The Doll Forum

LovesBlackWomen wrote:I'm fascinated with the airplane cockpit.

I took the photo in 2003 or early 2004. It appeared in the UK hang gliding magazine in May 2004. (I tried to arrange a photo of her strapped in to my hang glider, but I failed.)

The reason for it appearing in that magazine was that a chief instructor had a short article bemoaning the state of the world (it was a good old rant) and it included a comment about these new artificial women (that were in the news at the time) and something about their owners being 'sad'. I am fairly sure he did not know about Rebecca. (I had met him about 15 years before, so I doubt he recalled me either.)

So I sent in a reply from Rebecca, agreeing with all his points except the one about Realdolls. She concluded that, without her, I would be even sadder.


Anyway, you know how some people have no sense of humour, well, at least one other contributor wrote in objecting to any mention of dolls in that magazine and pointing out that he did not think she was really flying the airplane!
(Shakes head in bewilderment.)

I took the photo in my 'office/studio', incidentally. It is a genuine photo, well, sort of, and is completely unedited other than making the colours a bit lighter and adding my copyright text.

Notice that there are no control wheels. Just empty sockets. It is an actual size poster of a PA-28 (I think) instrument panel. In her right hand is a gadget from an old camera. She is sitting in my swivel office chair (you cannot swivel a PA-28 seat like that) and her ear defenders have an old shoelace strung on them. The desert scenery out the windscreen is an old plywood board I used to do some paintings on. Her shirt is too big because it is one of my old shirts. The epaulettes are strips of sticky-back Velcro still on their backing paper.

Only the air chart is real.

The name MacGyver comes to mind...

Great pics.

I love the cockpit shot!

Here are some more of my favourite photos of Rebecca over the years:

And some more:

And a few more. This includes what I believe to be the first ever extensive application of freckles to a life size doll, for which I used poster paint:

Love the Rebecca, (head 4) face. Nice to see a face with a little more character (& normal looking) than so many other of the dolls faces.

Lovey set of photo's there Ev I do like your taste of clothes, The invisible bra & t-shirt is my favorite

WOW! She has held up remarkably well over the years!

I think we all owe you both a debt of gratitude for being some of the early pioneers in doll ownership, without whom, there might not have been any present doll market.

It's so nice to see a doll with a realistic bust!
Happy anniversary to you both!

I think Everhard and I are the 2 oldest active members here on TDF.

Your photos have been amazing over the years here, and her condition states that you take good care of your dolls.

D.A.

Thanks guys.

Two more old photos of Rebecca:

She has such a thoughtful expression on her face in that chair.

Thwo more.

Hi Ev,

Sorry for the late response to Rebecca's 15 birthday thread, but better late than never! It's great to see these reminders of Rebecca over the years and it's wonderful to hear that she's still around. So many of the first generation RealDolls have been lost to time. As you may recall, Rebecca (along with Davecat's Sidore and Kahn's Sabrina) was one of the RealDolls who inspired me to choose the Face 4 for my doll Claire Marie who is now nearly 12 years old and still going strong.

To my shame, I've only just watched the movie "Lars and the Real Girl" on DVD and it wasn't as critical as I thought it would be. One thing that really interested me was in one of the DVD "featurettes" the film's director was interviewed and he said the face of Bianca (the doll in the film) was inspired by a "book of doll photographs." This was obviously Elena Dorfman's book "Still Lovers," which featured Rebecca predominantly. His reason for choosing a "Leah" type face was that it had "peaceful, almost Zen-like qualities." Your photos of Rebecca really bring these qualities out.

As you said in an earlier post, it seems as if Rebecca has different moods and I've certainly noticed this with Claire Marie. Her expression seems to change just by viewing her face from a slightly different angle. I'm not sure if this applies to other face-types, but it is certainly a feature of the "Leah" type face and one which people have noticed on this thread, making Rebecca particularly special. Long may she continue!

Regards,

Dave.

A blast from the past! It is great to hear that Claire Marie is still around. I even like her smiling face, which is unusual for me. (For newbies, the expression faces are extra separate faces. Claire Marie has a regular face 4 and a smiling face 4.)

It is also my impression that Bianca is based on Rebecca.

Sidore is still going strong, as far as I know, and I just read that Davecat and Sidore have a new flat-mate made by DS Dolls.

Kahn's Sabrina is now owned by another UK doll owner (last I heard).