Kitty's Face-up: A Custom Pullip Adventure!

I re-did kitty's faceup a while ago, but I still wanted to do a post on how I did it!
disclaimer: This is not a tutorial in any way! I'm wouldn't consider myself a pro, either. I'm just sharing how I did it! :)

Before:

 Kitty is my first full custom doll. She's not that horrible, for a first. Her lips are kinda a mess, and don't have much color. I also didn't spray sealant on her before I started, so her blushing is a mess too. I also found out the next day that I had actually used fixative (used for drawing on, so it's a lot rougher and shiny-er) instead of sealant (smooth and pretty :3)

Before I started, I found some inspiration pics, or pics I could try to base her off of.
*These are not mine!*

faceup and pic by aya&ume. I love her stuff and wish she still took commissions D:

faceup and pic by poison girl. I wish she still took commissions, too...

In the first pic, I love the light tones and sweet look, plus the large under-lashes. I would add a bit more blush. I'm going to attempt to to my eyelid lines somewhat like the second (haha and I totally failed at that). I like how the blush is done in the second.

Of course, I'm not going to try to copy these, just base mine off some of the parts I like about them. You can usually tell when people try to exactly copy things too much, plus I want to have my own style :)

Now onto the actual customizing!

The first thing I did, of course was disassemble her. Now onto scrubbing the old face-up off!

derpiddy derp

Most of it didn't take me too long, because I got (really really smooth) sandpaper instead of just magic erasers. Except for the eye-crack things and the corners of her lips, because I hadn't been able to get them off even the first time, from her original make-up. Plus her lips had a load of gloss and pastel stuff.

Once the makeup was finally off, I (well, technically my mom, she does it a lot better and more even) sprayed a couple of coats of sealant on. I got new sealant at like ace or something. I should've ordered some of that mr. super clear stuff though :(

Here she is with her first coat of blush.

 However, it was super duper humid and rainy that day, so we couldn't spray any more sealant. I decided to re-do her eyelids. I wanted to give her cool artsy eyelids because who likes plain light pink? xD I tried doing a vintage-y look with stripes and flowers, with acrylic paint.

 

 It was rainy for a couple of days, so I spent the next day making her a new outfit (and more pullip clothes). I also decided to put her on Mizuki's old body, since I like the type 4 better than the type 3 she was on before. 

 the next day, it was still really humid. I finally just decided to do the sealant in the garage. It actually didn't stink too bad. I gave her another coat of blush (I wanted her to be less pale this time, and have 'nice rosy cheeks') and the first layer of pastels on her lips. lips are actually really hard for me, because there's no actual point where they end and you can end up making her look like she put on way too much lipstick, or have really weird thin lips :-\ I wanted them to be darker in the middle than the ouside.
I also added some eyeliner, I don't remember what I used because my mom (we share a studio/supplies, btw) has a huge bin of different markers. and don't worry, I didn't use water or oil based ones!

this pic looks really red-ish pink for some reason...

 after another coat of sealant and more pastels going on and slipping off her lips, my mom gave me some of her awesome nice quality pan-pastels to use, and some brush things and spongey things that really helped!

pan-pastels!

However, the other eyeliner I did just kinda... came off. i mean, I accidentally scratched it, not that bad, and some came off. I ended up taking the rest off with a paper towel, then re-did it with another type. I had to use a pin to "arrange" the marker to make the teeny-tiny wing at the corner of her eye.
I also added some bottom eyelashes and eyebrows in brown colored pencil.

closeup of the wing

 I also added some eyelashes to her eyelids.

 After that, I think I added another layer of darker color to the inside of her lips, plus another layer of eyelashes and eyebrow and an eyelid line in darker brown colored pencil. I used a while colored pencil to add a bit of white to her eyelashes, on top of the eyelash line, and I think some lines to her lips. I sprayed a couple coats of sealant to finish, then put gloss on her lips. Oh, and lots of freckles with colored pencil! ^__^ I forgot to take pics of all this, though, sorry! I must have been way too excited xD
The gloss came out kinda lumpy. I put it on with a thin brush, and I think I used the brush too much. D: I don't know how to fix it without scrubbing all the color of her lips off, too! If anyone knows the "proper" way to apply gloss, or maybe how to remove the stuff I put on now, please please please tell me!

and now... the new Kitty!

There's a larger sized pic of this on my Flickr.

her eyelids.

Things I like/improvements:
Her lips, other than the gloss
How there's more depth/blushing, more done than the first
Her sweet little freckles :D
Her eyelids

Things I don't like/could improve on next time:
I put on too much blush, it made her skin tone a lot darker...
The lumpy gloss on her lips
It still looks kinda messy
Her face is shiny because the sealant I used is a big fat meanie liar and apparently isn't matte ծ_ծ


I hope you like it and thanks for reading! ^__^
~Hope




Also, here's a bonus pic of when I turned Kitty into Elsa from frozen on one of the rainy days because I was really bored. haha someone is secretly obsessed with frozen.

I just did most of the faceup by scribbling it on with colored pencils, the wig is alice's backwards, I made the eye (...one eye, the other is edited in xD) with paper and colored pencils, and the rest is all edited. lol.

Finally, a pullip blog! (+Guide thing)

I've had the idea of making a blog especially for my Pullips for the longest time. it was actually set up for a really long time, too, but I didn't say anything because I COULDN'T THINK OF A NAME \(O▲O)/
So... I have the usual bokeh background... that hasn't changed. I drew the picture of my dolls in the banner like a super long time ago, too and just got to scanning it a today. The pink haired one is Elsie, she's drawn in the wig I want to get her, but haven't gotten around to actually getting...  
So anyway, I plan to post things like updates new stuff, customizations, updates on stop motions, and photostories. anything pullip related that people on my AG/YT blog would get sick of. 
I also have a page where you can read and learn more about each of my pullips and their personalities and back stories! (uhmmm... Elsie doesn't have a back story. #oops. Just ignore that...)
The links are to my other stuff/pages and where you can find me. :)
I hope you enjoy it, and thanks for reading! :D
~Hope