping at it though, and there has been a lot of improvement in her knees already. Mostly with how they look when she stands, but also how her leg bends. Before her legs bent on a bit of an angle and I'm still trying to make that better, so her legs bend more in a line, rather than her lower legs going off to the side.

Heel feet by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

Heel feet by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

I've also been working on her heel feet and making them look nicer. I just realised recently that her heel feet are smaller than her normal/flat feet...but I've already done so much work on these and really like them so I don't want to change them. I hope I don't regret that later

Rain bust by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

Torso and thighs by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

I love the layers of clay and primer that are exposed when I sand different parts more than others (if they're not flush to the rest of her and need sanding that is). There is a lot of priming and sanding involved with the last stretch of making a doll from clay. So so much sanding. I feel like I've been sanding for 10 years. I don't want to make it seem like I hate it, because I actually quite like the sanding process and seeing Rain improve in terms of smoothness, and seeing her become more and more finished. I love it! I just wish there was slightly less of it

Anyway, I hope you're having a great day and thanks for reading!

 

I received resin colour samples from Harucasting, and chose some colours out that I like.

Resin colours by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

He didn't have any samples for pastel mint, which is a colour I would love to see Rain in, but he did have pastel blue. When I look at the pastel blue, I love the pastel but its too blue, so I think I would love the mint even though I haven't seen it.
I also love his colour Light tan, it's gorgeous. And peach normal is a lovely light skin colour. If anyone orders Rain I might also be able to afford to get her in white, but I might just leave that to another preorder if I do one.

 

@sammu did you upload the picture to Flickr? Then when you click the arrow to "share" the image, copy the BBcode (I usually choose the medium size image) and paste that directly into the message, don't do anything else to it. Hope that helps

But otherwise, that sounds super cute! I love dolls with elf ears!

 

All good! I haven't tried anything other than Flickr so can't help with any other host sites. Hope you can sort it out!

 

Hi everyone!

Thank you for all your nice comments. I have finished making Rain and have received the casts I ordered from Harucasting.
I am so ecstatic and happy to have her in resin and in different colours and I love dressing her up! I just need to make or buy more wigs, eyes and shoes haha. I now have 10 of her!

IMG_0710 by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

IMG_0702 by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

IMG_0716 by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

6D55CD8C-3374-4DFE-A028-5C63300818C6 by Monique Sutton, on Flickr

Rain measurements 2 by Monique Sutton, on Flickr