Did you know about DDs before mid-2008? If so...

Maybe it's a bit of an exaggeration but I'm guessing that perhaps Danny Choo's posts about his DD Saber ("blue" Saber, Not Lily) in mid/late 2008 is what got many of us (westerners at least) involved in the DD hobby. I'm curious though: If you knew about DDs before mid-2008, then how did you find out about them?

 

Edit: typos+grammar

Edited September 20, 2015 by Guest

Yes, but I had never seen one in person. I used to see them all over the Volks USA site, but never thought to buy one. I was hardcore into resin dolls at the time and if memory serves Drooling over the Soom Limiteds that were coming out lol.

 

I didn't know who Danny Choo was until late 2013, after hanging out here for a while XD

I knew *of* them, but what I had seen were the old painted-eye DDIs. Granted, this wasn't in person, it was photos of customs online, but I wasn't impressed until I saw Danny's posts. ^^;

 

If you're wondering, I was trying to customize old MLPs at the time, and found the custom DDIs through a customer gallery on my hair supplier's site.

I did find DDs through Danny but not til 2010 or so. I found Danny through YouTube as Dancingstormtrooper.

I first saw pictures of DDs in late 2007/early 2008 when I was looking into buying my first resin dolls and had been checking out various doll companies. At the time, I didn't like how they looked and thought they were too expensive.

 

I found Danny Choo's site sometime after that and even seeing his Saber wasn't enough to get me into DDs. DD Miku is responsible for that.

Hehe, maybe I'm the oddball here -- I had no clue who Danny Choo was and never visited his site until after I already owned several DDs.

 

I picked up the Pinky:St hobby back in 2003, and one of the girls on the Pinky:St forum had several Pullips that I totally fell in love with. By 2005, I'd become a Pullip collector, and in the following year (2006), that same girl picked up her first DD. I remember being totally fascinated by her photos, but terrified of the size! But my terror didn't last long... I was soon shopping for my own 60cm doll.

 

According to old emails (thank you gmail for keeping everything), I was considering buying a Dollfie Dream back in January 2007. I ultimately didn't buy my first big doll until February 2008, and I ended up getting a resin BJD instead. I didn't end up buying a DD until 2009 (won the lotto for Sasara), but I didn't become a true DD collector until li'l Marisa arrived and I fell in love.

 

...I had no idea who Danny Choo was until like, 2013.

I can't remember if I knew about DDs before 2008 or not. I think a lot of BJD fans/owners have a vague knowledge of DDs, but little to no interest. I hadn't seen how gorgeous these dolls could be until the time I joined this forum. The first time they caught my interest was when I saw a thread on DoA about hybrids with DD body and a resin head. I thought the DD body looked so great, I really love the abs. So I considered making a hybrid. In doing my research for that I stumbled across this forum and the Flickr DD group and I become a lost cause after that ^_^;;; It took me a bit of time to get used to the anime style sculpting, but now I love it.

 

Also, I didn't know about Danny Choo til this forum, I wasn't into anime figures.

I'm curious though; if you knew about DDs before mid-2008, then how did you find out about them?

 

Nope, I didn't know about DD's until late 2009/early 2010. I was really getting into anime figures/statues at that time and while cruising the interwebs, I came across Figurefm. That's where I first saw the DD girls and also found out how hard to get and expensive they were.

 

I probably waffled on the idea of getting one due to cost until I found out FFM had a marketplace. The *FIRST* day I went there I saw Manami up for sale and the rest is history.

 

 

 

Billy

I certainly did, because I was already a Volks resin doll fan. I had seen the DDs at the Volks websites. I always thought they were cute, and knew I wanted to get some, but my passion was really the resin BJDs.

 

The only DD I had seen in person at that point was probably a strung DDI, owned by an acquaintance of mine who sells at local doll shows. I believe she is a rooted hair head.

 

Linda S.

galatia9

Edited December 18, 2014 by Guest

Well I know DD since 2011 because that is when I joined myfigurecollection.net because I seriously started collecting statues. There I saw pics of those really beautiful dolls

 

I think Danny Choo came a year later or so

I found out about them through Den of Angels and BJD's. I had 2 bjd's back then (A Volks Midori and DOD U for anyone curious) and was very active with the community and kept up to date with all goings on.

 

I can't remember what year it was but I remember the big announcements about the new, unstrung DD2 bodies! I really wanted a Mirai on the new body, I remember wanting Sanjie too, but they were hard to get a hold of back then. The next DD I fell for was Yashiro Kasumi, and she actually became my first DD! I got her some point in 2007, she was second hand on doa for about $400 for head, eyes, box and body. I was so glad to snag her because getting second hand dd outside of Japan was quite a rare sight back then, there wasn't even really much of a international DD community back then, I used to mostly look at pictures mainly on Japanese blogs and yahoo japan!

 

I actually used to be active on figure.fm too, but in those days before Danny had dolls, most people thought they were 'creepy' and 'too expensive, you must be insane to spend that much money'. My doll posts never gained much momentum until AFTER Danny got one, then it seemed like all his followers suddenly accepted them, because their idol had one too!

 

At some point in the following couple of years I got fed up of the way Danny's follower's just started treating him like some sort of idol and worshiped everything he said or did, so I stopped posting on the site, focused on my own blog and the flickr groups instead. At one point I made a blog post about why I didn't participate on figure.fm anymore as some people had asked me after missing my posts being there. This post must have made it back to Danny because my figure.fm account was promptly perma banned.

 

I don't really care though, I've never missed using it and I've made much better friends outside of his site anyway

Thanks for the replies! Quite an interesting read.

 

I was hardcore into resin dolls at the time and if memory serves Drooling over the Soom Limiteds that were coming out lol.

I first saw pictures of DDs in late 2007/early 2008 when I was looking into buying my first resin dolls and had been checking out various doll companies.

I think a lot of BJD fans/owners have a vague knowledge of DDs, but little to no interest.

I certainly did, becasue I was already a Volks resin doll fan.

I found out about them through Den of Angels and BJD's. I had 2 bjd's back then

Looks like most of you found out about DDs through resins/BJDs or other dolls. I guess it would have been nearly impossible not knowing about them if one already knew about Volks' resins.

 

 

I didn't know who Danny Choo was until late 2013, after hanging out here for a while XD

I did find DDs through Danny but not til 2010 or so. I found Danny through YouTube as Dancingstormtrooper.

Hehe, maybe I'm the oddball here -- I had no clue who Danny Choo was and never visited his site until after I already owned several DDs....I had no idea who Danny Choo was until like, 2013.

Also, I didn't know about Danny Choo til this forum, I wasn't into anime figures.

I guess it's sometimes easy to think that others also knows about something just because you do. He's probably partly responsible for popularizing DDs outside the doll hobby but I guess his importance sometimes get a bit exaggerated.

 

 

Myself, I had never heard about DDs, resins, BJDs, figures or anime related merchandise, let alone thought about buying a doll, prior to mid-2008. I watched Fate/Stay Night early 2007 and thought Saber was a rather cool character and sort of whished for more. Don't remember why or how I found about Danny but his two posts about Saber from late-2008 is what got me started.

 

 

If you're wondering, I was trying to customize old MLPs at the time, and found the custom DDIs through a customer gallery on my hair supplier's site.

Haha, now that's a twist; cutomized MLPs to DDs

 

 

I probably waffled on the idea of getting one due to cost until I found out FFM had a marketplace. The *FIRST* day I went there I saw Manami up for sale and the rest is history.

So THAT's how it all started? Sweet!

 

 

I didn't end up buying a DD until 2009 (won the lotto for Sasara)

Ohh! That's a nice start. I bet you must have had sveral jaw-drop moments seeing her aftermarket price skyrocket.

I didn't end up buying a DD until 2009 (won the lotto for Sasara)

Ohh! That's a nice start. I bet you must have had sveral jaw-drop moments seeing her aftermarket price skyrocket.

 

Hahaha, yeah, I totally sold her once I realized how much I could get for her (it helped that I never bonded with her at all, and she just sat in her box untouched for years). Now, every time someone tells me that my dolls are a waste of money, I tell them how much I sold Sasara for, and ask if they have any investments that can even compare to how rapidly she increased in value. Then they usually shut up pretty quick.

I became aware of them around when they released Haruhi Suzumiya. I don't remember if it was via a doll site or an anime site or an anime figure site. It definitely wasn't through Danny Choo though, I've never been interested in his site for some reason. I was really into Haruhi at the time, so it was probably on a Haruhi-related site. I was still a poor student so I just did my best to ignore that DDs existed because I really, really wanted one.

It's cool to know I'm not the only one was clueless about Danny Choo before this hobby. Since I got into DDs, my perspective on anime merchandise has changed a lot. Before I just enjoyed the anime itself, and anime style artwork. Now I regularly look at anime merch releases, events, particularly for DDs, of course. I'm still too not interested in buying figures, but somehow a figma and a couple nendoroids have made their way into my home ^_^;

 

 

This post must have made it back to Danny because my figure.fm account was promptly perma banned.

 

Wooow.

I knew about DDs and Resin dolls since early 2009. I just never looked into getting one until this year.

Myself, I had never heard about DDs, resins, BJDs, figures or anime related merchandise, let alone thought about buying a doll, prior to mid-2008. I watched Fate/Stay Night early 2007 and thought Saber was a rather cool character and sort of whished for more. Don't remember why or how I found about Danny but his two posts about Saber from late-2008 is what got me started.

I would love to have a favorite anime character that later became a DD! I've only seen a few of the series that had collaboration DDs.

 

Linda S.

galatia9

Like others, I was into the resin dolls first and that's how I found out about DDs. I admit I was turned off by DDs because I didn't like Aoi or Yukino and it seemed like nobody painted DDs so I passed on the blank heads. If the new image characters were offered back in 2008, I would surely be more attracted to DDs.

 

I did not know about Danny Choo until after though! Not sure if it is because I am not a figure collector or the like.

I found out about BJDs in 2004, and soon after discovered DDs. It took a couple of years before I bought my first resin, but I soon owned a DD as well. I think the was mid 2006 when I got her. I had no clue who Danny Choo was. I actually found his site while looking for pics of Saber, who I loved but didn't have. As a side note, Saber is coming home soon! I won the Volks holiday lottery.

I didn't know about DD's until 2010. I knew about BJD's, but I wasn't aware of DD's until then. Needless to say, I was pretty smitten when I found out about them though...

Nope. Never been into neither Dolls or Danny Choo.

I got to know about them when I started to use MFC and at first they didn't impress me that much tbh. After seeing them in real life a couple of years later though I was convinced I wanted one of my own.

Yes... I ever bought a DDI body for a BJD head a long time back and decided to sell it as the skin tone was way off. I think I still have the closed eye head which came with it (somewhere in storage?)

 

Focused on BJDs and other types of dolls, didn't think of getting a DD as I went ahead to get sqlab (they were anime-ish and in resin, so I figured won't stain as much. Smart doll blew me off track and I got Mirai... DD Mariko Sensei found her way to my place too.

Nope, Danny's posting is what piqued my interest. 15 DDs later.....

I saw Mirai and Candy in 2003. I really wanted Mirai. I looked around on EBay and saw other similar sized dolls but they weren't as anime-like as Mirai and Candy. The clothes for DD on EBay were mostly bondage outfits. I was worried it would be hard to find normal clothes. I kept watching auctions on both EBay and Yahoo! Japan Auctions. I saw an auction on EBay for the 3 Sirius Production Models for like $2999. haha I really wanted a Sirius but that price was crazy. Kasumi was white skin and very goth so I kept an eye out for her too.

 

In 2005, I finally got a head off Yahoo! Japan Auctions and a DDI off a U.S. doll hobby online store. I lost a few Kasumi auctions. I started bidding on Sirius too and got Anniversary Model Sirius. The DDII body came in stock at the doll hobby store. I switched Sirius to that and listed the DDI on EBay for $30. It sold for around $180 or something like that. I was surprised. My impression was DDs were seen as weird because of all the bondage clothes and Volks' attempts at making sexy clothes for them. Most of the skirts were insanely short. I preferred the dresses they made for Femi and Cheryl. Kyoko and Yumi's clothes were nice but I wanted something more anime-like. I bought mostly KK Workshop gothic lolita dresses and dressed them in that. It was especially hard to get panties for them. But Volks USA had limiteds available for direct purchase (leftovers from lotteries?). I got Christmas Kotori, Kyoko, and Cheryl that way.

 

As the years went by, there were interesting collaboration models. It wasn't impossible to win Volks USA lotteries so I got some DDs that way. Like the author of this thread mentioned, things changed and DDs got much more popular and prices went up. The change in exchange rate made limited prices worse. DDs became very exclusive. The exchange rate has gone back to how it used to be and prices have decreased again.

 

I posted photos to Flickr and was aware others had DDs. I always loved Anouc's photos. I didn't think about talking to anyone till 2010 I think. Now I have pen pals all over the world who I treasure. But there certainly are politics involved in large communities. The good outweighs the bad. If you are afraid to reach out, you will never connect with others.

I've known about bjd's for a long time... probably like 2004. I stumbled on pictures of resin dolls and became interested. Resins were never quite "me" enough though, so I never bothered to look into buying any. I continued looking at doll photography and started seeing some more anime style girls quite a few years later, and discovered they were DD's.

 

It's only been the last few of years I actually did my research, committed to buying dolls and stumbled upon Danny Choo in the process.