• heads? and if so, which molds? these would be cast in resin. the newer CAM heads would be easiest to do since they already come with a head cap, but regular dolls are still doable. i rly like this idea. theoretically, you could even carve out the eyes and put glass ones in. how cool would that be? and presuming this is something i got better at doing, we could even eventually have custom head molds. FUN.
• wings? GLITTERY FUCKING GARGOYLE WINGS, MAN. idk, i like the idea. also would be cast in resin.
• wig caps? especially with the new hard-cap CAM heads, wigs are a better option than directly rooting, so, idk, maybe it would be cool to cast some wig caps for that purpose. this is gonna be sliiiiightly trickier, since they would presumably need to be made of a more flexible material than resin. hmm. i’ll have to think on this one. it’s definitely more of a “down the line” project, cuz flexible plastics = expensive assholes.

Hey, a couple questions about custom shoes turned up in our inbox but tumblr managed somehow to corrupt them so we can’t see who actually asked them or answer them, so here’s a general post on progress:

• we will either make a new etsy or just use my personal one. either way, when there are actual shoes up for sale and ready to go, we’ll provide a link here on deadfast. :)
• right now we only have clear resin on hand. we will be able to buy more solid white resin later on but the first batch of shoes will all be made with clear resin. of course they will still be full of fun colors and glitter, but we can’t do any solid/opaque colors for a little while, sorry. we had to pick one or the other when buying supplies, cuz they ain’t cheap, and we went with clear rather than solid because clear resin is easier to color-match and shows off glitter better.
• the molds we’ll be making are: Bee Girl pumps (this is our FIRST priority), Draculaura Day at the Maul platforms w/ strap removed and cut-out hearts filled in, and Lagoona’s Dawn of the Dance scalloped platform. We will also be redoing our Cleo Dawn of the Dance mold (some test shoes produced are pictured above) and making some of those for personal use as well, because unlike YOU GUYS who DID NOT VOTE FOR IT AT ALL we love this shoe and want it in a million colors.
• we will not be molding any “squishy” shoes or shoes that require squishiness to fit over the foot for a good long while (such as thigh-high boots or anything with straps). why? because softer liquid plastics are much more expensive and the molding process is more time and labor intensive, that’s why. it depends on how things go if we’ll be able to ever do this. we want to, but alas don’t currently have the money/materials.
• we will photograph each individual pair of shoes and take care to include info regarding any flaws. flawed shoes, such as ones with bubbles or slightly messier mold lines, will cost less than ones that come out “nicer.” this is of particular importance to us because we’ve bought custom Monster High shoes from folks in the past only to discover they’d been using stock pics of shoes long since sold instead of photographing each pair, and the shoes that we receive are a slightly different color, have bubbles/imperfections in them, or both. uncool.
• the molding process is time-intensive and douchey. but i’ll try to keep everyone informed and post any hilarious mishaps along the way.
• once we’ve got the molds figured out and have fiddled with color mixtures a bit, we’ll be able to take custom orders! for that, i’ll photograph my collection of pigments and glitters and you can pick stuff you want, won’t that be grand. custom orders will probably be a little more expensive than regular ones (but probs only by like a dollar), purely because it takes effort to get a color exactly right rather than just throwing pigments together and seeing what the fuck happens.
• we totally reserve the right to punk the fuck out on part or all of this project at any time, especially because yours truly has been battling chronic pain off and on and some days i legit can’t get out of bed.
• but keeping the above in mind we will NEVER take money for a product that is not actually available. when custom orders become feasible, we will make the shoes for you BEFORE you pay for them. we will not do pre-orders. given how hectic and unpredictable life can be, and given that this is not our day job, we don’t feel comfortable taking money for goods we don’t physically have in our hands, ready to be put in a bubble mailer and shipped out to you. and we know how disappointing it is to pay for something only for the seller to go “whups, can’t do it/don’t have it, here’s your money back!” sucks real bad. so we’re not going to do that to you.
• we will do our absolute BEST to provide world-wide shipping, offered at the lowest possible price, but there might be times when we have to limit where we can ship, or indeed not ship to certain countries at all if there are consistent customs issues. but we’re gonna try real hard, ok.

i think that’s everything! ok bye for now.

Since the discovery that washing the gross shellac out of a doll’s hair can actually be bad for them, I’ve been trying to find another way to clean and soften the bangs and bobs and other helmet-like aspects of my horde of dolls’ hair. What I’ve found works just as well as washing is combing!

Using a regular comb doesn’t work so well, because the hair is often so stiff that the teeth just bend against it or make grooves without actually pushing the glue out. But small, fine-toothed combs with sturdy bristles can get the hair as soft as washing it.

In my case, I’ve been using a very small, very sharp eyelash comb. Its teeth are basically a row of thick, rather blunt needles, and while I would never, ever, ever want to put it anywhere near my eyes, it works very well for combing out the glue. But I think any thin, narrow comb with strong teeth would do just as well.

For comparison, here’s a picture of one of my Operettas before I combed out her hair:

And here she is afterwards!

I think it holds shape pretty well! The curls are bigger and looser, but a bit of training with a pipe cleaner will fix that. The hair wants to hold its shape, and if it gets messed up, wrapping it around your finger (or a pencil or something similar) and combing over it will help get it back the way it was.

I did this for both of my Operettas that still have their stock hair, and I think it turned out pretty nicely both times:

So um, yes! Hopefully this will be helpful to somebody. I’ve used this method to de-gluify both of my SS Frankies, both of my Rochelles’ bangs, DotD Ghoulia’s bangs, and two of my Operettas with no problems so far.

-R