DollsArtCats

I spent the day putting away Christmas decorations--it's time to do the annual Doll Inventory, and I need to clear off a flat space to set it up. I am sure Stripey will find a way to sit in the middle of whatever spot I clear--it's part of the annual tradition. Here's a photo from last week, when it was cold and I forgot a bottle of lavender cleaner out on the porch: Photos from our mall visit on the Friday before Christmas--Santa getting last-minute requests: Gifts for the golfer who has everything (these things are huge, and expensive--at least you could use the silver one for an end table...) And finally, after two years and many near-death experiences, my tiny orchid is blooming!: So Happy New Year, and may 2017 be better than 2016!

I am sure I will regret it, but I bought a bird feeder and put it up--I thought it would amuse Stripey; but after 10 minutes she got bored with it, leaving us to watch the birds instead. They are cute, but there are a lot of them, rather like the bees. They can also empty out the feeder in a single day..except when the local, very small Cooper's Hawk shows up, and then they scatter. The Cooper's Hawk actually walked around on the ground like a surly pigeon after the small birds flew off, and he walked into the bushes and stuck his head in various holes, which seems like strange and risky behavior for a hawk that a dog or even a cat could take on. I guess he was hungry. The local possums and skunks are full of Christmas leftovers from the compost pile, so maybe they aren't out foraging as much. The squirrels in front can barely be bothered to get out of bed for nuts now.

Yes, Granado has a new guy, Raguel . He reminds me of Jaden; I have been careful not to visit the Granado site for a while because I am not supposed to buy anyone :D He has jointed hands as an option, and I think you can get him on the Evol or the smoother Embody body..but like I said I haven't looked too hard at him. If you visit the site, they are also discontinuing Charles; so if Charles has been on your wishlist now is the time to get him!

She's your standard 11.5 inch bends- at- the- hips- and- shoulders kind of figure, and she's got a really basic paint job--but she is there at last! She stands like a boss, too! Here is the outside of the box, a little blurry from being taken at night: And here is the sku on the box (not the Target sku): Maybe Hasbro has figured out we buy action figures too :D

Yes, she is back at Souldoll and if you are brave, you can order her with the 4 arms instead of the default two--AND she comes in novelty blue and saffron orange. I'm interested in the saffron-- but I would need to see it cast up before I would commit 900.00(which includes the helmet, wig and makeup and 4 arms) to a doll. On the other hand, Souldoll has made the deal even sweeter by offering most of the older Zenith heads as options, including the beautiful Chantal 1. Here is the option list: (Click to enlarge) So you can get your Swinte or Jina or Uha in a fun color with 4 arms, if you so desire. You can get the signature helmet, but only in white resin. I really am out of room, or I would put her on layaway--I love those extra arms, but she would need her own space to sit it and I don't have it. Ideally she should have a freestanding case with a low UV light. There doesn't seem to be a option to buy the outfit, but I haven't really had time to search around t...

I can't take a lot of artistic credit for this one--it was a test render of Daz Studio on the new machine, and it rendered Pixeluna's Mitsuko, the Three Gate Pass, and a tree in under 10 minutes :D All the models shown are for sale at Daz3d.com .

"Where is my plate?" (She did actually sit on the box in the back, at table level, and eat a little ham with us.) This was our Christmas Eve dinner--we will be slackers today and eat leftovers, and loll about the house-- because it's supposed to rain today :o If you celebrate Christmas, may it be a happy one! And Happy Holidays all around!

This little cutie is "Rudy" and if you want the brown tan shown, it's a measly 10.00 more. In fact at 171.00 he/she is cheaper than an Iplehouse Pet Doll. The order period is short, it ends on January 6, Korean time. Here's another pic: And there is a cute little outfit, too !

I got a 2 hour update this week and then had to reset all my privacy settings. I really like Windows 7, it never gave me any problems. But there is a silver lining--Windows 10 lets me run an old, moldy, wonderful 3d landscape program called Bryce that I found that I missed a lot. It was the first 3d "art" program I ever used, and I never would have mastered it without the help of the people on the alt.binaries.3d Bryce newsgroup. That's how long ago it was when I was using it :D You can model in it using the same lattices that you use to make terrains--and it's amazing what you can make out of "dirt". A lot of people make fantastic spaceships in it! It used to be we would piss and moan about a render taking 30-40 minutes--I ran an old file on the new computer and it took TWO MINUTES and TWENTY EIGHT SECONDS, including antialiasing. Whoo!!  Now if I could just get rid of the ads on the Start page...

So I have been a little bit of a slacker in posting--we have been out shopping, wrapping, shipping, eating too much, and in my case, trying to load up the new computer. The drive is partitioned and this is proving a challenge to Daz Studio. And me. But Stripey has some entertainment watching the squirrels, inspecting tissue paper in boxes, and generally being slightly weirded out by the holidays. Someone suggested I should do a "selfie" for a Christmas card; I can't imagine a less inspiring theme since selfies and I do not agree. You can see here: I have a much better idea: here is Tabitha in front of the small tree we have up: That's more like it! She owns more than one dress, too :D    Happy Holidays!

I hadn't been paying attention to Iplehouse this month, but they are having a Fashion Iplehouse Doll Event with Bianca , Mari , Claude and that hottie, Leonard . I haven't been online a lot anyway, between Christmas prep, and trying to get Windows 10 under control on the new machine (yesterday Microsoft decided to update the whole OS, so there was a 2 hour download followed by a lot of fiddling, and I had to reinstall some of my things as well.) I don't collect this size, which is a pity-- as not only are they more affordable; somehow Claude and Mari look so much more charming in the small size, though the molds are virtually identical to the larger size. (I think they are digitally resized from the originals). I love Bianca; she looks so much better in person than she does in photos--much less droopy and sad, and more curious and alert. The dress she is wearing is for sale, as well as all the ornaments; there is a shorter black version as well. Here's that scamp...

While this was a gag gift from my relatives, it might be my favorite present of the year--they are from Archie Mc Phee, peddler of goofy items since forever, and they came with a cute box AND a bacon patch. I have a jacket the patch can go on, too: Here they are, in what I thought would be their most-used form--under gloves : Because this was today's high, I was SUPER GLAD to have them! It turns out they are great for sitting and typing at the keyboard too (Night Blogging, as the illo shows). I did turn them inside out to get a little more room, since I have big hands. I think manufacturers in China don't really have a grasp of how big Americans are--they look at the stats and say "No way, that has to be a mistake." No, really, we are a large people. :D  So thank you, you crazy guys! <3 (It's so cold that J brought in the sensor from the Saw Stop to "warm up"--the saw won't start when it's too cold, around 12F and under. Sin...

Zelda was cleaning out some doll things and sent some to me!! They are so much appreciated--hats, shoes, wigs and a Christmas card! (I love those things). Merry Christmas and thank you too! <3 Here Tabitha (Granado Mercury) models her new shoes and wig.

This is Lut's newest Delf girl, Clary --who is a Banshee, though she looks perfectly kind. She does come in gray and sandy if that is your preference..and she has a Souldoll type poofy dress: Here she is in gray: Luts is awesome in that they show the blank heads too; and the types of makeups: She reminds me a little of the big Withdoll girls--they have relatively large heads and smaller bodies, so they don't match the Soom or Iplehouse guys too well, but I like them anyway. :D At the moment I already have a Poser banshee called Layla of the Black Sun Clan, and she is easier to store :D

I normally post in the evening, but last night we made a run out to the grocery store instead--it's zero F right now and it's supposed to snow quite a bit tomorrow. I also have a new computer--and let me tell you, having two computers is pretty awesome. I had the new one rendering Daz Studio files while I worked on Photoshop on this one. I'm converting the texture on the Nymph up there to be a borg babe, as well as a whole stack of other projects. It's a good time to be inside :D

So pretty! So cold! It will be zero degrees F tonight. The cat is SO BORED.

So I think Fairyland looked at Souldoll and said.. HA..you can do a centaur--we can do a winged unicorn girl! in a fabulous outfit...AND SHE IS A CENTAUR TOO!!! NYAH NYAH. Also, she has crazy great shoes, a sleeping head, heel feets and a unicorn staff. And if you get all of it, you get an elf head too. Akutenshi got ALL of it. I want to see the shoes!

They have really cute faceups, steampunk angel outfits, and really pretty wings this time around; they are also the designated Christmas "kit doll" that you can assemble yourself for a discount. Here's Yuki: Looking so cute! Best part? Those eyes! You can view their sales page here ! If you have that size doll already the outfits can be purchased separately during the sales period, too.

I really like this coffee shop , in spite of that pink back wall and somewhat disturbing plant painting under it--it renders really fast since the textures are on small files. It's by VanishingPoint on Renderosity, and was on sale yesterday for less than 6.00 USD. The poles that support the ceiling look odd because I made the ceiling invisible, which both lets in a lot more light, and also means I could use this high camera angle; each item you see in the cafe is actually a separate little file-- so things can be moved, hidden or re-textured as needed...and they are labelled so you can tell what they are! I made the mistake in the last, more polished Daz Studio coffee shop of deleting the ceiling, and there was no extra file that you can click on to replace it. So I had to find a box and push it up on the ceiling so it wouldn't look weird. In this model, I can hide or move stuff as I need to. I do need to scale my people up 15%. Compared to the rest of the digital world,...

The True Story of the original Star Wars movie prop, how it was nearly thrown away, how it became a trash can (with a photo), and how a collector's grandmother fixed the radar dish, all here .