allthemonsterhighdolls

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

One of my longest running projects at the moment that I've been actively working on is a Mari Lwyd doll. I've had her base - Skellita's body with a 3D printed head - for years, but have been running up against design hurdles. Today I've finally cleared the biggest one - conflicting textures - and the second biggest one - paint matching - shouldn't take too long. I probably won't her 100% photo ready by Christmas, but I'll at least have the ground work down.

Which brings us to the next question: should she have hair?

Traditionally, of course, she doesn't, but this is a Monster High interpretation. I could do it, if I wanted. Or I could just give her a gauzy head wrap to go with her equally gauzy dress (neither have been made...I'm thinking cheese cloth), which is more traditional. The hair would be yarn because gluing nylon or saran to a 3D printed horse skull is not something I want to even think about, thank you muchly.

So what are everyone else's thoughts?

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

Maybe this is just me being a product of the '80s, but how do we not have a fully glow in the dark doll yet?

Eyes? Check.

Hair? ...................not really, although some is UV reactive.

Actual Doll? Nada.

What gives, guys? This seems obvious.

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

Okay, so normally I don't include OCs in my Monstober stuff unless I know who they are? I have no idea who this ghoul is, but she's been kicking about for a bit waiting for me to decide what to do with her eyes and lipstick and what sort of monster is she anyway? A yeti like Abbey? A different sort of snow/ice monster? A water monster with big, big claws?

I do not knooooooooooooooow!

But I figured this might give me a kick in the pants towards figuring it out, or someone on the interwebs might have a suggestion or two!

In the meantime, I can show off her hair. I seriously love her hair, even if repurposing it from Avea was a pain that took forever! Still, so much fuuuuuuuuuuun!

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

By this point I just wanted something simple and therapeutic that couldn't easily blow up on me. Spectra and purple lights. What could go wrong? Nothing, that's what.

No, seriously, she even looked straight at the camera first try. That never happens!

Thank you, Spectra. I love you.

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

Abbey and Heath go to prom!

This is the shoot on which everything just...hopped in a hand basket and wound up in the expected place. The battery died on one of my main lights and I couldn't find the charger. Completely forgot my strobe could be used a slave light because my brain was still sick-dead. Probably needs set up I wouldn't be able to manage anyway. Wound up using a little LED torch, but then the balance with my big studio light was wrong. Bounced the studio light off my wall, but then the light wasn't going through the blue gel as it should.

Yeah. It was one of those.

End result - these shots were done with me holding a torch and red gels in my left hand, holding blue gels over my studio light with my right hand, and holding my remote trigger in my mouth.

Please enjoy them. At this point I'll beg if it helps.

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

I had planned on finishing up the backlit Power Ghouls series today, but I hit technological difficulties and had to quickly take things a new route. I wound up playing with what happened if I paired my gels with my light box instead.

Cupid was nice enough to volunteer to pose for a nice range of pink shots. The light ones are a single pink gel, the darker one is a pink/red combo. The lighting set up on the light box is big enough that it takes two gels to cover it.

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

Sultan Sting.

I love that they made a pet scorpion.

I love that his name is a Dire Straits reference.

Not gonna lie, though, his face design is kinda weird...

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

Either ghost ferrets have incredible chompers, or Rheun died because her bite was too screwed up for her to eat...

Or maybe I'm just reading too much into her design.

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

I will never get over my glee that Cleo de Nile, one of the girlyest ghouls in the school, has a pet baby cobra. My heart dances with this knowledge.

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

Part of me wants to figure out what all goes into Whatzit. The rest of me is all "naw, you'll undoubtedly miss the one armadillo claw or something".

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

I was already behind when I got my Covid vaccine which took me out for the past two days, so! Mad dash to get...ten shoots done? Yeah. No biggy, right?

Deuce's pet two tailed rat, Perseus. I really need to give that earring a bit of paint to make it pop...

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

The last time I tried taking misty pictures of Dracula, the problem was that I had the dry ice directly behind the figure, so all of the fog slunk across the ground. Effective in it's way, but not what I was going for.

The problem this time is that you can put your container above the figure all right, so that the fog creeps down your back drop...but good luck getting it to go to the part of the backdrop you want it to! I swear, I pour water in, the fog pours over the side away from where I'm shooting. I tilt it over the front, and it drifts away from the figure, no matter what I do.

...I'm beginning to suspect there's a slight draft in my photo studio...

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

Of course, the other thing about dry ice is that it evaporates so quickly, you need to come up with All The Shoots and do it Right Now!

I've already done Lenore, but I wanted to do something without the blacklight for once. She's lovely enough, she deserves it. First my camera battery gave out. Then my light battery gave out! So I switched to my little LED panel for the full body pictures, hence the more dramatic lighting.

Not sure which I like more...

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

Continuing my "back lit Power Ghouls poster" trend with Polterghoul!

I got dry ice again. Good news, I figured out how to get it behind the figures! Bad news, it's an even bigger pain in the tush as usual!

...no, seriously, these were picked from a total of 131 shots. I really, really need to get my tethering system worked out, although I'm pretty sure even with tethering dry ice is going to be a matter of "take a million shots and see which ones have the coolest smoke!"

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

More playing with fairy lights! And Jinafire, because I've not played with her in forever!

For the less dramatic ones, they lights were wrapped around my lens. The effect is less interesting than I'd hoped for, but I do like the reflections.

The more dramatic ones have the fairy lights tangled at her feet. One has a reflector held above her, the other doesn't.

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

Revisiting one of my oldest shoots - werecats under a street lamp. Originally it was just Toralei, but this time I decided to have some fun with the twins. Really played with the light settings on this one...ironically the ones that give the most realistic feel are the ones where you basically can't see Meowlody. Go figure. Also, I love my ghouls, but dang! Good luck getting them to look straight at the camera!

The BRUTE trash can pencil holder was a free gift for Earth Day at my old legal litigation outsourcing job. It says a lot about the job that it's the only long term good thing I really got from it.

[allthemonsterhighdolls]

c. 2024

A couple of breakthroughs later, I figured out what I did wrong with the "Star Wars Gigi" shoot, so I decided to redo it. However, since it didn't seem fair to give Gigi all of the screen time, used Wisp instead.

For funsies I also did a shot with regular white light, only blue light, and only red light.