Death to Shiny Dolls: Sand/Abrasive Blasting Silicone

[rubyfan]

Comparing a poor photo of a DS doll with flash against a well lit Abyss doll does nothing to prove your point and only does a disservice to doll comparisons.

Are you kidding? The problem is that the lack of skin detail on DS (and numerous other silicone vendors) renders shiny areas waxy-looking and obviously fake. Even in the shiny areas in the dinner table picture you can see lots of skin surface detail.

Anyway, this has devolved into fanboi spin-spin-spin. You're not helping DS by pretending there isn't an issue. Took me 2 seconds to find those shiny pics of a new DS. Find a single waxy/shiny picture of a 2016 RealDoll 2.

[rubyfan]

Here is a very good closeup of the fine skin surface detail on a RealDoll 2 face; detail a DS lacks. That lack of detail on a DS causes the surface to be far more reflective and susceptible to unwanted glare, reflection, and over-exposure from various light sources, including but not restricted to flash lighting:

http://www.dollalbum.com/dollgallery/al ... a_5671.jpg

[DarkOne]

Comparing a poor photo of a DS doll with flash against a well lit Abyss doll does nothing to prove your point and only does a disservice to doll comparisons.

Are you kidding? The problem is that the lack of skin detail on DS (and numerous other silicone vendors) renders shiny areas waxy-looking and obviously fake. Even in the shiny areas in the dinner table picture you can see lots of skin surface detail.

Anyway, this has devolved into fanboi spin-spin-spin. You're not helping DS by pretending there isn't an issue. Took me 2 seconds to find those shiny pics of a new DS. Find a single waxy/shiny picture of a 2016 RealDoll 2.

No, Im not kidding, I am saying if your going to compare one doll to another, if you don't do it under similar lighting conditions the comparison is not valid.

Is this shiny enough for you?


( from http://dollforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=70024 )

[rubyfan]

No, Im not kidding, I am saying if your going to compare one doll to another, if you don't do it under similar lighting conditions the comparison is not valid.

Is this shiny enough for you?
)

What the hell does that prove? Old/classic RealDolls had the same shininess problems (the classic dolls still have it!) that DS does before Abyss fixed it. They FIXED this and that is the point.

Show me a closeup of the face of a DS doll, showing the matte skin texture that doesn't exist, and I'll concede that there is no problem.

[DarkOne]

Here is a very good closeup of the fine skin surface detail on a RealDoll 2 face; detail a DS lacks. That lack of detail on a DS causes the surface to be far more reflective and susceptible to unwanted glare, reflection, and over-exposure from various light sources, including but not restricted to flash lighting:

Yes, DS could use more skin detail and it would help with things.

But in no way do DS normally look like the pictures you posted.

That is what I am complaining about. You have to compare dolls under the same lighting conditions. Bad photography can make things much worse then they actually are. People don't have built in flash bulbs to make things they look that bad, so representing a close up flash picture as 'how DS dolls look' is doing a disservice to your comparison/complaint.

I am not saying there is no problem, I am saying the problem is not nearly as bad as your pictures make it out to be. DS are not perfect but what do you expect at 1/3rd the price of a RealDoll?

[rubyfan]

I am not saying there is no problem, I am saying the problem is not nearly as bad as your pictures make it out to be. DS are not perfect but what do you expect at 1/3rd the price of a RealDoll?

I don't expect it. I don't expect a quality skeleton, or nice soft silicone either at that price, yet DS give that to us, so it makes me a bit greedy.

I ask myself, "I wonder why they don't add this one thing that would raise their product's quality to another level? Is it really that difficult?" That's really the genesis of this whole thread: if DS won't/can't fix this, I wonder if I could fix it myself?

And maybe it is really difficult. Abyss are very cagey about how they do this, and it is only available on the RealDoll 2 line. It gives a great, realistic effect when doing photography though, and it feels great to the touch, and having owned a RD2 with this texture, I kinda want it on every doll.

[upsux]

Not all manufacturers want to be Abyss (high price, high quality), some are quite content being medium price, medium quality.

I'd wager they know how to solve the problem but the cost to resurface the molds outweighs their expected return. It's a business decision that gets made everyday, it's unfortunate you're on the opposite side of their plan.

[rubyfan]

Not all manufacturers want to be Abyss (high price, high quality), some are quite content being medium price, medium quality.

I'd wager they know how to solve the problem but the cost to resurface the molds outweighs their expected return. It's a business decision that gets made everyday, it's unfortunate you're on the opposite side of their plan.

True dat, and I can (grudgingly) accept it. I'm very near to pulling the trigger on a DS, if for no other reason than to see if they live up to their reputations.

Now, I haven't beaten up other manufacturers like Sanhui for this sort of reason because I get that they are a bargain option. DS is very weird, though, in that they really are the value leaders in this industry. It feels okay somehow to ask them to be even better.

Again, I wrote directly to DS and asked, they said they knew about it but had no plans to change this anytime soon, so here I am, asking if I can take a sand-blaster to my DS!

[DarkOne]

Not all manufacturers want to be Abyss (high price, high quality), some are quite content being medium price, medium quality.

I'd wager they know how to solve the problem but the cost to resurface the molds outweighs their expected return. It's a business decision that gets made everyday, it's unfortunate you're on the opposite side of their plan.

Agreed. I'll also note that while my TPE doll does have 'skin surface' texture, its more just a random roughness like you would expect from sandblasting the mold or something. Its nothing like the detailed skin 'cracks' (in a good way) and texture that abyss put on their dolls. For that level of detail I would highly suspect Abyss sends(? or maybe inhouse) the molds out to be CNC'ed via an expensive 4 or 5 axis CNC with a tiny, tiny endmill that spends all night putting the details in. (And by 'tiny endmill' what I really mean is several dozen tiny endmills since one would dull before it got done doing all that detail)

The details would likely have to be procedural generated via a computer program written to texture the mold, Might include scanning the mold first so the CNC knows where to mill.. You just couldn't put all those details in by hand or it would take forever.

Such skin texture might also reduce doll yield, because it would make the silicone much more likely to stick to the mold, requiring more mold release that could result in problems.

[DarkOne]

Not all manufacturers want to be Abyss (high price, high quality), some are quite content being medium price, medium quality.

I'd wager they know how to solve the problem but the cost to resurface the molds outweighs their expected return. It's a business decision that gets made everyday, it's unfortunate you're on the opposite side of their plan.

True dat, and I can (grudgingly) accept it. I'm very near to pulling the trigger on a DS, if for no other reason than to see if they live up to their reputations.

Now, I haven't beaten up other manufacturers like Sanhui for this sort of reason because I get that they are a bargain option. DS is very weird, though, in that they really are the value leaders in this industry. It feels okay somehow to ask them to be even better.

Again, I wrote directly to DS and asked, they said they knew about it but had no plans to change this anytime soon, so here I am, asking if I can take a sand-blaster to my DS!

I would buy some DS inserts at $20 a pop and work on those to test your theories. They should be the cheapest source of 'DS silicone' to experiment on.

BTW: there are some blasting options that do NOT leave residue, for example Dry ice blasting (Dry ice = Frozen CO2 = turns into gaseous CO2 directly as it heats)

You might also want to experiment with temperatures. Things become harder/more brittle as they become colder, so silicone at -40c (dry ice temperature) might be hard enough to properly roughen up.

Chemicals are another option, Maybe something corrosive to silicone could be misted on then washed off after some etching has occurred. Silicone is pretty chemical resistant however so I wouldn't wanna be anywhere near whatever can etch silicone.

Again, I would only recommend these experiments on something you could throw out if it failed, IE a $20 insert. And after an experiment I would use it as a onahole for a few weeks/months to simulate stresses to the skin, make sure you didn't cause any long term damage/weaknesses that would degrade the silicone with time.

[rubyfan]

Not all manufacturers want to be Abyss (high price, high quality), some are quite content being medium price, medium quality.

I'd wager they know how to solve the problem but the cost to resurface the molds outweighs their expected return. It's a business decision that gets made everyday, it's unfortunate you're on the opposite side of their plan.

Agreed. I'll also note that while my TPE doll does have 'skin surface' texture, its more just a random roughness like you would expect from sandblasting the mold or something. Its nothing like the detailed skin 'cracks' (in a good way) and texture that abyss put on their dolls. For that level of detail I would highly suspect Abyss sends(? or maybe inhouse) the molds out to be CNC'ed via an expensive 4 or 5 axis CNC with a tiny, tiny endmill that spends all night putting the details in. (And by 'tiny endmill' what I really mean is several dozen tiny endmills since one would dull before it got done doing all that detail)

The details would likely have to be procedural generated via a computer program written to texture the mold, Might include scanning the mold first so the CNC knows where to mill.. You just couldn't put all those details in by hand or it would take forever.

Such skin texture might also reduce doll yield, because it would make the silicone much more likely to stick to the mold, requiring more mold release that could result in problems.

Well as I said, Abyss will not discuss how they do this publicly, though I do not know if they have patented it. There is also another possibility, which is that Matt McMullen goes over his clay body and face molds with some sort of texturizing pad/tool/instrument to create this effect. That effect eventually hardens and is carried over into the mold.

If that's the case, then DS perhaps really can't back a change like this into their production process, as only new dolls and faces could have it. Perhaps DS will release an "Elite" line of bodies and faces one day and that will include such detail for DS-style prices.

[DarkOne]

Not all manufacturers want to be Abyss (high price, high quality), some are quite content being medium price, medium quality.

I'd wager they know how to solve the problem but the cost to resurface the molds outweighs their expected return. It's a business decision that gets made everyday, it's unfortunate you're on the opposite side of their plan.

Agreed. I'll also note that while my TPE doll does have 'skin surface' texture, its more just a random roughness like you would expect from sandblasting the mold or something. Its nothing like the detailed skin 'cracks' (in a good way) and texture that abyss put on their dolls. For that level of detail I would highly suspect Abyss sends(? or maybe inhouse) the molds out to be CNC'ed via an expensive 4 or 5 axis CNC with a tiny, tiny endmill that spends all night putting the details in. (And by 'tiny endmill' what I really mean is several dozen tiny endmills since one would dull before it got done doing all that detail)

The details would likely have to be procedural generated via a computer program written to texture the mold, Might include scanning the mold first so the CNC knows where to mill.. You just couldn't put all those details in by hand or it would take forever.

Such skin texture might also reduce doll yield, because it would make the silicone much more likely to stick to the mold, requiring more mold release that could result in problems.

Well as I said, Abyss will not discuss how they do this publicly, though I do not know if they have patented it. There is also another possibility, which is that Matt McMullen goes over his clay body and face molds with some sort of texturizing pad/tool/instrument to create this effect. That effect eventually hardens and is carried over into the mold.

If that's the case, then DS perhaps really can't back a change like this into their production process, as only new dolls and faces could have it. Perhaps DS will release an "Elite" line of bodies and faces one day and that will include such detail for DS-style prices.

Yep, Iv also seen paint designed to 'shrink' as it dries to produce a cracked finish that has quite some depth to it. If the positive (clay sculpture) mold was first painted in this, the negative mold would take the texture nicely.

IMO there is a resemblance between crackle finish paint and Abyss skin texturing.

[rubyfan]

Not all manufacturers want to be Abyss (high price, high quality), some are quite content being medium price, medium quality.

I'd wager they know how to solve the problem but the cost to resurface the molds outweighs their expected return. It's a business decision that gets made everyday, it's unfortunate you're on the opposite side of their plan.

True dat, and I can (grudgingly) accept it. I'm very near to pulling the trigger on a DS, if for no other reason than to see if they live up to their reputations.

Now, I haven't beaten up other manufacturers like Sanhui for this sort of reason because I get that they are a bargain option. DS is very weird, though, in that they really are the value leaders in this industry. It feels okay somehow to ask them to be even better.

Again, I wrote directly to DS and asked, they said they knew about it but had no plans to change this anytime soon, so here I am, asking if I can take a sand-blaster to my DS!

I would buy some DS inserts at $20 a pop and work on those to test your theories. They should be the cheapest source of 'DS silicone' to experiment on.

BTW: there are some blasting options that do NOT leave residue, for example Dry ice blasting (Dry ice = Frozen CO2 = turns into gaseous CO2 directly as it heats)

You might also want to experiment with temperatures. Things become harder/more brittle as they become colder, so silicone at -40c (dry ice temperature) might be hard enough to properly roughen up.

Chemicals are another option, Maybe something corrosive to silicone could be misted on then washed off after some etching has occurred. Silicone is pretty chemical resistant however so I wouldn't wanna be anywhere near whatever can etch silicone.

Again, I would only recommend these experiments on something you could throw out if it failed, IE a $20 insert. And after an experiment I would use it as a onahole for a few weeks/months to simulate stresses to the skin, make sure you didn't cause any long term damage/weaknesses that would degrade the silicone with time.

Good suggestions, though I'm perhaps the least handy person around. My toolbox is the envy of no one!

[DarkOne]

Good suggestions, though I'm perhaps the least handy person around. My toolbox is the envy of no one!

Ask some of your friends to help with their tools? When they stop snickering at the idea im sure some would be willing to help, Just promise em a free onahole or something. Men like sex...

if they don't go for that, im sure a 12 pack of beer would work too.

[Ephebo]

i got this masurbator called Puni Virgin 1000 . it sucks in my opinion but what does impress me about it is the skin texture on the outside feels like 600 grit sandpaper , much more realistic and not sticky