Connecting the Dots: A Custom CAM and MH Body Model!

 This project is the resolution to two problems.

Firstly, I wanted to have an MH doll I could keep on hand as a body model when discussing articulation and comparing body sculpts of other dolls, akin to Toy Box Philosopher Emily's "assistant", the Made to Move Barbie doll Lena. I wouldn't just want a nude MH doll I wasn't doing anything with, but it's not convenient to use an MH doll that has more complex clothing or more setup in how I display them. I thought it would be good to have a simple doll with the basic body sculpt for reference and comparison, preferably wearing a noncomplicated costume that didn't even require the removal of arms and hands to take off...but I wanted something that also had appeal on its own as a doll.

The second thing I wanted to resolve was a face I liked. I was enamored with the CAM Insect head and thought it'd make for a fun retro-camp character design that wasn't bug-themed.

I loved this faceup.

The pack the Insect head came in had an incorrect mainline hand and a broken knee joint, and I took her hair for my Witch CAM, Alice Kazamm, so what I had was pretty much the ultimate non-starter for building a character. To solve this, I ordered a second, complete Insect base body, with the harder-to-find matching torso, to start and give the head I liked a body. After that, I needed to order a second pair of Insect forearms to get a second full set of the Insect hands, since one pair was reserved for my custom Alien CAM doll Marcia Greyman's doll stock. I was swimming in dismembered bumblebees and yes, it was a little confusing.

My direction for the character came when ILF Scarah arrived for the Marcia project. I tried the mod split-color dress on the Insect base, and I enjoyed the look, and thinking about mod sixties styling and looking at her buggy eyes full of dots, I thought about Roy Lichtenstein's famous pop art pieces done in the style of cheap comic books. 

Crying Girl by Roy Lichtenstein.

What if this character was a pop-art comic ghoul? With this, I decided to get a parts list ordered:

* A CAM Sea Monster and Vampire duo, since I thought the Witch wig I had that was wasting space would work on the Sea Monster, and the Vamp wig, with much hair care, would work on this doll.

* The colorful graphic dotted dress from the Frightfully Fierce/Spooky Sweet Inner Monster, ordered in two pieces since that was the best way with the options I was seeing.

* The halftone-dotted white boots from I Love Fashion Wydowna.

Here's her profile.

Maudie Sixtenstein

Monster Parentage: I’m not really anybody’s daughter--I was drawn by a comic artist and just came to life!
Killer Style: Pulp art meets pop art-I’m all sixties retro with lots of comic-book dots!
Freaky Flaw: People say I tend to be a little dramatic with how I move and talk. That’s how you have fun, silly!
Favorite Activity: Practicing poses in the mirror. Expression is so important and exciting!
Biggest Pet Peeve: People who call me two-dimensional really bother me. I may flatten things out and exaggerate, but how is that less rich or worthwhile?
Favorite School Subject: It’s between art and drama class for me. I kind of think of myself as an embodiment of both of those things!
Least Favorite School Subject: Probably math class. Structure and technicalities are important, but nothing is less invigorating than a calculation.
Favorite Food: Candy buttons. Sure, they don't taste too special, but I can't get enough of those dot, dot, dots!

Best Friends: Wydowna Spider, Scarah Screams

Her name was chosen because it sounds like "Maude", "mod", and a portmanteau of the words "body model", and "Sixtenstein" is just "sixties" with "Lichtenstein". 

Here's the complete bare Insect body serving as the base--I used my first Insect head, not the one the body came with, because the first was screened better:

And the face I was inspired by:

After looking at Lichtenstein's work, I thought to make Maudie's face look more illusionistically 2D by applying linework to her head that would make her look more like old comic book artwork in three dimensions.

Since my second Insect head was going to be wiped and repainted in time [while this project finished a fair bit afterward, this section of the process was written and documented before I completed DiDi, the doll who used the second head], I thought it would be a good opportunity before that happened to use it as a dummy head to test out the 2D comic style effects I wanted to put on the head. I imitated Lichtenstein to add nose contours and lip outlines, and I added dots in the eyeshadow.

Since that worked well, I did the same on the head I was actually using for Maudie, and I added lip reflections as well for more stylization. I also painted onto her arms to change the gradient effect into a Ben Day dot/halftone dot transition so her arms still fade to black in a comic-print effect. The fade had to be kept because yellow CAM hands that matched her weren't made, and it would look better than the effect of short black hand gloves that would occur if I wiped the paint off her wrists. The dots are far from precise, but I think the effect gets across, and it rings true to MH for me. If they did a printed comic character come to life, I'm sure their limbs would have a dotted fade effect like this.

I'm so pleased with how this worked!

While Maudie's arms had to fade to black because of her hands, there was no reason I needed to keep the gradient on her one-piece lower legs, particularly because the paint was unsurprisingly damaged, the color transition wouldn't show in tall boots, and the effect looked really ugly with non-black heels. So I decided to wipe this paint off and her legs became fully yellow. It's not a perfect wipe, since some black remains in the leg seams and her toe crevices, but the boots will cover them anyway and she'll look okay undressed. The second arms with the hands I needed arrived soon after and her base body was finished.

Maudie's body.

The Vampire and Sea Monster set arrived.

And oh boy, the wig was a nightmare. It feels a little ratty in texture, and was very tangled and snarled. After a ton of comb-fighting and conditioning and clumps of hair ripped out, plus a boil on the long part, I got it into this:

The hair is huge, which isn't awful, but it still feels a little ratty and disobedient, and the lopsided curled bangs are an issue since they don't hide the wig cap and I wouldn't know how to make them cross the forehead without undoing the curved shape and flattening them.

Then, after a fair amount of time, the four costume parts arrived and I had a finished basic doll.

The Inner Monster costume I ordered is a separate top and a skirt made to look like one halter dress with a pencil underskirt when worn together. The skirt is best pulled up the torso and fastened high before scooting it down to make sure the top is tucked into it. The dotted pattern was intended to resemble candy buttons for the Sweet half of the Inner Monster character, but the dots and bright emoji-esque graphics also feel very comic-book or pop-art.

The two pieces go on and off very easily since the top is sleeveless and opens all the way down the back and the skirt works like any other in the brand. I only need to take her boots off to remove the costume, and I'd be doing that anyway when using Maudie for body comparisons, so it works out perfectly. Another bonus is that I think I can use both Maudie's wing and tail slots with this costume, so she can be used for CAM doll reference points that might come up.

The boots are a good find, since they have the dotted shading and feel reasonably retro.

Man, I want their Wydowna doll again.

And here's a few basic poses playing around with Maudie. She'll be more versatile paired against other dolls and maybe out of her costume, but I like her.

So there she is--an informative body model to use as a comparison tool, but one with a theme and personality to give her worth on the shelf. She's not a moment too soon, because I have someone coming in to compare to her. I hope Maudie proves to be a useful presence in my reviews going forward!