At this year’s Toy Fair, Mattel showed off its upcoming collaboration with MegaBloks on the Monster High line. In terms more pertinent to me, this means more highly articulated dolls for dolls, as the MH MegaBloks figures have jointed knees! I find them adorable, in part because the small scale reduces the bobble-headed proportions of regular Monster Highs to something more appealing to my aesthetic interests. I actually do not have any MegaBloks licensed figures in my collection of dolls for dolls, so I don’t know how big they are.

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Over the past week or so, I’ve been customizing dolls for Isabel with the aim of creating as many articulated dolls for her as possible. Like me, she works quickly and rather messily, using a lot of hot glue and not worrying too much about matching skin tones. :p

Continue reading Custom dolls for dolls

Breyer, purveyor of plastic horses, has a 1:32 scale line of horses [obviously] that occasionally includes human figures in the playsets. It’s very hard to find pictures of them. However, they appear to be articulated at the shoulders, hips and knees at the least. I think they are about the size of my Hasbro Human Alliance Mikaela doll. They’re wayyyyyy cheaper though!

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Here’s a selection of my miniature dolls that are articulated:

Continue reading Dolls for dolls: articulated exemplars

One was Bering Lusk, my Harumika mannequin who went to visit Andrea a while, then came back when I decided that Isabel needed a lifesize doll. I discovered that Bering’s arms popped out of their sockets, so I was able to dress her in actual clothes, as opposed to the strange tuck-and-wrap fabrics she was sold with.Continue reading Isabel got more dolls today!

As you may know because I write about it all the time, my next series, Zombieville, is currently developing. Zombieville features people who eat brains and lose body parts, but they are not the mindless, undead creatures of pop culture lore. Rather, they are average, living people with a condition known as spontaneous disintegrative disorder ["spondis"] that causes physical and mental degeneration, which may only be arrested through a diet of at least 50% fresh human brains. Most people with spondis [PWS] see themselves as people with disabilities, while most of the public sees them as pop culture zombies. Conflict ensues.

In one planned episode, Isabel, protagonist and PWS, encounters a vending machine filled with zombie dolls. The manufacturers model the dolls after pop culture zombies [drooling blood, chewing severed limbs]. However, the dolls also have mobility aids that many PWS actually use. Isabel’s response to these toys forms an entire story arc.

The foregoing explains why the creation of these zombie dolls did not just entail slapping red paint on some miniature figures. I wanted to make zombie dolls with electric wheelchairs, walkers and canes of the type that PWS would use.

Continue reading Zombie dolls for dolls

A helpful Figurvore member has identified doll "I" from my recent lineup. She is a member of the Smaller Home and Garden family made by Tomy. I happen to have all 4 family members in well-loved [and chewed-on — the dad and daughter have human teeth marks in their legs :p ] condition. Here they are.

Continue reading Dolls for dolls: Smaller Home and Garden figures by Tomy

I need to get these for Isabel! Fat peoples for O gauge model railroads!

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We all know that I like to play with dolls [or otherwise I wouldn’t be here]. Well, not only am I a doll enthusiast, but so are some of my dolls! Yes, my dolls like to play with dolls too.

Lemax Collection makes several different sets of little decorative tabletop resin fantasy villages with [all white] people, vehicles, buildings, animals, plants, etc. They have a "Victorian" village [in quotes because it doesn’t look Victorian to me], a "coastal Massachusetts" village [ditto], a Halloween village, Santa’s village, etc., etc. Am I the only one who thinks it would be hilarious to cross-pollinate elements from one set [mostly the Halloween one] with others?

Think of the possibilities:

• Grim Reaper stalking daredevil skiers [or the Girl Scout parade]
• Skeleton mariachi band baking up Victorian carolers
• Killer clown mobile home [no really!] lurking at the edge of Santaville
• Santa’s Wonderland sign in front of a little cemetery

Then again, these ideas are coming from someone who thinks that vampire + 1989 + ice cream = cute, so your mileage may vary. :p

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At Toys R Us, where I got Megan her slightly improved body, I also got Isabel some dolls in the form of Mattel Winx action figures. They are articulated at the neck, elbows, thighs and knees, which is also where Megan’s new body is articulated. The Winx figures’ soft, rubbery skirts and hair are supposed to permit posing, but they don’t really. Their molded hair is way too heavy, making them pitch backwards. I plan to rip it off and replace it with fiber.

Continue reading Some dolls for Isabel

Disney makes a bunch associated with Tinkerbell and all her groupies. Cheap!

Do you know how hard it is to find 2-inch [1:36 scale, i.e., 1:6 scale for 1:6 scale] figures?

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54mms come in PIECES! You can buy sprues of heads, hands, weapons, etc., etc. And you can get not only generics, but ARMATURES [= skeletons], some of which can actually POSE a bit! And some of them are in RESIN,  a material I actually like working with much better than vinyl/ABS/action figure plastic! This means that I can make SOMEWHAT POSEABLE DOLLS FOR MY DOLLS WITH VARYING BODY TYPES, FIBER HAIR AND REALLY SIMPLE FABRIC OUTFITS!

I am so excited about this! I’ve wanted articulated ~1:6 scale dolls for my 1:6ers for YEARS!

JMD Miniatures provides a 3-pack of articulated armatures without heads or hands. They appear to be guy bases, but I don’t really care. They also have two sets of 5 heads and 6 pairs of hands apiece, but, irritatingly enough, all the heads are for dudes.

Historex Agents makes a 5-pack of female heads with sculpted hair. They also have a wonderful series of 5-packs of "expressive heads," again, all for dudes, but more versatile than JMD Miniatures’ because there’s no facial hair. On this page, they’ve also got hairless heads and massive packages of hands.

EDIT: Wonder if I could buy heads and hands and make my own damn armatures?

EDIT 2: Red Lancers has some Historex heads and hand sets. And they’re a US dealer!

Colorado Miniatures, also a US dealer, has Hornet head sets and hand sets. The "African" and "East Asian" head sets are pretty neat. There’s a "Female" set too that frankly has nothing to distinguish it from the "male" sets.

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Well, that took long enough to find. Bronze Age Miniatures sells 54mm unpainted generics, which are the minifig equivalent of naked dolls. As with 1:6 scale action figures, there are only two body types available: 1) ripped and boobular ["female"] and 2) ripped and slightly taller ["male"]. God forbid that anyone be fat or scrawny!

I could probably work with a generic, though, giving it at least some fiber hair and a simple skirt like Flower and Mellifer’s. I really need to know, though, about the body modding potential of these individuals. Does white metal respond to Dremelling? Sanding? Sawing? Addition of modeling paste? If so, I could easily get a female generic and perform Ye Olde Masectomie on it to have a body shape more approximating Lucian’s. Hmmmm…

EDIT: I really wonder about some of these minifig sculptors’ grasps on anatomy. The erect nipples on all the femfigs are way out of scale.

EDIT 2: Bronze Age Miniatures female generic #2 is a possibility, as are #3, #4, #8, #11 and #21. #8, #11 and #21 are relatively neutral stances. #11 and #21 are notable for having minimal knock knees and relatively relaxed arms.

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…that requires every single freakin’ minifig to be holding things in both hands and/or waving their arms around? I understand that minifigs are supposed to be in dynamic stances, but, when everyone has a ridiculously huge weapon in one hand and the other arm flailing over their head, it looks silly.

Context: Poking through tabletop wargaming minifigs again, I was looking for a Lucian doll for Ellery and Jamisia. I finally tracked down some male elf mage/wizard/sorceror types in heroic scale. Here’s one, a Mordheim elf mage. And here’s a cheaper dude, Larnach the gray elf mage.

I’d like to go with Mr. Mordheim Mage because he looks less tense than Larnach. His ears also appear more in proportion to his head, and his clothing resembles Lucian’s the most of the two figs. He appears to be 28mm, which is about 1 inch, which would make him 6 1:6 inches high. I wish he were double that, but ugh…he was hard enough to find in the first place.

Whenever I’m poking around in the world of minifigs, I think of the Calvin and Hobbes strips where Calvin is trying to put together model airplanes. He and Hobbes grow increasingly frustrated and baffled by the confusing directions and their inability to make the pieces resemble anything as it is shown on the box. At one point, Calvin asks, “How’d they paint eyebrows on a pilot less than an inch high?!?!?!?!”

Hobbes, looking at the model box, says, “I think that’s a real plane superimposed on a toy stand.” :p

EDIT: Holy poop, this guy is even better! He’s much closer to 12 1:6 inches, plus he has a sly expression. He has gratuitous wings, but that’s okay because he doesn’t come with them on. The only thing is that he’s ridiculously ripped, but I’m willing to live with that.

Of course I’m interested in the guy who’s extra expensive because he’s some collector’s edition. :p

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After I posted about beautiful, but expensive, 54mm minifigs, Elizabeth Jr. clued me into the fact that the original Polly Pockets were less than an inch high and therefore approximately in range for 1:6 scale for 1:6ers. I poked around for them ["vintage polly pocket"] on Ebay, but the prices were too high for my liking, at a few dollars per figure. I decided to seek other sources.

I’ve had success in the past with Homies, who have the added bonus of being hilariously sculpted. Unfortunately, the price of individual Homies seems to have gone up since I last purchased them to by Ellery’s dolls, but I have found some alternatives. Vendstock on Ebay sells the following sets that could be useful as a source for female dolls [Isabel, my latest doll nerd, isn’t really into male dolls]: American Girl [no, not that American Girl], So Fly Divas and Tomy/Barbie.

Incidentally, Vendstock also sells the latest Domo series. [That’s the fuzzy brown rectangle with big teeth that serves as the Japanese TV station NHK’s mascot.] I have actually seen this series in local vending machines, where I was amused by the Domo wearing bling. This set also features mustachioed Domo, luchador Domo, Domo with big blocky glasses, Domo with an inner tube, Domo in diapers, devil Domo and Godzilla Domo, who is, of course, bigger than the other Domos. I think I might have to get the set, since Domo has always amused me. ^_^

EDIT: In my search for fat Homies for Isabel’s collection of fat dolls, I discovered that there is a Trailer Park series of Homies [Trailer Parkies? :p ]. A majority of the Trailer Parkies are fat, thus playing into the stereotype that people who live in trailer parks are poor, stupid and disgusting. I’m also disturbed that there’s only one woman among the Trailer Parkies. Her name is Moo Moo Ma. [Yes, she’s fat.] How’s that for sexist, anti-fat objectification?!!

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I have another protagonist who plays with dolls — Isabel — so I’ve been thinking about 1:6 scale dolls for 1:6 scale dolls again.

54mm minifigs, AKA tabletop gaming white metal figs, are pretty much perfect for 1:6 scale dolls for 1:6 scale dolls. I have problems spending upwards of $1.00 per millimeter, though. SIGH.

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First things first…all these references to zombies you’ve been seeing refer to the denizens in my future saga entitled Zombieville. Many of the denizens have a degenerative condition called spontaneous disintegration [spondis], which causes their body parts to drop off and which make be arrested only through a diet of at least 50% fresh human brains. People with spondis tend to refer to themselves as PWS, but the public calls them zombies. As Burlington, Vermont has the highest concentration of PWS in the country, its nickname is Zombieville…hence the saga’s title.

Anyway, there’s a truly infuriating minority of abnormals [the PWS’ term for people who do not have spondis :p ] who wish that they had spondis themselves. Unfortunately, their idea of spondis comes from the pop culture image of zombies, so there’s a lot of shambling, bleeding and "Braaaaaaaains!" involved, which has very little to do with the actual daily lives of PWS.

Abnormals who are wannabes fetishize PWS in all the ways you can imagine. Some dress up as PWS, with canes, fake blood and cans of pork brains. Some collect zombie memorabilia…and that’s where these little zombie figurines by Zombie Planet, 1 to 1.5 inches tall [6 to 8 inches in 1:6 scale] come in. For just a few bucks, I can furnish a wannabe with an obsession!

EDIT: Apparently there’s a whole tabletop gaming subgenre of zombie figs…This review provides details of several makers’ zombies.

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My mini GI Joe came today, along with his mini adventure-mobile and his mini sarcophagus. Jareth and Jennifer show off the playthings.
Continue reading More toys for Ellery

Ellery plays with dolls, so, naturally, I need to get her some dolls. I would like the dolls to be around 1:36 scale, that is, 1:6 scale for 1:6 scale people, but I can go with slightly larger or smaller. Anyway, I bought Ellery an awesome little replica of Silken Flame Barbie and her carrying case. It is a Hallmark ornament with two pieces, one the doll, the other the carrying case, which actually has an opening drawer. It's either 1:36 scale or a little smaller. Pictures when I get mine! No, I won't tell you how much I paid for it.

EDIT: I also got her a set of 3 1:36 GI Joe ornaments, including a GI Joe, an ATV and a mummy's sarcophagus. Yay, now she will have truly scaled dolls! No, I won't tell you what I paid for those either.

EDIT 2: I also got her a set of 12 Homies figures, which are 1.75 to 2 inches tall, just right for 1:36 scale. It was only $6.00 for 12!

At some point recently, Rement came out with extra-super-miniature shops, called Tiny Houses, with furnishings, goods, clerks and customers. One shop is a "donut" shop; the other is a flower shop.

From what I can tell, they are very small; I think the scale might be 1:48. As usual, the number of movable pieces and the details — a paper wrapping station at the florist, for example — really make these sets shine.

I want one for my 1:6 dolls to play with, but I can't decide which one to get! Here are both for sale as a set at etradersplace.com.

One of Rement’s latest sets has a Hina Matsuri theme, which is to say that it celebrates the Japanese March 3 Girls’ Day. During this celebration, elaborate little hina ningyo, or dolls, are displayed representing an Emperor, Empress and court attendants from the Heian Period. Rement’s set duplicates the hina ningyo, their platforms, accessories and settings in 1:6 scale. Hooray! I’m always looking for dolls for my dolls.

Well, I think it’s the best Microman ever because it’s basically a super-articulated, naked female figure with a painted face, no hair and a broad array of hands, waiting to be customized. Unfortunately, she comes with some sort of electronic coffin, which exponentially jacks up her price. Yes, I know she’s a character from an anime series, but I don’t care. It’s a little naked doll waiting for a kitbash! Also did you see that she has articulated feet?!

Anneka and Will are each supposed to have some dolls of their own in 1:6 scale, but I’ve had a horrible time finding affordable figures in the 1:36ish range…until now. The Homies series of plastic figures, all 2" high or less, presents models of various urban characters, one set of which, the Micro Icon Punks, would be perfect for Anneka and Will’s dolls. But I still need to make at least one mermaid for Anneka and a Bru for Will…maybe out of paper…

Barclay’s O Gauge Corner sells O gauge [1:48] civilian figures for reasonable prices.

Here’s a 1:12 scale girl doll [by Sophie Drummond?] that might work as Will’s Bru.