Embedded Files
From the game 'Trails Into Reverie' from the Trails of Cold Steel/Azure Series
Overall I think shes adorable and aside from things I think look a little rough, I'm intentionally and have been during the whole process; forgiving myself. Aftering finishing my 6 months working on my perfectionism with a professional I wanted to keep challenging that after, this being quite a battle. The constant need to redo things, not settle for less, get frustrated by the result while learning how to do things. Fighting all those thoughts, compulsions and feelings of critique I put myself through all the time. I have to internally speak to myself, almost ordering myself to leave things where they are, to actually finish something for once. I will admit that I avoid finishing things very frequently because if the result is not up to my desires (as it always never is), then I dont have to face that 'lesser result' since its not finished yet. Always perpetually unfinished so I dont have to accept imperfection. What's really nice is that I really love her, shes so cute and tiny and while I have those critical thoughts still, I have actually finished something! On a side note, I do not reccomend this game, lol.
Making of Process:
Using a base of a 'Minty 1/12 (1st Series)' and a bunch of tools and supplies. One being glass domes to which I drew and printed to scale the eye design, gluing (E6000+) it to the dome to make a 3D 'always looking' effect. After removing the Minty faceup I drew my own in many layers of Inktense colour pencils, chalk pastels and Hycote Clear Matte Top Coat. This was an incredibly lengthy process and really pushes your patience waiting for things to dry and doing incremental additions. Oh I also cut off the elf ears and shaved them best I could, the same with the inside eye plate since you cannot get custom eyes in place without cutting it out.
Tights made from...tights. (Cheaper then buying the same fabric- untights'd)
2) During this process I got some white cotton with the intent to paint it the colours I need later on. I decided to sew the entire outfit by hand because I find glue exceptionally annoying and a machine too cumbersome for this scale. I started from inside layers out, eyeballing a pattern and trial and erroring it. I had to get specifically ultra thin VELCRO (brand) because 1/12 is too small for regular velcro.
3) Working on the other parts of the outfit, the dress, headband and altering the shoes the Minty came with by cutting off its decoration and painting it. Here you can see a back of head clay sculpt which was an absolute bitch to make. The polymer clay (Fimo Pro, highly reccomend) shrinks slightly when baked so getting it to fit without being too heavy and stay on was just an awful time (I ended up embedding a magnet on the top plate). I would say buy an official 'back of head' piece but theyre like half the price of the doll, I'd rather suffer thanks.
5) Using wig cap mesh I made a tiny wig cap. In hindsight I should have doubled up the thickness because after the wefts it became weak and torn in places. I made wefts from nylon hair as I didnt realise you could use natural yarn's. I initally tried gluing with E6000, then sewing on the machine, then both to eventually conclude this process sucks. I ended up sewing the wefts on because I cannot understand how people are glueing their wefts while retaining flexibility. I used acrylic paint and fabric medium to colour the clothes appropriately and made little arm bands with some black elastic.
Unstyled finished wig. (I royally f'd this up when styling using a glue method I saw online. Don't, just style with water and heat, dont get glue anywhere near the wig my god. I had to make a new fringe out of scrap fibres and laying it over the dumb glued part by 'facade' gluing them on top.)
4) I sculpted her gold button thing which is a bit large but it was difficult going any smaller than that and retaining detail. Finished up the jacket base, the triangle design turned out a little hack but It is what it is. At this point nothing was velcro'd, so I eventually opened up the shirt at the front and put it there which I then attached everything else to the shirt so it was all a one piece outfit. I also started on her axe, which was a metal tent spike sawed shorter and carfully layered up with clay and sanding.
5) I finished sculpting the axe (only one side), and styling the wig. Then did a paint pass of the outfit details (lines ect.) as well as the axe. Now the axe is a little messy but I was getting pretty tired with the project amongst alot of others at the moment, and as a supplimentary set dressing I allowed myself to cut corners and get this done while I still had energy.
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