doll: 2026 goals and a hatsumode photo

[matsushima]

Lately I've had a hard time posing my dolls. I'm feeling uninspired. I've taken my dolls everywhere so the locations alone can't be the visual interest in my photos. I don't want to rely on buying new outfits and props to make my photos look/feel more interesting, either.

I always have a hard time with this feeling that I'm a "one trick pony." My MFA thesis advisor suggested I think of myself not as a "hack" but an "auteur." Yes, I have certain themes and forms that I'm drawn to but so do most artists.

She was talking about picture books but I try to think about it when I take my doll photos, too. It's not that I'm lazy and uncreative. (I also just noticed that she follows my dollstagram?!)

When I look at bone_hollow's or ametchu's feed, I don't think, wow, boring. I think they're good doll photographers with a consistent visual style.

That said, I want to improve my doll photography skills. I'm not trying to monetize/professionalize my doll hobby (other than academically) but it's important me to have a hobby that I'm practicing and improving without any pressure.

I'd really like to get better at posing my dolls more dynamically. I've written about this before, too.

I really admire sfishfish's photos and it's possible that my dolls aren't even physically capable of holding some of those poses (my dolls are old, most of them are single jointed) but… it's something I want to work on this year!One thing I worked on last year was editing. It wasn't a goal I set, it just happened. I have an Adobe Creative Cloud subscription through work and I've been lightly editing my photos in Lightroom Mobile before uploading them. This is the edited photo; here is the unedited photo.

Oh, and Nene's amazing feather wig is from _karasuya!