Disney Animator doll restoration & customisation part 2 - Cutting eye holes
THIS POST FEATURES JEROME'S WORK, a very talented artist - all of her work and photos have been marked as hers in this post. I have used the method she features on her Flickr so I wanted to give her credit and also explain others how I've used these methods as she speaks little english and has no description for these. But to be fair, the pictures are quite self explanatory!
Her Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/116494153@N05/
So when I was looking for tips&tricks painting the Disney animator dolls, I found this person on Flickr, who has a terrific gallery, is incredibly talented, and she makes the most helpful stage photos about her Disney customisations!
Look at these beauties:
You can see that instead of painting the eyes on, she uses actual acrylic glasses just like with ABJDs (asian ball jointed dolls). As I have a couple of years' experience in the field of BJD painting, this method is much more suitable for me than actually painting the eyeballs on the sculpt. I was seeking a way on how can this be implemented on Disney Animator dolls as well, but I wasn't sure if the plastic was suitable, how to put in eyes etc. Until I found Jerome!
With her tutorials was able to see this actually works. I was particularly interested in if the plastic can be cut in a niche shape for the eye sockets. It can!
Disney Animator doll eye opening tutorial
You'll need:
acetone
cotton balls
a small brush
small X-acto knives
acrylic doll eyes
Removing the doll's facory paint with acetone First of all you will need to remove the original factory paint from the doll. This will uncover the many characteristic features these dolls have - let the fun begin! So go grab your acetone now.
In the UK and Hungary, my experience is that you can just walk in a pharmacy and ask for a small botle of household acetone. You need about the amount that you would use for removing your nail polish so not that much, really.
I have tried nail polish removers with and without acetone in them, none of that worked... you'll need pure acetone. But if your local pharmacy is fussy because of safety risks just ask for literally the smallest possible container available - which is probably not enough to blow up anything!
After you have your precious acetone, let's remove the factory paint:
Apply some on the cotton balls (don't overdo it, you don't need to give the doll an acetone bath) and rub the eyes, mouth and cheek with it.
Try to avoid smudging the paint to unpainted areas.
Change your cotton balls regularly as they get covered in paint.
If you have trouble getting into the small areas of the mouth, dip your little firm (but soft!) brush into acetone and scrub gently.
DO NOT USE A TOOTHBRUSH, this is a very handy tip for ABJDs but these dolls are made of vinyl and not hard resin and a toothbrush will scratch the vinyl as it gets a little softened with the acetone.
Done!
What a pretty face underneath the paint
Opening the eyes of the doll with the X-acto knife
You will need one of these beauts:
They are very precise and due to the thin end it can easily move in the vinyl and can be turned beautifully!
You will want to start by cutting a whatever looking hole in the very middle of the eyes (furthest possible from the edges of the eye). Then you will need to widen and widen your hole and work your way out towards the edge of the eyelids.
Instead of cutting big chunks of vinyl out, use very light strokes, almost cutting just flakes each time you strike with your weapon.
Thankfully, somehow this vinyl is very easily carveable, it doesn't stretch as you cut it but it's not too hard either - just like some hardened fudge... I guess. (best association award goes to me, thank you, thank you)
The eyelids are very sharply sculpted so those will be your guidelines forming your eye shape - that's the good and the bad side of it, it helps you in a way but you also can't really get too creative with how the eyes stand, fo example you can't make half-closed eyes for these dolls. (Or can you? Any ideas? Challenge accepted? :) )
Look how Jerome does it:
My victim...
Think I pulled it off okay?
And there you have it! Doll head is ready for paint and the new pair of acrylic eyes.
Inserting acrylic eyes into the doll's head
And if you were wondering about how to put the eyeballs in the head, Jerome has two methods.
First is for when you keep the original hair - in this case you'll have to cut a hole at the back of the doll's head with the same X-acto knive as before. Only difference is that you have to redraw your rectangle and you'll have to be very confident with your lines as no flaking or building up your way is possible here - you will need to be dead precise with the lines you cut.
Just make sure the rectangle is wide enough for your acrylic eye and finger, I managed to forget the fact I needed to squeeze the actual eyes, and my finger through this hole and it was almost too smalll so keep this in mind.
Second is when you put a wig on the head so the scalp can have I'm just yet to try this method!
In case you were wondering about what eye size you might need for these dolls, Jerome has an answer to that as well:
She recommends using acrylic instead of glass eyes since glass eyes are heavy. You will need to wrap the eye in some Blu-tac and insert it in the doll's head and glass eyes may just be a little too heavy for that.
We love you Jerome!!
Let me know if you have any questions or if you have any ideas on the previously mentioned question, which was: how could you make a half-closed eye look on the dolls with sharply sculpted eyelids?
