If it is a hobby, it is a consumptive one, rather than a creative one. I’ve been rethinking my toy collecting lately and I just feel like a huge consuming hoarder.
Creative hobbies, by definition, would require that you be creating something.
Woodworking = Creative hobby. You are taking wood and making a new thing out of the wood.
Sewing = Creative hobby. You are taking fabric and creating clothes or blankets or other cloth goods out of it.
Baking = Creative hobby. You are taking raw ingredients and making food out of it.
Fermentation = Creative hobby. You are taking ingredients and canning or brewing with them to make them into a different thing.
Collecting is like grocery shopping. Grocery shopping is not a creative hobby. Cooking is a creative hobby.
You can use your collection for creative purposes (though most collectors do not).
Photographing action figures = Creative hobby. You are creating photographs.
Customizing action figures = Creative hobby. You are creating action figures.
Collecting action figures = Consumptive hobby. You are not creating anything, you are buying a thing someone else created. That's consumption.
To be clear: that's not an inherently bad thing, imo. I collect things. That's fine. But collecting things is not the same as creating things. Watching a movie is not a creative hobby. Making a movie is. Watching a movie might inspire you to make a movie, but watching a movie is consumption, not creation.

>>11468813 (OP)
I think the difference with action figures compared to say statue collecting is posability. I think most people like to recreate scenes and interactions between characters, whether it be slice of life, fighting, memes, coom purposes. That is where the creativity comes in. I also customize and photograph.
This is why I stopped collecting statues, because outside of arrangement, there is very little creativity involved.
But then would you say flower arranging isn't a hobby if the flowers were already grown for you?

>>11468813 (OP)
Another area that a lot of us dabble in is creating accessories for figures, weapons, furniture, clothing, anything that improves on the figures, photography, and diorama building.
I myself, am teaching myself CAD to design figure stands, risers, and other things that improve my displays and then learn optimal ways to print those designs to make them reality.
Toys offer up quite a few different ways to be creative

>>11468813 (OP)
Isn’t it just the same as a hobby like collecting art prints? Even though I think a lot of /toy/, myself included, prioritise interacting with these figures, and enjoy posing, photographing, customising, hunting down their heart’s desire for a good price, trading, working with others to customise etc. if you’re curating a collection of little aesthetic things you love, it’s still not a totally consumptive hobby if you interact meaningfully, collect with some thought and is like most hobbies: a mixture of creative and consumptive.

I think when it becomes fully consumptive is when you start hoarding, or have a hundred unopened boxes you’re nowhere close to opening with new things arriving daily, when you buy things just to keep up trends or copy popular online creators or you’re dropping thousands on buying a full collection just to show off to others.
If you go on sites like plebbit there are a lot of younger collectors (not just figures, things like statues, books, manga, DVDs, consoles, games etc) who are going into debt to buy a massive collection all at once, which turns it into full on consoom.

>>11468813 (OP)
>If it is a hobby, it is a consumptive one, rather than a creative one. I’ve been rethinking my toy collecting lately and I just feel like a huge consuming hoarder.
That's a load. It can absolutely be creative. I do toy photography where I use dioramas and backgrounds to make scenes for my pictures. And that's just one example. There's customizers, model builders, miniature painters. There are plenty of creative outlets that involve toys, just because you're too much of a brainlet to find a way to be creative with your toys, that's your problem. And not all hobbies need to be creative. Some things you just want to do for leisure.

Consumptive:
>buy only what is popular
>PO everything
>throw out or fucking superglue things that get broken
>buy massive collections all at once
>rely on accolades from others to feel good about your collection
>zero effort into poses, no thought in displaying aside from standing them around in a lit glass fronted cabinet
>hoarding

Creative:
>take photographs
>use as drawing references
>customise
>learn modelling (both digital and physical) to create props and extra parts for toys
>learn how to fix and restore toys
>think seriously about what you want, buy only what you personally like

I think the creative aspect is tied to how much thought you put into your collection and how personal it is.

>>11468845
I see reading isn't a hobby of yours

>>11468813 (OP)
The entire "package" of collecting isn't just the purchasing part. If you leave it at just the buying stuff part that's no different from buying art materials or baking ingredients. In an age where everyone can easily take camera pics the bar for creation is really row. Like you can buy something take it out of the box and snap a pic for your friend and you technically created something. Putting up your display and rearranging figures once in a while is like making something. Even just taking a height comparison photo of a figure to help someone else causes you to engage with what you have. Unless the person doesn't even open the box after they buy it, the creative aspect is a very low bar to pass that it should count for most people.

>>11468813 (OP)
A hobby doesn't need to be creative. It's simply doing something you enjoy in your leisure time.

>>11468813 (OP)
>If it is a hobby, it is a consumptive one, rather than a creative one.
Well, yeah. The creative aspects of this hobby for the average collector will basically boil down to deciding where and how you want to display your figures. Like you said, most collectors aren't going to be customizing or even photographing their stuff. I used to do a little of both, but lately I just don't have the energy and see them more as décor, like 3D art. Probably why I've been getting more into statues.

>>11468813 (OP)
Meh, everyone collects something, try not to be too hard in yourself for being a human being born in current year,

>>11468813 (OP)
Watching shows/movies and playing video games are considered hobbies even though there's nothing creative about those and they're passive activities. Collecting is just as much of a hobby, perhaps even more of an active one since many collectors physically go out to hunt for deals/finds and stuff

>>11468865
kek

Collecting is collecting. Like the people who collected marble statues and oil paintings back in the day.

Im a creative person and I feel it is creative in that you can model them in various ways and decorate your home. You can also go all out and play with them like a child if you want.

>>11468813 (OP)
If only you knew how many people who sew hoard yarn.

>>11471346
Wouldn't those be knitters hoarding yarn? Stupid knitters.

>>11468813 (OP)
Carefully curating a collection and planning a display can be a very creative activity. What you exclude can be just as important as what you include.

Before the internet, a big part of toy collecting was the hunt. You used to go to yard sales, flea markets, and conventions to put a collection together.

If you collected while a series was new and live, you had to figure out how to make money and get an adult to take you to the toys to buy them.

It was much more active then.

Now you can just blow your credit card out and buy everything.


Modern toy hunting doesnt have to be passive. People do like displaying them in little scenarios. The problem is that most of us work too much and probably have phone addiction, so our toys are neglected.

>>11472973
The hunt was the worst part. Because basically you just ended up with what you could find and not what you wanted.

>>11468813 (OP)
Appreciating art is one of the best things about being alive. Any art appreciators are based in my book. I don't even own any figures, I just come to /toy/ because I find it so enjoyable to look at all of the photos.
Musicians watch movies. Film makers look at paintings. Painters watch ballet. The vast amount of people never do anything creative, so even those are a small minority. Like millions of people own guitars but only a small fraction ever try and write a proper song. I think even just posing toys can be more creative than just playing a riff, since the pose is your own from your creative desire.

>>11473066
>Because basically you just ended up with what you could find and not what you wanted.

Get better at hunting and trading. Thats part of why 100% a line used to be a big deal.

Now it is who has the deepest pockets

>>11473318
>Get better at hunting and trading.
How about I just don't and only buy figures that actually go up for preorder. I sure as fuck wouldn't trade with some random person on the internet with no protection guaranteeing I'd get my item. That's just begging to have you send a guy a figure and he sends you nothing and ghosts you.

>>11473388
I was talking about back in the day, you dildo

>>11468813 (OP)
I started making props and signs for 1/12th scale.