How to get an ocelot!

Some years ago,  before the Ocelot from Papo was released, I was so sad to have no Ocelot. So, I decided to custom a little cheap chinese leopard. I just cut a little its too long tail, elongate a little its ears and changed its coat:


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  One year after, I met another one from a Wild Republic toob, I had to repaint and to make its legs a little thiner. I was so happy now with my 2 ocelots:


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  .. and then the wonderful surprise from Papo:

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 and released in the Wild:


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Wonderful repaints!!!!!

Thank you Taos! :)

WOW !!!! They are just GORGEOUS

Thank you Susanne! :)

Great repaints! Such a nice pair of ocelots And the Papo one looks like a bigger cousin

Beautiful, incredibly detailed and realistic custom! You have a real talent for painting cats!

Really splendid job! Such a cute little feline friend.

  Many thanks to you three Ana, Bonnie and Paige!

Ocelots have a weird story in this hobby. Probably the K&M adult and baby from the AZA collection are the oldest ocelot figures we know. What means until recently there weren't ocelots anywhere. Unfortunately those are rare and you're so talented that you made your own models and they're so beautiful. I also dreamed about them, especially the large ones I mentioned but fortunately Papo saved all of us with a beautiful figure. Sadly, it is already very rare too. So, you are one of the collectors with a bigger number of ocelots I know.

The big K&M one sculpting is rather good but its painting is rather strange.. I suppose that the specific pattern of this species is not easy to do in mass production context and it's why they are so few.. But Papo succed with that and they stopped its production.. it's surprising for it's a very known and popular cat!

what superb tiny ocelots you have now Alain! they look magnificent, well done on creating them for your collection!
I too have many thoughts about turning such and such model into such and such animal to fit into my collection

What a beautiful detailed job on something so tiny- hats off to your talents!

  Many thanks Annette and pipsxich!

 .. and here with its big cousin, the jag from Sfari ltd:


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Caracal wrote:

The big K&M one sculpting is rather good but its painting is rather strange.. I suppose that the specific pattern of this species is not easy to do in mass production context and it's why they are so few.. But Papo succed with that and they stopped its production.. it's surprising for it's a very known and popular cat!

Yes, you're right. These kind of animals with complex pattersn are a nightmare for companies , the same happens with some civet species, etc. I don't think ocelots are that popular but surely it was desirable to see more renditions of this beautiful animal. Caracals are more famous, easier in terms of painting and they're rare too.
Papo ocelot was available for such a short time that I think we cannot even find knockoffs of it.

I prefer yours 

Very beautiful, made by the master of the spots!

Roger wrote:

Caracal wrote:

The big K&M one sculpting is rather good but its painting is rather strange.. I suppose that the specific pattern of this species is not easy to do in mass production context and it's why they are so few.. But Papo succed with that and they stopped its production.. it's surprising for it's a very known and popular cat!

Yes, you're right. These kind of animals with complex pattersn are a nightmare for companies , the same happens with some civet species, etc. I don't think ocelots are that popular but surely it was desirable to see more renditions of this beautiful animal. Caracals are more famous, easier in terms of painting and they're rare too.
Papo ocelot was available for such a short time that I think we cannot even find knockoffs of it.

  Do you think caracals are more famous?.. but their fur were never used to make very expensive stars coats! I don't understand well why Papo retired ocelots from their catalogue since the were alone to produice them!

 Many thanks Christophe, Andreas and Roger!

Really beautiful custom work, they make a lovely pair with their matching sleek and perfectly applied paintjobs. Even nicer than their officially released bigger brother!

The big cats seem to get the majority (the lion's share? ) of figure releases, these smaller cats are just as beautiful and important but the companies don't seem to favour them. Perhaps we're seeing it too much from our adult-enthusiast perspective, where we've had a lot more time to learn more animals. Maybe they're not as well-recognised by the average small child, where lions, tigers, leopards and cheetahs will always sell more because they're famous with that target audience?

Toy Animal Wiki is a good source to know which animals are more popular in toy shape.
Here the ranking of the reasonably popular species, all others are poorly represented. Snow leopard is a new wave thing.

1º Lion
2º Tiger
3º Leopard
4º Cheetah
5º Puma
6º Snow leopard
7º Jaguar
8º Eurasian lynx

Caracal wrote:

  Do you think caracals are more famous?.. but their fur were never used to make very expensive stars coats! I don't understand well why Papo retired ocelots from their catalogue since the were alone to produice them!

Ocelots are not so unknown in my country due to our connection with Brazil but I have the perception that the misterious Desert lynx is better known globally but I may be wrong.
I agree about Papo but this is the kind of figure for a single production batch. Poorly known species, complex painting and expensive for its size. It all means poor sales. We see the exact same thing with Schleich.

Hah, I guessed an exact right top four just by thinking back to 'What would other kids in my class have heard of?' when I was a small child (they didn't believe I'd seen snow leopards or red pandas in the school holidays, because leopards are from hot places and pandas are black and white)

When I was a child I would have dreamed to find ocelots figures but of course, my comrades had other dreams and I am not sure they knew ocelots very well.. I know you're right, these less known cats species are more difficult to sell to most kids  and it's why I was so surprised when I saw this species on Papo catalog, my dream  was guetting real!!.. and I bought 2 of this so precious models!.. But since it's retired from catalog, I don't think Papo will  release one Serval or Caracal!

  Thank you for your replies and kind words Rogério and George!

These are really nice creations of a beautiful cat, you handled the unique coat pattern really well, especially on that scale. The additional sculpting work were perfect touches as well!