pieces of a dream

Oh, dear. It’s already November and I’ve already been inactive for almost two months. I’ve been extremely busy with work, school and life, that I hardly remember the events of the previous day. It’s quite sad, to be honest!

Over the past few weeks I’ve been able to secure some of my favorite stock outfits, such as Oren, Aquel and Chibi Risa (dal). Aquel was definitely a stock that I’ve always admired. I already have Coral’s stock, Aquel is perfect match because it’s blue, and Pullip sized. I didn’t want to go as far as to buy Aquel now and try to sell her, so it was perfect timing that someone was selling their stock. I need to do a little cleaning to it, but it should work perfectly. Oren’s stock is also wonderful! I love the bright pink pattern, and I’m excited to have another pair of sunglasses. I also split Dal Chibi Risa [Rock Version], and should receive her stock by early next week if all works well. I already have plans for parts of her stock, especially the very awesome heart shaped shades.

I’m honestly overwhelmed by the amount of dolls, clothes and accessories I’ve accumulated over past seven years of collecting. I’ve collected pinky:st since 2004, and Pullip & friends since the end of 2005. Since then, I’ve gathered a vast amount of miniatures to act as accessories to my little plastic friends. This weekend, I looked across my room and felt saddened because it’s so crowded and disorganized. Apparently I collect too much at once, and have little to no time to play and organize.

So it came down to this. Organization. I needed to accept that although I may have lost a few items here and there over the years, the fact I still have them means something and I could still use them. So I sat, opened items and organized. There are two organizing projects that I am currently invested in. 1) Organize the pinky:st and 2) Organize the miniatures.

It takes several hours to disassemble tiny packages of pinkys and rement/megahouse products. Lots of recycling and trash takes place too. It’s interesting because minis + pinky always came hand in hand for me. I’d always want to create some sort of miniature world with the miniatures I have. But seeing all the different miniatures that I do own helps me think of all the photo possibilities. There’s only one thing I need, and that is time.

I never realized how many miniatures I’ve collected over the years. Some sets I didn’t even realize I already owned! I’ll be separating each item by type and theme. It’s going to be a long process but once complete it will be totally worth it. Hopefully in the near future I’ll be able to share actual photos on this blog and less dream posting.

It’s been a long time since I last put in a post. It’s pretty terrible considering summer is the time that I wanted to “create”. Summer is nearing and end, and to be honest it feels like it went by so fast that I really can’t remember what I did for the last 2 months! My life was consumed with work, having traveled to New York for four days last month for work, and then Seattle for another five. But now I’m back, and I really need to focus!

I actually had to drop out of the Dalicious contest that took place at Dolly Market. I had the last minute business trip mentioned above, so I didn’t have time to put effort into my last entry for the final round. I was a bit bummed I couldn’t complete the challenge, but in the end I was still glad that I did enter overall. I learned a lot from this round. I challenged myself to try to do more action shots with scenery rather than just plain backgrounds and face shots. I might enter next season’s Dalicious, which apparently won’t happen until Spring 2011.

Earlier this month, I organized the second San Francisco Bay Area Pullip meet of 2010, and it went pretty well. Three people came that also attended last year, which was nice because now we have some regulars. I’m going to try to plan another meet for December in San Jose, and hopefully that will be just as successful, drawing more members. Looking back, I did a whole lot of planning in the last few months! I’ve been cross-promoting and trying to reach out to other collectors I’ve met through the years. There are other pullip collectors in the area, and if they are willing, I’d love to meet them as well.

But that’s what’s been inspiring me. After meeting with other pullip collectors, it helped inspire me to be more creative with my own collection. I eventually want to own a nice camera, but for now, I’ve decided I should focus on my photography and photo-shopping skills. This past weekend, I took a few of my dolls out to the park near my home and did a few practice shots. I don’t normally take my dolls out in public (especially on my own), and I feel I need to overcome that fear. I think that a few came out pretty well considering I’m still new to shooting dolls in public. Hopefully, over time I’ll have better compositions and take more interesting photos. I’ll first take small steps within the park, then perhaps over time, work on going to other public places.

With anything, practice makes perfect, and I keep having to tell myself that. Although the weather has been strange lately, I won’t let it discourage me from trying to get out and take photos. I’m finding that the more I spend ‘studying’ my subjects, the more interested I am about creating their personality and back story. I’ve been using the notebook on my desk to sketch them and copy down their traits. I don’t draw enough as it is, so I am extremely rusty. But I figure, once you get the juices flowing, it should come easier. Nothing is natural, I just need a little more practice.

Even though it’s nearing the end, summer is always a time for inspiration for me. It’s the only time of year that I feel like I have some time that I can use to set aside and create. It probably the school schedule, because summer is the only time you could do absolutely nothing. Of course, now that I’m all grown up and have a full time job, summer doesn’t exactly equate to that anymore. But there’s something about summer–maybe it’s the longer days–that makes me feel like I need to do something productive.

This summer I entered my Puki Dal into the Dalicous Photo Contest that’s held at the Dolly Market Forum. It’s a good excuse to practice photography and setting up stage sets. I’m putting in more effort into these sets of photos because I’m using my re-ments and other miniatures, which actually turns out to be a great excuse to reconnect with an old hobby.

The first challenge theme was Summer. I had a hard time pin pointing which idea I wanted to do, let alone which was the easiest to execute. Seasons are so broad; there’s so much you could do with one season. I toyed with ideas of sitting on the porch eating fruit while watching the sunset, flying a kite, or blowing bubbles on the lawn. In the end I decided to have Puki do what I would probably do in the summer. Lay on the floor, in front of a fan or air conditioning unit and complain about how hot it is!

I have to admit I had fun though doing this because I could imagine what she was going through. I’m not a big fan of heat, and I tend to feel sluggish and stay indoors so I was trying my best to capture that frustration. Ironically though, the weather for the week I took the photo was rather cold for the San Francisco Bay Area. We had overcast and wind chill! But I think the photo turned out fine and hopefully it conveyed what I wanted. Does it make you feel a little hot at least?

Last weeks challenge was Chores. I was absolutely afraid that I wouldn’t be able to send my entry in on time because my work week was extremely busy and my weekend was booked. I originally wanted to do a paranoia picture themed after Disney Princesses (ie. Cinderella and Snow White). However, with the lack of time and resources I had to quickly scratch that idea. I woke up early enough on Saturday to take a quick photo shoot of Puki washing the dishes instead.

I have to admit that using props is a big plus when I take photos of my dolls. As I was pulling out my re-ment kitchen and refrigerator I ran across my re-ment cleaning supplies! How perfect is that? In the end, I was lucky to have the rubber gloves, sponge and scouring pad all ready.

Hopefully down the line I will actually shoot the other ideas I had brainstormed. Maybe I should put all the ideas into an idea book, so when an ‘artist block’ hits, it’s there for me. Wouldn’t that be nice? I wouldn’t have to think so hard, and time would be saved!

Tomorrow, the third challenge should be revealed. Here’s to hoping that this will be my first completed contest. Whether I go far or not, I’d be satisfied with the fact that I finished. Fingers crossed!

Note: Photos included in this post are my actual outtakes. Please visit my flickr account for the actual entries!

A few years ago I would spend countless hours of my free time online. It seems that nowadays I’m hardly as active in forums and hobbies as I used to be.  There are places like LiveJournal, Facebook, and Flickr that I can use to easily post my thoughts and share images with “connections”.  But in the end having an old fashioned domain that I can use to post my thoughts seems to be the most desirable option for me. Maybe it’s my inner old fashioned webmistress, or the creative side that just wants more options.

Last month I was in a two day training at work and my mind started to trail away. All I could think about was creating a web design and relaunching my dead domain. I realized that things like this take effort, so my first step is to just write. Hopefully the designing and awesome content will follow, but I definitely needed to put in an honest effort.

What will this domain/blog be about exactly? Me, that’s what. I’ve accumulated a few more interests over the years and I believe I’ve matured a bit since my fan art days. Not to say that I have given that up, because I haven’t. But I’m hoping to document and improve my skills with this online blog and site. I will be sharing my in progress projects (and hopefully completed ones as well!) on a regular basis.

Since it is currently the middle of summer, I think it’s a great time to create new goals and work on something crafty! I’ll attempt to slowly update this and hopefully my monkeemoo.com will become a nice little content-filled site I always dreamed of.