0bsequious's Custom Journal

I wanted to make a thread where I can post my custom and mod projects, and since most of them are not the "big 3" companies I figured I'd put them here.

I especially wanted to share this silly mod project I finished a week or so ago. I got these Real Doomsday blind box heads months ago, and I mostly haven't done much with them. But I got the idea in my head a while back to mod one of the eyeless ones to have small, close set eyes:

(my digital mockup)

I definitely wanted to stay anime-inspired, but this specific cartoony gonky anime style. I was thinking something like Tetsuro from Galaxy Express 999. I think that kind of character is so so cute, so I wanted a doll with that sorta vibe. 😚

(Mid-cutting and after sanding)

I had to be careful when choosing where to put the eyes, since this head obviously wasn't designed to accommodate inset eyes. It probably would have been much easier to paint on these super simple eyes, but this was also sort of an excuse to use my brand new Proxxon Pen Sander. It turned out to be extremely effective, and I got the edges of the eyeholes nice and rounded in about 30 minutes. I know from experience that it would have taken forever by hand... the Real Doomsday heads are on the harder side, but vinyl is always a pain to sand.

In hindsight I probably should have sanded the chin round too, but I don't think it looks too bad pointy.

Here he is after the faceup! He's very temporarily on a OB45 male body, but it's too tall for him. Hoping to put him on the 1/4 imomodoll boy body once it's released.

Also in the works currently:

I got a ton of the imomodoll blind boxes as well, mostly with the intention to mod. I just started marking one of them (the narrow-eyed one is called Tack) up on a whim a few days ago, and liked the concept enough to actually carve it up.

(before cutting, after cutting & sanding)

Yet again the pen sander was the MVP for this mod, made smoothing the mouth and eye a breeze. It's currently in line for a faceup, I'm hoping to do something like this very quick pencil sketch:

 

I've also got some MDD heads I've been working on that I bought in a damaged/junk lot, but they'll get their own post once they're further along.

I'm hoping to do a lot more weird mods in the future (I have at least 5 more cheap vinyl heads to work with) and I'll probably also post plain-jane custom faceups here too.

Neat! I have to say I'm too cowardly to even modify a doll, which sucks since that is something I might enjoy doing!

Oooh, very excited to see how that Imomo head will turn out!

I always enjoy your youtube videos a great deal, and as someone who is also interested in modding in the future maybe a video where that pen sander is showing its magic would be very interesting.

On 7/9/2023 at 5:28 PM, RozenGermain said:

Neat! I have to say I'm too cowardly to even modify a doll, which sucks since that is something I might enjoy doing!

Honestly practicing on these cheaper $5-$10 heads has really emboldened me, I'm still pretty nervous modding MDD and other heads that are more expensive 😅

8 hours ago, MoiBakaDesu said:

Oooh, very excited to see how that Imomo head will turn out!

I always enjoy your youtube videos a great deal, and as someone who is also interested in modding in the future maybe a video where that pen sander is showing its magic would be very interesting.

Me too, I keep looking for opportunities to paint it but the humidity this time of year is unrelenting 🥵
 

Thanks, I'm glad you enjoy them! I really need to kick this hiatus and get back on the horse. 😂 If you want to see it in action without waiting for me to get my butt in gear, this video is how I found out about the pen sander, and he uses the exact same brand I ended up buying!

 

Wanted to show this leg... swap? Customization...? Don't know what this type of thing is called.

I have a tan Mochi-Ashi body that I've been using for a boy character for quite a while, and for obvious reasons it hasn't really worked. 😅 But since Tan is so hard to come by, I had to settle. Recently though I managed to snag a pair of tan standard MDD legs, and in the process of swapping them out discovered this combo that I've never seen before (perhaps for good reason, but still):

(spoiler for nudity)

Spoiler

It's the Mochi-Ashi calves and feet with the standard MDD thighs. It fits perfectly, somehow seems more snug and flush than the pure Mochi-Ashi legs were before. It's definitely an inelegant look, but I think it's a cute look for boys especially.

And Vodka dressed, with his new legs. Still looks very girly, but in a way I can tolerate a bit more. ☺️

Also working on another Imomodoll mod while the weather is still too humid to do faceups... This time I modded Tick, the big-eyed version of the head.

Mod on the left, original on the right.

I'm very eager to get some paint on these heads, but I still have to sculpt mouth pieces and everything first anyways. Thinking of using Apoxie sculpt for the most part, though I'd love to experiment with white air dry clays that I can mix into the colors I need.

Very nice! I wouldn't know where to begin with this kind of project!

Really good stufff wow!!! I've been a big fan of your tumblr for a long time actually, it's really cool seeing what you come up with for your mods

Thank you @Imawerecat and @uoub ! 🥰

No problem!

On 7/29/2023 at 4:29 PM, 0bsequi0us said:

Thank you @Imawerecat and @uoub ! 🥰

 

I've neglected this thread for a while! So here's a post about my experiments with modding tan vinyl. Usually tan is way to rare for me to even consider modding, but Imomodoll has made tan heads very accessible.

This one is from quite a while ago. I really loved the result with my previous small-eyed boy, so I got a few of Imomodoll's "Empty" heads to continue my reign of terror.

I started doodling on this head out of boredom one day and actually landed on a direction I liked... though it ended up looking kinda different than this.

Thankfully Imomodoll's vinyl doesn't appear to discolor with sanding! The problem, though, is that the darker vinyl shows every little surface imperfection very clearly:

This is after quite a bit of sanding and polishing, and as you can see the surface is still looking messy and rough. But I kept sanding with super-fine sandpaper and then polished it with a melamine sponge, and by the end I had managed to get rid of most of this roughness. It was a little shiny, but that was fixed by the MSC anyways.

This is how it ended up in the end! I really like how this one turned out too, she's giving sort of the opposite energy of the last one I did.

The other mod I did was on my Ruby A head:

It has a sculpted mouth, but unlike other heads I've worked with the mouth parts are not removable. And the mouth is quite deep, with nooks and crannies inside that would be extremely difficult to get to. Hell, it seems like it would be difficult to even get sealant in there. I've been putting off messing with it for a while.

But I've decided that I want to use this head for my incoming tan boy body, so I decided to bite the bullet and just cut the mouth out entirely. I wasn't looking forward to having to sand the shit out of tan vinyl again, but to my relief there was actually no sanding necessary!

Since the lips were already sculpted, I could just cut away the mouth from the inside with a craft knife very carefully for a very clean finish. I dremeled the inside of the head a little so that the mouth parts I eventually sculpt will fit better, so the inside of the head is a mess. But I don't care what the inside of the head looks like, so as far as I'm concerned it's a win.

The teeth in the picture is just a blob of white eye putty, but I plan on sculpting something very similar. 😁 Funny how removing the inside of the mouth sort of changes the expression.

 

Edited January 12 by 0bsequi0us

I'm always so impressed by your mods...! Really good stuff.

By the way, I don't know if this works on tan vinyl, but I follow a Japanese faceup artist who seems use V Color thinner (which I think has rebranded to Mr. Color thinner?) to smooth out their sanded heads. I've seen another person make a video on it also in Japanese, but there's no subtitles unfortunately.

40 minutes ago, uoub said:

I'm always so impressed by your mods...! Really good stuff.

By the way, I don't know if this works on tan vinyl, but I follow a Japanese faceup artist who seems use V Color thinner (which I think has rebranded to Mr. Color thinner?) to smooth out their sanded heads. I've seen another person make a video on it also in Japanese, but there's no subtitles unfortunately.

Oh wow, that is super interesting! In that video is almost looks like it's melting the softer top layer of the head? Though they also sanded it afterwards so maybe it also makes it harder and easier to sand? 🤔 That's really cool though, it really seems to open up more options for full customization.

Admittedly I'm definitely not at that level yet (like totally reshaping the face) but I can see myself trying this on an inexpensive head at some point in the future

Those little teeth on Ruby look great! Excited to see what you do with her!

I love your customs!  Your faceups are always so unique!

Oh wow, these are incredible!

This is kind of a lame little update since this head isn't even finished yet, but I'm impatient and I really like how it's turned out!

This is that modded Tick head I mentioned earlier in the thread.

Usually I would do a real mockup in procreate, but I guess I was feeling bold because I based the final faceup off of this very sloppy sketch. I've also taken to using white eye putty to test where I want teeth to go! The lighting of this pic is sorta bad but you can see one little fang I'm planning to add.

And the nearly finished faceup! I decided to add freckles at the last minute, but I think they're cute. I just need to add some finishing touches and give it a final seal, then I can sculpt the mouth pieces! I've taken to using colored foam clay for the mouth parts, it makes sculpting them super super easy.

Aaaand just because I want to, a cute pic of Puccini wearing this Mezzaluna outfit I recently got!

Looks great so far. 

Can I ask what makes working with foam clay easier than using regular modeling clay? I would love to learn more 

@pyoko Thanks!

I probably should have specified that it's just easier compared to the method I had previously been using 😅 In the past I would sculpt a mouth part with gray Apoxie sculpt (which requires hours of sanding and retouching after curing) and then paint it.

With foam clay I can just stick the pieces in one by one (teeth, tongue, then the back of the mouth) and they dry in place in the head. And because foam clay is super light and sticky, it adheres to the inside of the head and just stays there even after drying. But I'm certain other modeling clays could work just as well, I've been meaning to try other options like Milliput because foam clay is unfortunately pretty delicate.

Ooo, I think freckles were a great choice! The warm tone the faceup has is really nice in general, very sun-kissed. Puccini made me laugh a little because he looks so unamused about having his photo taken. The outfit rules, I love that kind of techy sci-fi look!

Yes, having to paint the mouth part definitely sounds more work. 😅

Wanted to quickly drop in and show the finished result with the mouth parts added!

I think it turned out surprisingly cute! I've got it on a resin Pudoll body right now, because as I suspected these early imomodoll heads look sorta funny on bodies that aren't chubby and short.

I just realized I've never shared the final result of my Ruby A mod in this thread (though I have spammed him elsewhere lol) so I'll include him for the sake of completion. I used the same mouth sculpting method on him, but his mouth was considerably smaller and simpler, only needing 2 colors.