Syd's Cauldron

🍎 About the making of Clara 🍏

There are some imperfections & design oversights- but ultimately I’m very happy with how she turned out.

Learnings...

With the model- I wish I had extended the neck a bit deeper into the head so that she could looks further up/down without gapping showing. And I accidentally totally hollowed out the limbs instead of creating a spherical cavity- so that made stringing this together a nightmare.

I learned that inserted pieces (the tusks) should not be an EXACT fit. There's probably some micro warping in the physical print, and resin is rigid/inflexible. So the insert pieces didn't fit! Luckily that was easy to fix- I just filed the holes to be a little bigger.

The next biggest issue was cracking in the clear coat. I had to redo all of the limbs because of this. We found that simply doing several very light layers (over the course of 48 hours) prevented cracking.

I’m also having paint chipping at the joints. This is the only doll where I’ve had this issue. The only different factors in this project were the type of spray paint, & that I didn’t do much hand painting. Parts getting a bit beat up at joints is common in BJDs so it is what it is IMO.

Head complete. I was very strategic with this one— mostly spray paint with just a little bit of hand painting around the eyes, and soft pastels all over.

Next up will be a series of 3 little bat girls. These anthro dolls are a bit more on the humanoid side. I hope to design more detailed outfits.

I think I might start sharing work in progress pics more. Because the process of making a doll can be challenging but also SO FUN. I want to celebrate that.

I finished my Spyro doll, and with that- all 3 of my girls are done!!!