Identifying a Recast: Aileen Doll

Legit Violet

As many of my readers know, I mostly own recast Aileen Doll dragons. I recently purchased my first legit dragon, and thought I would share some things that I found.

Company: Aileen Doll

Website: http://aileendoll.com/

Sculpts Available Recast: Ashes, Rot, Sleeping/Dreaming Ashes, egg






 
Stringing: Recast AD generally have their legs strung backwards (unless the current owner has switched them).

Backwards legs.

Identifying a recast: La Legende De Temps

About LLT: Is a one woman sculpting business, ran by a Chinese lady named Julia.

Website: http://lltdoll.weebly.com/

The following sculpts from LLT are available recast: Little Edria and Roderich; Roderich comes by default on the SD17 body. 

If you purchase these heads second hand, you should be aware of what comes with the legit heads in order to establish legitimacy.

Identification card:

This little card contains the number of the sculpt, the name of the sculpt, the assigned gender of the sculpt, the date/birthday the sculpt was made, and should have this picture on the back.

Mine also has the artist's signature and a handwritten sentiment. I have blocked out these in order to limit potential forgeries.

CYA- It's that important.

CYA- Cover. Your. Ass.

I recently had a negative experience regarding recasts as legit. The poor gal thought, with good reason imo, that an item I sold was in fact recast. They were not, but I ran into trouble proving this. In order to spare you the headache in the future, learn from my mistake.

Amaranth's Rules for Trades and Sales

Buyers:

1. Always ask for proof of ownership, even if it's someone you know or have traded with before.
2. Always ask for more pictures, even if you're happy with what you see. Don't be afraid to ask them to take a photo with the item next to a paper with your choice of text. 
3. Always ask for proof of legitimacy EVEN IF IT'S SOMEONE YOU KNOW. That's fine and dandy, but how do you do that and what should you ask for?
1. If they are the first owner, ask for receipts from the company. Screenshot the purchase screen. Most companies keep records of sales for several years. Fairyland still has the record of the first purchase I made from them 4 years ago.
2. If they purchased it second hand or traded, where did they do this trade? DoA? Facebook (and thus, which FB group)? Flickr? Ebay?
3. Ask for the username of the previous owner before them, if any.
4. Research to know what comes with the dolls direct from the company. 
1. Does the company send certificates? What do those certificates usually say? 
2. Does the company use headplates, and if so, what do those look like?

Should you get a recast as your first doll?

Probably the last post for a bit. My baby is due in a couple weeks so I might not have the time or energy to put into any useful posts for the next month or two.

There's a few things you will want to consider before deciding on a recast as your first. My answer has always been no, even when I was a pro-recast supporter. Here are a few things I thought of when I was into recasts and a few thoughts after I left that part of the hobby. This is just my opinion, it's not gospel, and I'm not billing it as anything other than my opinion and experience. Your mileage may very of course. Yes I'd like to sway you towards buying legit instead, but I'm also objective enough to see the good points of recasts.

I'll probably update this as I come up with more ideas or change opinions on things. XD

Reasons you might want a recast for your first:

Reason #1: I just want a cheap doll to test out the hobby.

There are some absolutely adorable, cheap (sometimes cheaper than recast) dolls out there to buy, and I'm not even talking about Resinsoul or Bobobie. You may need to do a little research or check out the following list of dolls under $300.

Why YOU should purchase legit

Note: I've avoided posting this because I didn't want to offend some friends, but it's come to a point where I can't not post it. This was before I'd done a lot of thinking about recasts, so it doesn't express my full current understanding/view point. I'll do a more in depth, updated one soon ish.

Let's face it, recasts are pretty great. They give you access to expensive, high-end toys at a fraction of the cost, in colors your otherwise could never get, and often molds that are long-since sold out. I was pro-recast, but have since changed to recast-neutral. My intention is to get you to consider the importance of supporting the companies you love.

This is only my opinion, so take this for what it is worth.

There are so many discussions about whether BJD companies are small-time artists, companies, factories, etc. To me, this is irrelevant. I think of it in only one term: shrinkage.

A company, whether it be Walmart or the mom-and-pop quilt store down the street, measures the loss of product as shrinkage. Loss of product can be translated as loss of profit: e.g. loss of a sale or opportunity to make money off a product. When a shoplifter takes the sneakers, that's shrinkage. When the worker accidentally drops a crate of milk and the gallons burst, that loss of product is also shrinkage. When a person purchases the recast doll, the company sees that as a potential lost sale as shrinkage.

Recasts are shrinkage, and eventually they will take their toll on the larger company. The more people steal sneakers and shopping carts, the higher prices will rise to compensate for this lost sales potential and excess expenditure. They will also cease producing new product if the sales potential is not there.

Many argue that they would have never purchased from the company in the first place, so that by purchasing a recast they are not in this category. The company will not see it that way.

Prices rise and employee pay, hours, and benefits plummet to compensate for shrinkage.

I'm not an economist, so my understanding here could be a bit flawed, and I'm totally up for entertaining more opinions and ideas. Many see recasts as a way to put pressure on the doll market. We are not the doll market's primary customers. People in their respective countries are. We Westerners are an after thought, an extra market. In our home markets we have ways of putting pressure on businesses to indicate the need for higher or lower prices and more or less of a product. We don't have the ability to do that in foreign markets. DoA is the only way I personally can think of to affect these foreign markets, other than purchasing recasts.

I do believe that companies do not see it as, "Oh, they bought a recast because our basic is too expensive! Maybe we should reconsider our prices!" Instead they get offended and sometimes aggressive (like my personal encounter with Souldoll). It is my hope they will eventually understand why recasts are purchased when basics are available. It seems to be cultural differences regarding finances and economics that get in the way. Methods that work in one country just offend those in the other. I think this is improving as time passes and think that it will continue to do so, maybe even to the point where we have mutual understanding.

So when you can, when it is an option, try to save and purchase from legitimate companies. This means if you love Fairyland, buy from Fairyland. You will help keep prices in check and your favorite companies producing new dolls to love.

Don't worry: I'm no hypocrite. I had the funds and the opportunity to purchase from my favorite company. I did. I could have purchased an army of recasts, but I supported my favorite company to show them I do appreciate their work…even if I do own a couple knock-offs too. 

This post was originally written last year, before most of the drama regarding recasts happened. It seems even then I understood the risk of recasts. Since then, I've been selling off most of my recasts (at this time I have four recast anthros). If I hadn't modded these guys and made them so special, I'd be replacing all of them with legits too. I can't do that, so I'll be buying only legits from here on out. 

My next post will dive deeper into this.

And if this article doesn't have an impact on you, read this article here.

http://www.greenheartgames.com/2013/04/29/what-happens-when-pirates-play-a-game-development-simulator-and-then-go-bankrupt-because-of-piracy/

I really hope this hasn't offended anyone...

Thank you for reading, and happy collecting.

Fantasy Doll (FDoll) Information, Posing, and Body Review

Note: Though I haven't posted the details yet, I should note that I don't own recasts anymore, beyond my dragons, one cheshire cat, and a second-hand littlefee head. I consider myself pro-owner, recast neutral. I do not and have not ever posted recasts to DoA and will not do so in the future. An upcoming post will explain my position and a few other things.

All the dolls in this post are legit.

Onto the post!

I am utterly shocked and impressed with Fdoll's (Fantasy Doll company) 60cm girl body. You'll see soon through the pics that she beats my other girls in posing. There's a few more acrobatic things she simply can't do because her body lacks a latching system, but with sueding and possibly wiring she'd definitely be the best in my collection.

For comparison pics between Delf Type 1, Feeple 60, and FDoll, see this post HERE. 

Note: In these pics she's wearing Delf option hands, not the default FDoll hands.

There isn't much info available on this company that I could find, so I thought I'd start compiling some information.

Site: http://www.fdoll.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=34

Price: $218 for the full girl, $178 for her body.

Quality: Her resin is heavy and her jointing is well done. Definitely not bad aesthetically for a cheap body.

Recast DC Alberta Identifiers

Here is a comparison post between recast and legit DC Albertas. I hope this comparison is useful and helps ease some worries.

Recast Albertas have a different stringing system. S/L drilled these two big holes here so they didn't have to go through the pain in the ass process of using the tiny holes in the legit body. These two big holes are clear indicators of recast status.

Aileen Doll Ashes Recast Identifiers [revised]

New information about recent Ashes dragons at the end of this post. (As of Jan 2014).

On Scammers, and why it's not your crusade

Here's the thing- for as long as there have been replica dolls there have been a few assholes selling them as legitimate dolls.

Recasters often provide fake paperwork and fake headplates. Scammers may have used these to sell recasts as legit.

Why this isn't your crusade: A scammer can use a legitimate set of papers or plates to sell a recast as legitimate. Are you going to tell a company to stop producing these things? In my opinion, the reason FL is one of the top recast companies is because they have no papers, no plates, no logos on the dolls.

Some recasters are now offering boxes. Scammers will use these to sell recasts as legits…because scammers are scammers and that's why they will do.

Box Opening: Ulla- DC Ada, legit

Ipod photo of the sketch, since scanner is packed...

I could not sleep waiting for this girl. I've been so stressed and busy, I was afraid if I slept I would miss the mailman and wouldn't get my girl until Tuesday...turns out I didn't have to sign anyway, haha.

(Ulla's name is actually from a series of short stories I wrote about a Swedish-American family in magical realism style. The main character's name is Ulla (pronounced Ooo-lah). I just liked the name for Ada.)

This Ulla awoke in a meadow filled with flowers and butterflies, so she is feisty and bouncy. She dreamt of wolves in the centuries before she was born, so she took the name Ulla.

Her "mothers", Saga and Alfie, can't wait to find her (e.g. arrive at my house lol).