Dollz
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dollz, Cartoon Dolls or Pixel Dolls are small pixelated images, generally of people. They are mainly used online as avatars, signatures or just displayed as artwork on personal webpages.
Dolls range in size from being a few pixels high to a few hundred pixels high. Generally, dolls are human figures (mainly female), although there have been instances of animals being named "dolls." Dolls are generally dressed, and come in a wide range of styles. Bases are the template upon which dolls are created - the naked human form with no hair.
People who create dolls call themselves dollers or dollists. The majority of dollers are female, as indicated by the vast amount of both bases and dolls that are female.
The community is well inter-linked because of both communities and the concept of "adoption." Adoption is where a doller displays a favoured doll that was created by someone else upon their website, with credit and a link to the other's site or email. Adoption is not an option with bases.
"Dolling" has become a widespread Internet phenomenon, spawning numerous websites, communities, forums and other related items. Some entrepreneuristic people have expanded into the commercial world with their digital art and sell their graphic images as either clipart or on merchandise. However, dolling is more of a personal hobby for many.
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[edit] History
The first instances of cartoon dolls showed up in 1995 as avatars made for use on a visual chat client called The Palace by a Palace user named artgrrl (later known as shattered innocents[1].) The first dollz were simplistic, starting from a generic base consisting of 44 by 44-pixel "props" that were hand-drawn in the Editing palette of the Palace program. The idea was inspired by Paperdolls, with a base body overlaid with clothes, hairstyles and accessories. The first dollz were generally cartoon-like in appearance and restricted to only a small number of poses.
At first, these doll-like avatars were called "little people," then "skaters" or "sk8ers." Another Palace user named Rainman was responsible for the proliferation of the skater dollz, editing and distributing them by the thousands. The Palace "dressup" script helped in distributing the dollz from user to user, with each user editing the props to customize their doll. Because dollz were generally worn by younger people, some Palaces started banning their use in an attempt to restrict membership to adults. Modifications to the dollz were called "editz" and contests were held daily on many of the Palaces, with competitions based on style of outfit, color schemes, music themes, or accessories. Eventually, there were entire Palaces devoted only to doll-based avatars.
People who weren't satisfied with the quality of the base and/or artwork began to expand and make their own. Early dolling sites began to develop around 1997, displaying people's work. With the popularity of graphics programs like Adobe Photoshop and Paint Shop Pro growing, many dollers took advantage of it and expanded upon the cartoon-like images of the first Dollz.
Doll-makers began to spread. Doll-makers are similar to the old method of paper dolls where a base and clothes were provided and the user just made combinations of clothes to create their doll. This became a trend in the community, and many people who did not want to create their own dollz utilised these "drag-n-drops" to make their own.
As the popularity began to grow, it soon expanded from a few fledgling people who regarded it as a hobby to a more accepted form of art. Graphic artists began to delve in and produced highly detailed dollz. Regular artists also followed the trend and created dolls that were less cartoon-like and more realistic. Forums began to sprout, bringing together a community of dollers. Soft shading, true human forms and realistic designs soon dominated the community, evolving from cartoon.
"Dollz" soon evolved into "Dolls" as the artists wished this method of graphic deign to be recognised as a form of art rather than an Internet fad. A recent survey at a popular dolling forum showed that many see "dollz" as referring to the earlier form of cartoon-esque images rather than the elaborate graphic artwork displayed now.
There are a large amount of websites, forums, communities and others of the sort that are dedicated to dolling and the art. It has been surmised that the popularity of dolling is due to the fact that anyone can do it. The current trend that seems most popular is the incorporation of anime style to the dolls, as well as getting back to the cartoon-like roots.
[edit] The Dolling Community
'Dollers,' people who draw computer dolls, often join dolling forums in order to share their finished artwork or ask for help from more experienced dollers. These forums often run themed events in which the members participate in contests to create a doll with certain guidelines, for instance, using a picture as inspiration or with a particular range of colours. These contests are judged and winners are awarded plaques to be displayed on their websites. Individual sites often host contests as well. Currently, contest forums are becoming very popular. They are pages exclusively devoted to these competitions.
When a doller joins a community, they often become very close with the other members and exchange gifts (often dolls or other pieces of pixel art) at holidays, birthdays, seasons, or on a whim. When two dollers become good friends, they sometimes join their websites by a mutual link. This is called becoming a 'sibling site.' Siblings are very good friends and exchange gifts, help each other, and sometimes produce collaborations together, with each sibling contributing parts of an image. Because most dollers are female, these are better known as 'sister sites.'
[edit] Technique
Dolls are created in a graphics program such as Microsoft Paint, Adobe Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro.The doll may be made on a base, which is explained in the next paragraph, or the doll may be baseless. Clothing, adornments, decorations, etc are then hand-drawn onto the Base to create the doll. If the artist so desires, a background or props may be included, but the focus of the picture is the doll itself. Other popular tools are "drag-n-drops" are applets which load both Bases and clothing/hair/accessories onto a page, allowing the user to select and combine a base and various pre-drawn accoutrements. Drag-and-drop applets are normally created by another doller, who may include his or her artwork as clipart. Many tutorials exist explaining how to create dolls, focusing on methods of utilising tools in the graphics programs as well as elements of shading and outlining.
[edit] Bases
Bases are the templates upon which dolls are drawn upon. They normally consist of the naked human form in a pose without hair. Bases come in many forms: one can be an outline of a human figure; it can come with or without faces; it can come with props or accessories; it can come in multiple skintones; or it can be partial or full form. Also, there are some bases which are not human-like. They may be deformed, exaggerated or cute, and may be in the anime chibi style.
Not all dollers create their own bases. Many choose to use bases that others offer for free use (with certain terms) to draw their dolls upon. Stock bases are a popular option, as they give beginning dollers a chance to just draw clothes upon the base instead of drawing their own.
Bases come in a range of styles, sizes and forms. Typically, they are arranged in a set, where all the bases in the set are created in the same size, style and form, just with different poses, skintones and facial expressions. These sets are generally given names to identify and distinguish them from other base sets that the doller may also offer.
[edit] Shading Techniques
There are two main ways that dollers create and shade their dolls: pixel shading and tool shading. Some dollers mix the two, with, for example, tool shaded hair and pixel shaded clothes. The effect is not generally a good one, and most experienced dollers tend to shy away from this technique.
[edit] Pixel Shading
This method uses a set amount of colours, with gradients created manually through dithering. Clothes, hair, skin, and anything else on the doll are shaded by the use of a set palette. How many shades make up a doller's palette is a matter of personal preference and style. Shadows and highlights are added gradually to give the effect of a gradient. Pixel shaders pride themselves on the ability to create 'life-like' shading effects without the use of tools. This technique is most commonly used by beginners at dolling, who use the free program that comes with their computer, MSPaint. Some dollers will use other programs to pixel shade, like Paintshop Pro or Adobe Photoshop.
[edit] Tool shading
With this method, the artist employs a drawing program such as Adobe Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro to create their dolls. Tools in these programs, such as blur, blend, dodge and burn are used to create shading. Although this gives a smoother, and often more life-like effect, it can pose problems when the dolls are uploaded to the web, as most dolls are saved as GIFs which can only handle up to 256 colors. Because tool shaded dolls often have more than 256 colors, they are usually dithered and can change shade or appear grainy or noisy as a result. Dollers may refer to this as being "attacked by the GIF Monster." Some pixel artists believe that tool shading is easier than pixel shading, and so not 'true dolling'. However, realistic tool shading can take years to perfect.
Some dollers only accept pixel-shading as a true dolling method. However, doing so holds more true to pixel art, instead of 'dolling'.
[edit] Dolling etiquette and issues
The dolling community has long been plagued by plagiarism and copyright violations. Many such abuses arise from pure ignorance of copyright law, although some people commit them willfully or maliciously. With these issues in mind, there are unspoken rules and respect in effect in the dolling community that prevent such activities from happening. (Within the dolling community, the term Netiquette generally refers to these rules.) Additionally, many dollers, in an attempt to protect their copyrights, have instigated rules, or "terms of use" when visiting their website and using their artwork. However, there remain a large number Internet users who believe dolls are stock material or clip-art that can be used in whichever way they desire.
Those outside of dolling and many dollers themselves mention the seemingly "elitist" or "unfriendly" attitude some dollers take towards each other. This is a popular, though some may say wrong, opinion of how members of the dolling community behave.
[edit] Plagiarism and unauthorized reproduction
Theft of artwork is a common occurrence in the community. It mainly happens whenever a person saves a doll that another has created, places it on their site, or uses it as an avatar or signature or anything of the sort, and claims that he himself created the doll. Theft is different from "adoption," when the user who places the doll on his or her site gives credit to the original creator and often provides a link to the original site, as dictated by the terms of use required by the original creator. Some consider the lack of attribution as a form of theft, as the perpetrator gives the impression that he or she created the doll. This is especially important when a user has created a doll with a "drag-n-drop" dollmaker. Some discussion has taken place concerning doll makers and whether or not credit is necessary if the "parts" of the dolls are taken from "free-for-all" stock sites such as those on The Palace as opposed to hand-drawn by the webmaster/mistress.
The same rules apply when using another person's base. It is a common misconception that if a person draws adornments upon a base, then the entire work is theirs, rather than just the adornments. Neglecting attribution to the person whose base is used is considered a form of theft as, again, the editor is claiming exclusive authorship. This is a complicated issue as many people offer their bases as stock resources, and some do not explicitly require credit.
[edit] Permission rights
Some dolls are classified as "Not Adoptable" or some bases as "Exclusive" or "Not Usable." These designations are used for various reasons, but ultimately the original artist does not want his or her artwork displayed or used by others and, therefore, has withheld permission. Some people ignore this notice and still display the artwork or use the bases without the original owner's permission. Even if the art thief gives the owner credit, he or she has still violated their terms of use.
[edit] Frankendolling
A portmanteau of "Frankenstein" and "dolling", Frankendolling is essentially the practice of combining elements of other dolls and claiming the product as one's own. Like the Frankenstein monster, an arm from one person's doll, clothing from another, and hair from another one may have been combined together to form a "new" doll. This, too, is a form of plagiarism. An artist may obviously legally reuse parts of his or her own dolls to create a new one, and give permission to others if he so wishes.
[edit] Copying
Another issue within the umbrella of copyright is when a doller traces or makes an exact copy of another person's doll. The result may still be their work, but, because it is not original, it may be considered a form of plagiarism. It is, however, a popular method to trace over a photograph or other image to create a base or a doll. Similarly, an artist may draw inspiration from other people's work. Neither of these practices are generally considered plagiarism, though some see them as such. A fair amount of controversy has arisen over the years as many people have been discovered to have copied their bases from graphic sites that are in a foreign language.
[edit] Direct linking
It is also considered a form of theft, or at least poor etiquette, when a person displays a remotely hosted image or doll on a site or as their avatar, etc, without permission from the host site's owner. (Instead of downloading the image to his or her computer, uploading the image to an independent server and linking it from there, the person has instead linked it directly from the original website.) Every time a browser loads the page, it downloads the image from the original server rather than a server owned by or authorized for use by the secondary author. This practice is known as bandwidth theft, a form of theft of service, as the original artist has paid for the bandwidth in question for their own use only. Direct linking is often in conjunction with the other issues above.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- The Originz of Dollz - A site belonging to "shattered innocents," the first person to create small, pixel-based Palace avatars in 1994/95, which were later called "dollz."
- Tutorial Search Engine - A search engine to help find a needed tutorial
- PixelBee - A site full of cartoon doll related content.
