Dolly Market Forum

(07-21-2023, 12:20 AM)davidd Wrote: [ -> ]Pix or it's not real!!!!!

"Although I'm not gonna do it twice cos I value my back muscles...."


The flowers look interesting.
Put the ruler down and step away from the (new) diorama....

(07-21-2023, 03:50 PM)Alliecat Wrote: [ -> ]

(07-21-2023, 12:20 AM)davidd Wrote: [ -> ]Pix or it's not real!!!!!

"Although I'm not gonna do it twice cos I value my back muscles...."



Put the ruler down and step away from the (new) diorama.... 

You know you took pictures the first time, then! You know that I know that you take pictures of everything you do!

Except for setting the lupine patch on fire. You gotta get pix of that next time, too.



As for the diorama... uhmmm... back off, coppers! I've got a (craft) knife!

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21 July - A Doll A Day 2023:

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Ya want more ketchup with those fries?

a) I didn't.

b) I did. 



I used to post pix of the process on FB too until I clued in that most of those people are not like-minded about some important things so why bother sharing stuff.


That flower looks really cool!  I had to look it up.  Wow, it can grow over 5' tall?!  How big do yours get?  Have you tried sampling the nectar? Do they change colour through the season?
Your wall looks excellent.  And someone is later planting things than I am.

(07-22-2023, 12:39 PM)Alliecat Wrote: [ -> ]I used to post pix of the process on FB too until I clued in that most of those people are not like-minded about some important things so why bother sharing stuff.


That flower looks really cool!  I had to look it up.  Wow, it can grow over 5' tall?!  How big do yours get?  Have you tried sampling the nectar?  Do they change colour through the season?

Pictures of the flower bed burning process, or of the dangerous dolly photo process?

I'm noticing that the people who post doll or figure photos on Instagram and then include detailed "making of" or "behind the scenes" photos in the scroll are receiving a lot of "likes" and "follows" and "comments" these days. Interest in toy and figure photography appears to be on an upswing again.

I don't follow enough flower bed photographers to have a sense as to the popularity of sterilization by fire.

The Scarlet Gilia around here seem to only reach a foot or so (30cm) in height. I have not noticed a color change, other than going from red to dead. The flowers are quite tiny, I did not realize sampling the nectar was a possibility. I remember chewing on grass stems when I was a kid. We would pull the "straws" out of certain wild grasses, and chew the tips of the inner layer, which had a sweet taste.

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22 July - A Doll A Day 2023:




I had a scene like this in mind as a "humorous response" to a post on another forum, but the thing is, those "gag responses" have a short shelf-life, and by the time I assembled the bits and bobs I needed for the scene, the moment had passed.

I had not thought about the Babes With Blades website in years... decades, even. I see that there is still a web site under that name, and it's not particularly prurient, although the definition of "babes" is fairly generous. I believe the original version was part of a larger site dedicated to custom cutlery: decorative knives, swords, and blades for decor and costuming purposes. There's also, I see, a theatrical company called Babes with Blades who emphasize stage swordplay.

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More catching up:


Added:

Bits of wire for security bars in the window.
Transparent plastic from a product package for "glass" window.
Bits of wood from an old garden lattice panel as door and window trim.
Torn fabric fragment as a curtain.
Remnant of a woven grass beach mat as a window blind.
Printed "Closed" sign.
Piece of old fence board as boarded up door.

Photo processing for a more atmospheric effect using the PhotoToaster iPad app.

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I recently purchased the things at screen left, and made the thing at screen center, because I couldn't find the things at screen right, which I found later, after the items I purchased had been delivered and the item I made had been made, by which time my enthusiasm for the project for which I needed the things I could not find and for which I had purchased the things I had purchased and for which I had made the thing I had made had dissipated completely.

But hey: real fire in this pic!

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I saw a picture of miniature television sets like this online, so out of curiosity I poked around online a bit to figure out what they were from, which of course led to eBay, and now I have two miniature dollhouse size plastic boxes shaped like television sets that I shouldn't have wasted money on, but inflation is eroding the value of money so quickly these days that what does it really matter?

These little TVs are pretty cool, though, because there's a slot in the side that allows the image in the screen to be easily changed. There's also enough room inside that it should be relatively easy to rig up some interior lighting to create a realistic screen glow.

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McFarlane Toys Doctor Fetter's Family of Freaks Parade toy set.

I've been trying to figure out the source for some of these pieces for a few years now, after seeing them in some decade-old photos here on Flickr. I was finally able to identify the source -- McFarlane Toys -- but the prices for this set tend to run at over a hundred dollars on eBay. A couple of months ago I ran across a set being offered at one-third the price most sellers ask, and... it's been sitting in a box for three or four or more months, until I finally got around to opening it.

As is so often the case, my enthusiasm for the project this set was intended to embellish has presently ebbed. Maybe I'll get back to it one of these days. Prior to that, perhaps I can figure out how to restore the preservative fluid that has evaporated from the specimen bottles.

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Sometimes I ask myself, "why do I have so much useless junk cluttering up my life, where does it come from, and what can I do about it?"

Case in point: this little bit of random plastic. It's only an inch or so wide (two or three centimeters), so it doesn't take up much space; but multiply this by dozens, or hundreds, and things like this make quite a mess.

I was opening up the package for the item seen in yesterday's A Doll A Day picture (the Freak Show set), and I noticed this interesting little bit of plastic. I had just, like literally half an hour previously, been looking at some particularly well-done action figure diorama photos on Flickr, and thinking about how the builder had made excellent use of "found" or "cast off" items to add visual interest to the settings, including random bits of plastic packaging material like this.

I mean... a quick spray with paint, maybe a touch up with a contrasting color, and you have yourself a nifty little "gadget" or "greeblie" for a science scene or a technical scene -- space ship, submarine, whatever.

So of course I had to keep it.

Were I ever to get around to constructing said space ship or submarine or whatever, will I be able to find this "potential greeblie"? Oh hellz no. It'll be lost in the bottom of a box somewhere, or it will have fallen under the furniture, or it will be taking up space in a drawer in the kitchen.

Keeping this crap to make "doll stuff" out of is some kind of compulsion, and it's gotta be unhealthy.

I should take up a normal escapist hobby like golf or alcoholism.

(07-23-2023, 08:28 AM)davidd Wrote: [ -> ]Pictures of the flower bed burning process, or of the dangerous dolly photo process?

I don't follow enough flower bed photographers to have a sense as to the popularity of sterilization by fire.

I have not noticed a color change, other than going from red to dead.

It's not a flower bed; it's a wildflower patch.  It would be a "field" or a "meadow" if it was bigger, but it's just 1/3 of my front yard so it's a "patch" -- lots of grass, flowers, wild stuff rather than a tended "bed".  And yes, pictures of the annual burn.

As to popularity, there are those who insist you are wasting organic matter and polluting the air and killing small animals and lowering biodiversity and endangering grandma and you should never do it.... and then others who will point to centuries of indigenous land management where burning was part of a natural cycle, and clearing away dead material reduced fire risk or helped other things grow... I've never done a biodiversity census of my yard but there seems to be quite a variety of plants in that patch, and the fireweed is doing awesome this year, and it "might" kill off some ticks as well, so that's good.

So do your hummingbirds stay throughout the blooming season then?  Or maybe you don't have hawkmoths.

Your tale of Things Purchased And Made made me chuckle.  You are really good at using bits & pieces for your sets, and it's true you never know when you might need a thing, so, yeah, save it...  Because if you throw it out you'll end up needing it.  (Of course if you keep it you probably won't.)
The little TVs look fun.  I'm astonished at the demand for the "freaks" set though.  And the diorama details are also looking good.

23 July - A Doll A Day 2023:

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(07-23-2023, 12:29 PM)Alliecat Wrote: [ -> ]So do your hummingbirds stay throughout the blooming season then? 

No hawkmoths here. Or very few.

The hummingbird situation has been odd. Three years ago there were so many, like dozens, that I put up three feeders and was filling them twice a day or more.

Then a drought kicked in, and the hummingbird count dropped to a few. And then to none by the end of last summer.

This past winter the snow was back, with a massive snowpack, and the spring was cool and wet. By mid-spring there were at least a dozen hummers flitting around.

I don't know what happened after that. They all left. All but two. From late spring until yesterday there have been two hummingbirds. That's it. Two.

Yesterday afternoon, a third one showed up.

I don't know if the spring was too cold (cooler than usual through June, especially at night) for nesting, or what, but the hummingbirds all left again this season, even though the weather is back to normal and there are plenty of wildflowers.

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A Doll A Day 2023 - 24 July

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Meh... sorry! I'm still playing catch-up... but I think I'm done after this batch, finally, maybe. It's taken me a while to edit pics and to research captions.

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But in case you don't, because, like, it was posted on a different forum, here ya go:

I took my wish to the wishing well
But someone had filled it in
With dirt and rocks that left no room
For wishes to fit in.

I took some seeds to the wishing well
And planted dandelions.
I watered them and watched them grow
Sun yellow, bright, they shined.

I took a flow'r from the wishing well
Bright yellow turned to white.
Puff! On a thousand fairy seeds
My wishes all took flight!

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Members of the American Penstemon Society... and there is such an organization... call themselves 'Penstemaniacs.' There are over a hundred varieties of wild Penstemon flowers -- also called Beardtongues -- found in the US state of Utah.

https://penstemons.org/images/newsletter...spring.pdf

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Well no hawkmoths might ex-plain the flowers not turning colour for them.  Weird about your hummingbirds.  I wonder if they moved with weather changes, or whether there was actually a population loss?  I suppose they would go where there are more flowers, thus not be around when it's dry, but they do eat bugs too.
I wondered where mine had gone in early June too -- was afraid they'd gone off the feeder that wasn't changed while I was away.  But maybe they were focusing on bugs, and nesting.  They are "back".  Maybe yours have been nesting and now you are seeing young ones?  Do they have relatively short bills?
Here are some really cool facts about hummers!

Enjoyed seeing all the flowers (and the captions, haha).  I think the penstemon is my favourite.  I looked them up and some are a bit orchid-y looking.

I loved your poem!! 

25 July - A Doll A Day 2023:

Another cool flower. She looks like she is ex-ploring an alien landscape. Is that a bug above her eye???

(07-26-2023, 04:21 PM)Alliecat Wrote: [ -> ] Is that a bug above her eye???

  That's actually her somewhat freakishly long black eyelashes above her eye! The Novi Stars all had long, stiff eyelashes.

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26 July - A Doll A Day 2023:


Janie inspects the results of the exhausting task that caused us to fall behind by three –– count 'em –– three entire weeks of A Doll A Day posts.

"Could use some more blocking if you're going to leave everything ex-posed like this for any length of time," she offers.

27 July - A Doll A Day 2023:

The girls look a little uneasy with the sketchy surroundings. Can't say I blame them.

Wow, look at that VIEW!!!!

An eyelash -- ha! It sure was a weird stringy-lookin bug

28 July - A Doll A Day 2023:


Based on an action figure, Captain Action, released by IDEAL Toy Company in the mid-1960s.

Costume: Round2 Captain Action re-issue figure
Body: TBLeague M32
Head: Triad Toys "Zorro"

29 July - A Doll A Day 2023:

Janie and Triv embark on a summer yard clean-up project.

What... if anything... will they accomplish?

Stay tuned!