I have been tackling with this question for a while now in relation to a particular head of mine. I owe a Feeple70 Sleeping Breakaway head and have for quite some time. I never took photos when he arrived, so I can't date him properly, but I have owned him since approximately 2009. Originally the plan had been to mod this head to an Open Eye and use him as my SD/SSD Breakaway - instead of spending even more money and buying a Luts released Breakaway. (this is the root of my obsession with only collecting Fairyland released BAs.)
I was saved from this dilemma when I spotted the head which is now Arawn's, an F70 head with a default Midnight Blue faceup. I snatched him up and he arrived in head form in May 2010 - he didn't get a body until 2011, as is my strange way of doing things, and the sleeping head was placed into a box with the rest of the sleeping heads and other paraphernalia and essentially forgotten about.
I accepted that I was unlikely to own a 60cm Breakaway, since all of the releases are Luts releases in that size and quite happily continued collecting BAs on a smaller scale. I had an F70 BA and considering the similarities between the F70 body and that of the now F60 bodies, I was quite content with the situation as it was. (Even though there was always a little gap called "SD BA" and I kept looking at the Vamps and other 60cm BAs which came onto the market.)
My desire for a SD sized BA seemed like it would be fulfilled when CP announced that the event head for their F60 event was going to be a popular scarred MNF head - that could of course only mean one of two things - a Scar Shiwoo or a Scar Breakaway. I figured it all out, counted back and discovered which of the two would be a "Juri" and which was a "Nanuri" - in case you're wondering, the MNF Scar Shiwoo is a Nanuri, and the BA is the Juri.
And then there was the issue that all those people brought up - the Scar BA was NOT the most popular MNF event head (although how would anyone but the maker know that I don't know). And somehow they convinced CP to make a resculpt of the Juri 05 Delf - otherwise known as the MNF Juri 08. Ironically enough, while I watch BA sales on the MP (currently there are aboout 4-5 BAs in SD size available on the MP) I also occasionally count the number of Juris. I counted the other day - for such a popular SD size, there are 18 Juris - both original 05s and 2012s for sale at the moment (mostly unmodded - and 05 Juris are rare unmodded... not). That is not what I consider a popular sculpt.
But anyway. That kerfuffle made me think, at least for a little while until people started complaining, that I would be getting a 60cm BA to complete my collection. I stewed over the eventual decision and am still trying to sell both the Juris I own, one of them has been up for sale for over 12 months.
Since I had been denied an F60 Scar BA of my very own, I admit I was very bitter over the whole debacle. CP rose to the occasion though and to keep BA owners and obsessors, like myself, happy - they released not one in the next event, but four all at once. I don't think they've ever released that many of the same sculpt at the same time, like... ever.
He of course came with his original name, Ital, because of a problem with Luts owning the name "Breakaway". So CP tried to make us happy and gave all of us BA lovers an F65 with three faces (OE, Nose Scar and Eye Scar) and a Chicline. I have one of my F65s faceplates and I admit I am very happy with him.
Just after this, during the rush of waiting for new arrivals and the like, I continued to think of the elusive 60cm BA and I remembered my sleeping head, lying unused and forgotten in my box of heads. I dug him back out again and instead of getting another head or another F60 altogether (I was considering an El - which is pretty close to a BA afterall...) I once again considered the idea of modding my sleeping BA so that I could have him on an F60 body.
Then I came to a quandary. My F70 Sleeping BA is one very rare young man. Breakaway has only really ever been released in a limited capacity - three times under Luts and all three of them were limited fullsets (the final release in 2008 was of course the Bloody Valentine). All of the Luts releases had sleeping Vampire heads - the first two with open mouths and the last, the Bloody Valentine, with a closed mouth. Also in 2008, CP attempted to release BA in a basic capacity through their fledgling company, Fairyland. Unfortunately, after a stink, the F70 Midnight Sun and Midnight Blue Breakaways were turned into limited releases.
The Midnight Blue and Midnight Sun were unique in two ways. It was the first time the BA had been released with a Dreaming head, and the Dreaming F70 is still one of the rarer heads (the entire F70 range are quite hard to find); and it was the only time the BA did not have a Sleeping Vampire head. The Sleeping BA is just that - a closed mouth sleeping sculpt. No vampire fangs anywhere.
So my quandary of course was whether or not to mod a rare head so that I could fufil my own desires for an F60 BA. I thought I had it down, but I kept facilitating over it. I put up a WTB for a Dreaming BA head - the only one of the F70 set that I didn't have.
And I hoped that I would find a reasonable priced Dreaming or OE head that I could buy and use that instead for my F60 rather than modding such a rare doll.
I know that everyone doesn't hold to the thing that keeps me from modding dolls I know are rare in their original state - I can only really live with certain types of mods. I know that a person's doll is their doll and they can do anything they like with it - they paid for it and all of that, and I accept that, although I may not always agree with their choice of wig... or face up or anything like that. But that is my personal taste and not theirs. Fair enough.
However, lately I have seen two poor dolls who are SUPER rare - a Dreaming 05 Elf Lishe and an Elf Shiwoo, both of whom have been modded, seemingly pointlessly. Admittedly the poor Shiwoo came out of it much better - but considering the uniqueness of the Elf Shiwoo - none of the other Elf releases have quite the same ears as an Elf Shiwoo - his have a slight down turn at the ends which is so cute and if I didn't have a thing against Shiwoos, I wouldn't mind an Elf simply because of that!
This poor Shiwoo had the tilt on the end of his ears sanded off. Why? Why ruin one of the most unique and rare features of a single sculpt (not to mention the Elf Shiwoo can be really hard to find, even though he was released twice). They'd also sanded off the end of his very distinctive Shiwoo nose. Why buy a Shiwoo if you don't like a feature so distinctive as that? (I feel the same way over people who buy Lishes, Els and BAs - if you don't like the nose, which is such a massive feature of them, why did you buy it??)
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| Wynn also showing that ear |
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| Draven - showing the curled ear |
The Elf Lishe, an 05 release which is rare enough in itself and not only that but the rarer Dreaming 05 as opposed to the Dreaming Elf Vampire - this particular Lishe was the only Elf release to have both Vampire and non-Vampire Dreaming Elves released with it, had been treated very badly. She had been modded - her nose, her cheeks, her eyes - almost to the point that she didn't look like a Lishe anymore. But worse than that, she had been modded badly. One of her cheeks had been sanded further than the other in and different spots. Her eyes had been opened too wide and were different shapes. It looked like someone had stuck a dremel up her nose... but only on one side. The poor girl had been so badly mistreated that it was sad.
I think that if you are going to mod a rare doll, and I own one myself - a well and sympathetically modded Dreaming Elf Lishe 05 (her eyes have been opened to full OE) - I think you should get someone else, preferrably someone with a LOT of experience to do it for you, rather than just attacking a doll with a piece of sand paper and a dremel!
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| My own modded Dreaming Elf 05, Fea |
Admittedly, people have to learn to mod things, and that's fair enough - but why practice on something so rare? I suppose that they could have bought the poor Lishe back when she was first released... but she was never released as a basic, and she was always a limited release, so wouldn't that suggest that it's probably best not to mod a limited release doll unless you know what you're doing??
Anyway. Admittedly I probably couldn't live with modding much beyond eye openings. As I've outlined I don't understand things like sanding down cheeks or chins, or snubbing noses. If you don't like the sculpt as it was when you bought it.... why did you buy it? I know that some people like to mod dolls to make them more their own and that's fair enough - like faceups its a way of customising a doll. I suppose I don't completely understand the full reasons behind it. There are plenty of dolls, surely someone will have made a doll better suited to your needs?
Anyway. The reason that I posted this - other to explain my views on modding and limited dolls (please if it's limited, limit yourself to a professionally done eye modding or something! - did I admit I modded both of my Limited Nanuri As? Only small mods... eyes and a bit of ear piercing, lol. I also had a very slight mod done on my limited SM Arkose... his eyes. I wanted to sand off his lips, but settled for having them painted so they were less obvious!)
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| Rasmus - my Arkose |
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| My modded VE Chloe - Pax |
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| My modded Nanuri As, Mor Mumain and Nic Naomhim |
So anyway... I have good news... last night I came across a freshly posted F70 BA, OE of course... But of course I leapt in both feet first. My new boy will be Aeron, and I'm going to see if I can swop his F70 body for an F60...
This is the new boy... the photo is by his old owner. He'll be coming home in a month or so, I'm so excited!
Now I have to go finish squeeing over my brand new, just arrived Chiclines... excuse me!
