toys | mareymercy.

Ohmygosh – I’ve bought and photographed so many dolls since last I wrote.

In fact, I went on such a buying spree my husband threatened to divorce me if I bought One. More. Doll. And yes, we’re still married.

So I think the best way to catch everyone up on all the dolls and all the photos, I should categorize my entries by line – and yes, first up is good old Barbie.

I swiped this outfit from a different brand of doll. It didn’t really fit her but I made it work.

When it comes to Barbie, the choices are endless. But there’s a certain body the line makes that is called “made to move,” and it is a fully articulated doll. This means it bends and rotates at the elbows, the wrist, the shoulders, the feet, the knees, and the torso. The head on an articulated doll usually has more movement too. Whereas a non-articulated doll’s head will swivel back and forth, an articulated doll will also look up and down. They’re just infinitely more posable. You can identify an articulated doll by the joints. It’s a tradeoff, the joints themselves are kind of ugly, but the posabiliity makes up for it. And while it’s not a total dealbreaker, there’s no denying how much more I can do with an articulated doll.

Several of Barbie’s collections have this “Made to Move” body, and my favorite is what is called their “Signature Looks” line. Based on the lack of availability of a lot of these dolls, I assume they are a line that’s been out of production for a while, and many are listed on Amazon at over $100, but I’ve managed to collect a nice variety of them for less than that. The Signature Looks line is more focused on the fashion statements the dolls make – which is nice, considering that Barbie’s outfits are often lackluster.

A “tall” Barbie and an average-sized one.

Barbie also has different sizes of dolls – something they’ve been doing for a while now – and while I haven’t bought a “curvy” doll yet, I intend to do so at some point. They also have a “petite” doll, and some “tall” ones. The doll on the left in this photo is one of the tall ones – and I mean, she is TALL. Legs for days. She photographs beautifully. She was hard to find, and the one I bought off Amazon clearly wasn’t new, but I was happy enough just to have her so I didn’t complain.

See what I mean about posability? You really can’t beat an articulated doll when it comes to taking photos. And the fashions on the Signature Looks dolls are pretty nice, too. They’re not elaborate, but they’re more fashion-forward than your average Barbie, and the materials are a bit nicer too.

Remember when I told you that my tall Barbie was clearly used? Well, one issue I had with her was that her hair was a little creased. And I tried to flat-iron the crease out of it, which was a mistake, because I burned off a section of her beautiful long black hair. I can fix it in Photoshop, but when she is hanging out in my closet she looks pretty sad. Fortunately, there are doll wigs. I found this one on Etsy, and wow – it really elevates my photos! The thing about doll hair is that it doesn’t move like natural hair or normal wig hair; all the wind in the world won’t move it much. But with this wig I can pose it like the wind is blowing it, and it stays. So now this gal takes even more gorgeous photos!

Sure, the hairline’s a little thick, but hey, it is just a doll.

The Signature Looks line also has some short-haired dolls, and of course, I had to get both of those! It’s really rare to find a female doll with short hair, and these two were too cute to pass up:

I love Blondie’s Argyle sweater! I stole that off a “Be Kind” doll that I only bought for her outfit. (She was cheap)

Really pretty make-up and face sculpts on this line, too – not so Barbie-ish

Both of these had very limited availability online – I bought them through Amazon but from third-party sellers, and they were more expensive than I generally go for. But I had to have them. Also, the brunette is a “petite” doll, and when they say petite they really mean it! I have two, and as of yet, I haven’t posed them with a taller doll, so it might not translate here, but trust me when I say these dolls are pretty short.

I stole those pants from an average-sized doll, and her shoes disappeared! The shirt and tie came from a Rainbow High doll.

I have a few more Barbies I haven’t had time to photograph, a curly redhead and another petite gal – also from the Signature Looks line. So this post turned out to be shorter than I thought it would be, but oh well. Next up – Monster High!

Hey there – more doll photos!

I’m really digging the monochromatic look of some of the Rainbow and Shadow High dolls, which isn’t a surprise considering my previous selfies. One thing I’m using PhotoShop to help with is the eyes – I’ve found that moving the irises to a different position helps with realism, but it’s kind of a bitch to do. In the photo above, I moved the eyes of the doll in the foreground to be looking directly at the camera, which makes a huge difference. I also tilted the background doll’s head just a bit for the same reason. It’s a small adjustment, but it really helps.

Same for this one – I shifted her eyes so that she’s looking up instead of straight ahead to give it an angelic quality. I think I may have over-processed this one, but old habits die hard, y’all.

.With this one, I think I made her eyes too blue, but I’m keeping it as is. And let me just say that a solid black doll is difficult to photograph! You really have to lighten it up to get any of her facial features, and then you have to decide where you want to add shadows back once that is done. It’s tricky.

This solid white doll on the other hand? Heaven.

Another issue I’m working through right now is doll stands. The ones that come with these dolls is fine if you’re just going to stand her in the corner, but for posing it absolutely sucks. It falls apart constantly. I even tried gluing it all together (it comes in three pieces) with Gorilla Glue yesterday, and the damn thing still fell apart, although it lasted longer before doing so. Good doll stands are stupid expensive – like $8-$14 for ONE stand – so I haven’t bitten the bullet yet, but I’m going to have to because working with the ones I have is making me crazy.

I finally got the doll with the plaid leggings!

Backgrounds are another issue, and while I have purchased some small backdrops specifically for photography of small items, they haven’t arrived yet, so I’ve managed to come up with some creative ways around the problem. As you can see in the photo above, wrapping paper hasn’t worked out that great – it has creases I have to try and fix in post, and it reflects light which I then have to pretend like I intended to be there. But in the photos above this one, I had better luck – I have a furry white chair cover that I was able to use to good effect, and I have some other ideas for things I can use around the house.

Oh, and another issue with these plastic doll stands is that they show – there are ways to maneuver the doll’s legs to conceal them, but when the stands keep falling apart while I try to place the legs properly things get annoying quickly. So for this one, even though the full shot was super cute, I could NOT find a way to successfully get rid of the stand, so I chopped her off mid-calf. Bummer. With the fuzzy background, I was able to use it to cover up the stand for the most part, but when using wallpaper not so much.

This was part of a shoot that really did not work. The paper was reflective and crinkly, and the outfit I put on the doll just really didn’t work. But I did get this one pretty cool shot. As much as I love to have hair moving around in my photos, I haven’t yet been able to successfully do this with a doll. Their hair just does not move like human hair or wig hair for some reason, no matter how much wind I blow on them. So I’ve kind of given up trying. And as excited as I was to try taking photos of dolls outside now that I’ve got this lovely property, I’ve found that I hate it as much as I do taking selfies outside. For whatever reason, I just can’t function when dealing with heat, or leaves, or gravel, or dirt, or anything relating to the outdoors. So back to the studio it’s been.

These are actually quite small dolls – about five inches – and I’m really proud of this “backdrop” I came up with. It’s just some old paint palettes I use when doing my paint pours – one behind them and one they are standing on, as well as some of the plastic stands I use to dry them that get all drippy. I think it came out kinda cool!