Went to pick up Peach this afternoon, and she's now perfect! There's no sign of the resin flaws anymore. Charie did a totally amazing job in fixing her. I thought for her very first photos back home, I'd dress in her Lonnie's Victorian ensemble. She looked beautiful.
Talking with Charie it became clearer as to what exactly she had done. One thing is for certain, Peach definitely had flaws in her resin. They showed up very clearly when a light was shone into her head. The light flaws were widest near the surface and tapered towards the inside. I had thought Charie had scraped the light areas off, but what she had really done was scrape and sand the darker areas around the flaw in order to soften the edges and blend it into the lighter resin. Darker coloured resins become lighter when they are sanded, so Charie took advantage of that and ever so carefully scraped and sanded away the darker resin across the entire bridge of her nose so that it was all one soft colour, and blended seamlessly into her face. Charie said we were lucky the flaw was where it was, because had it been in the middle of her cheek, it would have been impossible to fix that way. All I can say is "Charie you are amazing!"
Which is more than I can say for Iplehouse. I went to look this morning to see if they had responded to my questions from last week. They had back-tracked on their hot glue claims and said there was still something there, and they wouldn't know what until they saw the head in person. I'll give them that. But then they went on to insult my faceup artist..."it is normal to assume that our chief sculptor, who has made resin dolls for more than ten years, has much more experience than an amateur". That made me mad! An Amateur!?!? Charie is no "amateur"!! She has a lifetime of experience with making and painting dolls, and has been painting BJDs since they first came out over 10 years ago. Or are they implying that anyone not working for them is considered an "amateur"? Anyway, then they went on to say that if I paid to send the doll back to them, that they'd be kind enough to pay for the shipping back. Gee, that's so generous! I get to spend more big bucks to totally start over.
At that point I really lost it, and because my Peach had been fixed, I figured I had nothing to lose, and decided it was time to tell them what I really thought of their lousy "Customer Service", and to tell that us "amateurs" had even noticed one of their newest light brown dolls on their website - Aaliyah - had a similar light area in her resin towards the back of her upper right arm - something no one there had noticed - not the person who took the doll out of the mold, not the faceup artist, not the stylist who dressed the doll for the various clothing and lingerie photo shoots, nor the photographer, nor the web person. I won't post the links here, since I fully expect the photos to be pulled by tomorrow. But I took photos of the web pages.
Anyway, I have my Peach, and she's beautiful, and I'm glad this is all over. And as with every cloud, this one had a "silver lining" too. We learned a lot in our research into flaws in resin, and about mold release, and about how doll companies deal with issues in their resin. We learned that the BJD community is a close-knit group, willing to share their expertise and give tips for possible solutions. Charie also developed a whole new set of skills in addressing this issue, and those will be very useful in future faceups.
And all I can say to anyone ordering a blank doll from them, whether you are a professional faceup artist or a do-it-your-selfer, take a moment when the doll arrives, and before doing anything to it, shine a light inside to check for any flaws in the resin. I'd hate for anyone else to have to go through what I just went through this past week.
Which is more than I can say for Iplehouse. I went to look this morning to see if they had responded to my questions from last week. They had back-tracked on their hot glue claims and said there was still something there, and they wouldn't know what until they saw the head in person. I'll give them that. But then they went on to insult my faceup artist..."it is normal to assume that our chief sculptor, who has made resin dolls for more than ten years, has much more experience than an amateur". That made me mad! An Amateur!?!? Charie is no "amateur"!! She has a lifetime of experience with making and painting dolls, and has been painting BJDs since they first came out over 10 years ago. Or are they implying that anyone not working for them is considered an "amateur"? Anyway, then they went on to say that if I paid to send the doll back to them, that they'd be kind enough to pay for the shipping back. Gee, that's so generous! I get to spend more big bucks to totally start over.
At that point I really lost it, and because my Peach had been fixed, I figured I had nothing to lose, and decided it was time to tell them what I really thought of their lousy "Customer Service", and to tell that us "amateurs" had even noticed one of their newest light brown dolls on their website - Aaliyah - had a similar light area in her resin towards the back of her upper right arm - something no one there had noticed - not the person who took the doll out of the mold, not the faceup artist, not the stylist who dressed the doll for the various clothing and lingerie photo shoots, nor the photographer, nor the web person. I won't post the links here, since I fully expect the photos to be pulled by tomorrow. But I took photos of the web pages.
Anyway, I have my Peach, and she's beautiful, and I'm glad this is all over. And as with every cloud, this one had a "silver lining" too. We learned a lot in our research into flaws in resin, and about mold release, and about how doll companies deal with issues in their resin. We learned that the BJD community is a close-knit group, willing to share their expertise and give tips for possible solutions. Charie also developed a whole new set of skills in addressing this issue, and those will be very useful in future faceups.
And all I can say to anyone ordering a blank doll from them, whether you are a professional faceup artist or a do-it-your-selfer, take a moment when the doll arrives, and before doing anything to it, shine a light inside to check for any flaws in the resin. I'd hate for anyone else to have to go through what I just went through this past week.
RSS Feed
