The Doll Affair 2008 event report

Posted on Dec 29 in Events, Photography, Stuff we want, Toysby adminPrint

The Doll Affair is a yearly event focusing on ball-jointed dolls, that is already in its second run owing to great response last year. These dolls are almost like works of fine art with their attention to detail and posability, and many artists use these as subjects too when developing media such as photos. Their prices reflect the demand, and in my opinion anything in the region of $1000 for one is too high although collectors will no doubt snap up those with rare faces, pale skin or other unusual features.

This year’s Doll Affair took place on Saturday, 27 Dec 2008, at a bigger venue than last year – 2 meeting rooms at Suntec Convention Center, and had more dealers too. There was a huge crowd snaking around outside the room before the event started, which got my usual “DOH!” as soon as I arrived, but my fears were unfounded as the crowd dissipated within 10 minutes of the event opening. I managed to pay for admission on the spot and enter by 1.45 pm. There wasn’t any Louis Vuitton ‘maximum room capacity exceeded’ routine like last year.

The arrangement was more spacious this year – one meeting room was used for the dealers’ tables, while another was left mostly empty for people to lounge around and pose their dolls. However, people in general tended to take up spaces adjacent to walls, leaving the center mostly unused. Which was a good thing, actually; anyone suffering from oxygen deprivation at the dealers’ area could come here to catch their breath.

For the first hour or so the dealers area was packed with people, at all levels. Ground level, knee level, eye level, and the hail mary level. People were on the ground thumbing through bargain bins, others were at knee level getting photos, still others were at eye level going through stuff laid out on the tables, and people were trying to take photos from above the crowd. Some displays were really eye-catching, like the one right in the center of the room with lots of green, pink, purple and orange donuts (or ice cream, or something like that), as well as the one with the flickering lamp.

There was quite a lot of focus on self-made jewellery, and lots of stuff was available cheaply. Like Volks wigs, usually going at 4500 yen, being sold at just $10. Unfortunately for me, these were mostly really short hair sets; not what I was looking for. I couldn’t find more specialized stuff like 10-12mm or 18mm glass eyes, but that’s probably just me. Accessories for the common sizes were all there.

There was a photo competition, and all the entries were very nice, but I didn’t stay around to catch the results. I wonder who won.

I overheard someone asking a dealer, “do you sell cosplay clothes?”.. was wondering what the relation was but maybe she was referring to doll-sized ones. And then one dealer was also nice enough to thrust her photo album at me to show her stuff, but I was more interested in the nice metal frame around her album. She then asked how many dolls I had, to which I replied none, and she went, “that’s alright, most guys are usually quite tight-lipped about this.”

Despite walking around the room about 10 times I still feel like I missed out a lot, because I didn’t dig through many of the bargain items, plus many doll poses seemed to change with every round I made.

Anyway, some things I thought I’d share.

• If you’re using a big camera, stick a shorty lens onto it. There’s no feeling quite like having a medium zoom attached, entering the thick crowd and having someone walk right into you resulting in a sickening, sickening crunching sound from the gearing.
• Don’t use a flash. There’s no scientific basis for this, but a lot of people believe anything posted on the internet and think flash emissions cause their dolls to turn yellow. All organic resins yellow over time from age anyway; there’s no point getting into a quarrel over this – you’re there to take photos! Plus, a thick crowd might wrench your flash off it’s hotshoe.. very nasty if it’s plastic. And flash kills the ambient lighting.
• If you see something you want to buy and the price is alright, just buy it. Hunting around to save a dollar and coming back later might see its disappearance. Most people keep only a handful of items in stock.
• Try not to step on people on the floor. Especially on their fingers. They’ll remember your face.

Well, it was a tiring 4 hour event. I wish I’d decided on what to look for before I attended, but there’s always next year, and ebay in-between. Anyway, there’re many more photos in the gallery here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/96785691@N00/sets/72157611756219087/show/

Rose Furr Bergamot

VeryBerry

Mikans Poketo

Mikans Poketo

Monochromatic Dreams

Sassystrawberry

Small Wonder

Angel Candy-Rock

Entrants for the photo competition

2 Comments

• seven6037 says:

  May 2, 2009 at 3:14 am

  if you don mind would you tell me any up coming doll affair event held in singapore. i have miss this event. i didn’t know any news of this event. many many thanx.
• Pei Pei says:

  September 5, 2009 at 12:59 pm

  Can someone tell me where can i buy the doll in SIngapore?
  When is the next doll exhibition in singapore?

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