1/32 scale animals

bjarki12 wrote:

I'm really enjoying watching this topic!  It's so cool to see a whole collection of animals in scale with each other, even if only more-or-less.

Me too

Oh, two panda figures couldn't me more different. The scale is a question of average. The use of the shoulder height is just the most confortable element to measure. However, figures are three-dimensional and some parts could adjust better to a certain range of scales while others not. Thus, besides the metrics, I think the way it displays together with other models, is also a good indicator.
Eikoh has really a somewhat Western design, that chubby panda could easily be Schleich or Bullyland designs. Though, as I mentioned, I enjoy the figure and despite being more massive, I think it looks great in your collection.

That's very true, Rogério. Interestingly, Eikoh prides itself for making figures "for a Japanese taste". I assume that means that they are small and cutish.

Thanks Adam, Susanne and bjarki12. I am happy that you enjoy the topic. Bjarki, quite a while ago you commented that the Britains brown bear in fact looks like a Himalayan black bear. I had never seen one in black then, but more recently, I found a photo of a lead version (not my photo, I don't own the figure):
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So yes, perhaps the original intention was for it to be a black bear.

I thought I’d show you my Eikohs in two parts, but I won’t manage to show all the rest of them today, so there will be three parts.

Another one of my favourites is the tiger. I like the relaxed pose:
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Impossible to measure either the shoulder height or length, so let’s compare him with a large tiger, the Colorata from the Ueno Zoo box (shoulder height 3.3/106 cm). The Eikoh doesn’t look larger, so good for 1:32 scale.
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The Eikoh reminds me of the Hausser Elastolin lying tiger, it’s almost a mirror image:
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Eikoh also makes a tiger cub:
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Although it is smaller than the adult tiger, I don’t know whether I can really consider it 1:32 scale. It looks very young and it is rather large for the way it looks. Compare with the Hausser Elastolin tiger cubs, which also look young but are smaller:
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The lion has a similar pose to the tiger:
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He doesn’t look any larger than the Britains lion (shoulder height 3.4/109 cm), so that’s good too.
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There is also a lioness (a Schleich semi copy), but she is a bit large and not strict 1:32 scale.

And another lion, the Steller’s sea lion:
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I had stored him in a box for a while and remembered him as rather unexciting, so when I saw him again I was surprised that he is actually quite good. He is about 7.5/240 cm measured over the tummy (around 6.5/208 cm between pegs). The size is possible, although he is quite small. Winship and colleagues (2001) found that Steller’s sea lions reach sexual maturity between 5 and 7 years old and the smallest males have a length of 2 m by that age. But they don’t stop growing until they are 10 years old, by which time they are between 2.5 and 3.4 m. Here is the Eikoh together with the Colorata (Marine Mammals box), which has a similar size:
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The next one is a cheat, but it’s a good cheat and Rogério keeps encouraging me to cheat, so I think it’s OK
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The okapi has a shoulder height of 3.6/115 cm and is too small to be an adult (Wikipedia: adult males 140-155 cm), but he looks so cute that I think he is a young one. A young one with horns? Well, they can start growing horns from 1 year old and they don’t reach adult size until they are 3, so I think it’s possible. Or am I cheating too much? Here with the fully-grown Colorata (Ueno Zoo box):
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The gnu is a bit toyish, but looks pleasant enough.
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There aren’t many 1:32 scale gnus, so I am very happy to have it. He has a shoulder height of 4.4/141 cm (not including mane).  Wikipedia says 115-145 cm. Next to the Britains gnu (4.1/131 cm):
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Final Eikoh part next time …

I really don't know what is Japanese taste. We often judge it based on the realistic models from Kaiyodo or Kitan but, if we forget the animal univers, we will find many cutish things, often anime based. Though, I do really think the Eikoh models's design are more like the Western companies. Maybe the Japanese taste is related with their concept once they are sold in sets and they have the gashapon style where most of the figures are around the same (small) size regardless of the animal represented.
I never thought I'd encourage people cheating. Though, considering the subject, I am glad I do.
In my opinion, all these models work, even the okapi. I also enjoy the gnu comparison, it is a fact that Eikoh are very nice even if not ultra realistic and we can see how Britains gnu is clearly more convincent despite its age.
I am glad you reconsidered the sea lion. A great model with a true mane as it is supposed in a lion.

Final episode in the Eikoh series. For now anyway; hopefully there will be a sequel as Eikoh releases more models.

The Eikoh polar bear isn’t the best one in my opinion, but it is 1:32 scale. He looks a bit unhappy:
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Shoulder height is 3.3/106 (3.7/118 cm at hip). The reported shoulder heights of polar bears range a lot, which is a bit confusing. Better to use its length (about 6.6/211 cm without tail), as it is more frequently reported in scientific research. Derocher & Wiig in Journal of Zoology (2006) measured 659 polar bears in Svalbard. The length (including tail) of females was about 180-210 cm (mean 194 cm) and the length of males 205-245 cm (mean 225 cm), so if we include a tail of about 10 cm the Eikoh is most likely male. Females from other subpopulations can be larger than those from Svalbard though.

Here he is with the Kaiyodo Wild Rush (6.4/205 cm):
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The Eikoh Nile crocodile has a length of 10.5/336 cm. The Guinness Book of World Records says that the typical mature size is between 3.4 and 3.7 m and Alexander and Marais (2007) reported that it is between 2.8 and 3.5 m.
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Together with the PNSO crocodile introduced before:
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Eikoh also makes two elephants of the right size. First, the African baby elephant:
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At 3.2/102 cm, it must be a newborn. He is somewhat smaller than the Britains baby elephant (3.7/118 cm):
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He has a dad too, the Eikoh “Animal Infinity” elephant. It’s one of the large-size models that Eikoh has recently started to produce and is 9.0/288 cm at the shoulder. He is fairly small for a bull, but research by Della Rocca (2007) suggests that it is quite possible for a mature younger elephant.
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I am rather fond of him, probably because he looks similar to the Britains African elephant cow (8.7/278 cm), but with a different pose. I grew up with the Britains elephant, so I think that’s what elephants should look like
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These are all my 1:32 scale Eikohs for now. It looks like Eikoh have just released a few more models in this scale (I can’t be sure until I have them), so hopefully, they there will be a sequel to this story!

Really nice Roger, I enjoyed your Eikoh series

me too!

Advicot wrote:

Really nice Roger, I enjoyed your Eikoh series

Yes !! Wonderful comparisons

Some of you may know that I fell in love with Eikoh at first glance
Sometimes I have felt a little lonely in my Eiko-interest so it warms my heart to see them in these great photos from a serious collector

rogerpgvg wrote:

That's very true, Rogério. Interestingly, Eikoh prides itself for making figures "for a Japanese taste". I assume that means that they are small and cutish.

Thanks Adam, Susanne and bjarki12. I am happy that you enjoy the topic. Bjarki, quite a while ago you commented that the Britains brown bear in fact looks like a Himalayan black bear. I had never seen one in black then, but more recently, I found a photo of a lead version (not my photo, I don't own the figure):
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So yes, perhaps the original intention was for it to be a black bear.

I'm pleased to see this, as that sculpt looks really good as a moon bear.  I wonder how hard it would be to track one down.  Thanks so much for sharing this, and quite a good number of other interesting models.

Let’s see whether I can make Rogério jealous . I am very pleased to have found all the Hausser Elastolin plastic foxes!
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First, I found this good-looking fox from the 70 mm series:
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Wikipedia says that red foxes are 35-50 cm at the shoulder. This one is 1.5/48 cm. But it’s a sly fox, he is trying to lower himself, thinking he can deceive us to be included in the 1:32 wildlife reserve. I was indeed misled, until I measured his head and body length (5.1/163 cm). Wikipedia says that the largest fox ever measured in Britain had a length of 1.4 m. The fox says he is not British but German. Hmm, OK, OK, I’ll sometimes allow him to visit the reserve.

Next, I found these 54 mm foxes, an adult and cub:
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The sitting adult has a shoulder height of 1.5/48, but she isn’t lowering herself and is clearly shorter than the 70 mm fox.

Finally, with the help of Andreas, I managed to get the second pair of 54 mm foxes. The seller did not want to post them abroad, but Andreas was so kind to receive them and with a little detour, they safely arrived in my wildlife reserve. Thank you, Andreas!
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The standing fox is 1.1/35 cm. Perhaps he would have preferred to stay with Andreas rather than go to the 1:32 reserve, as he is lowering himself, but this one can’t deceive me!

When we lived in the city a couple of years ago, we had a foxes' den under our garden shed with several cubs, so I am particularly happy to have found so many 1:32 scale foxes for my collection.
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Another animal I regularly see is the roedeer. As far as I know, only Hausser Elastolin ever made them in 1:32 scale:
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The roebuck is 2.5/80 cm at the shoulder and the doe is 2.4/77 cm. ADW says that roedeer are 66-83.3 cm. It’s great that for most of their animals, Elastolin also made kids. In this case, they produced the fawns both with and without spots. I think the fawns with spots are actually meant to be fallow deer fawns, but young roedeer also have spots. They lose their spots quite quickly; here they are when they are slightly older:
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The roedeer and the foxes seem to get along well. Not sure whether the foxes should be trusted!
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OH, I am surely jealous, especially about the second pair of foxes once I don't have them yet in my collection.I am glad you could finally find some foxes for your 1:32 code. ... and you surely deserve these foxes more than I do once You have made an effort to find them and I never did.
I am sure you haven't measured the scale of your deer based on their tail lengths. Roe deer have very short tails, almost vestigial, that's a good thing to look at when we don't have antlers. The standing fawn seems to have a generous tail, so I'd say it was originally sculpted to be a fallow deer and used as unspotted to roe deers. Even if roe deer fawns are also spotted, it turns their decision even more interesting because these fawns are surely large to represent a very young roe deer fawn. So, they may represent somewhat older roe deer fawns and the spots already vanished.

Sooo wonderful models you found Roger
All these Hausser Elastolin models are beautiful and charming . Congratulations !

very beautiful additions!

Thanks, everyone! You are right, Rogério, I hadn't measured the tails, an important oversight! In the 1972 catalogue, the spotted fawns are shown next to the fallow deer and there are no fawns without spots. I am sure you are right and the fawns were originally intended as fallow deer. I am not sure whether the fawns were produced without spots so they could be young roedeer or whether at some point in their history, Elastolin couldn't be bothered to paint spots on these very small figures. The adult roedeer don't have a tail, just as it should be.

I am jealous also

Ohhh, golly, they are wonderful

Hooray, I found a 1:32 scale ostrich. The Marolin ostrich! I thought I had very accurate size information showing that it was too large so I didn’t initially buy it, but after I finally got it, it was a very pleasant surprise to find that it is the right scale. His total height is 8.3/266 cm, making it a large ostrich, but within the maximum 280 cm stated by Wikipedia and many websites that copy from it.
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OK, I know, he is repainted. But the painting is tastefully done and similar to the original. I’ll try to find the original figure, but they are hard to find in a good condition. For now I am very happy with my first proper 1:32 scale ostrich. I am quite surprised how enormous an ostrich can be. Here he is with some of the other ratites I showed before:
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And here with a few other African Savannah animals in the same scale:
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Worth pointing out the Marolin lion, which I recently got from Taylor (Taos). Probably the best of the Marolin lions; it makes my Marolin lion collection complete. The others are a Colorata Thomson's gazelle, PNSO African buffalo, Safari bull elephant, Britains black rhino and Colorata African wild dog.

Finally the ostrich! Your Marolin model is looking wonderful and it is a kind of restoring of the painting. To me it works perfectly. About the size, ostriches are really huge, I crossed with a real one in my homeland, it ran away from a circus and it was quite close to me. When I say close, I'm talking of a distance as small as I was with 8 years old or so. The animal was quite powerful and it was incredibly stressed. Marolin model is less delicate than the others what makes it look even larger. Here is a chart, take care because the moa seems interested in something weird.
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So many wonderful models and I loved the Eikoh comparisons!

Great comparison pics agan. Could you make some more pics of the big eikoh elefant and a Papo
One please ?

Congratulations for this nice ostrich Roger :)

Kikimalou wrote:

Great comparison pics agan. Could you make some more pics of the big eikoh elefant and a Papo
One please ?

Kiki, maybe my topic will help you with this :)
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The topic helped me Kosta, thank you for the link

Sorry, I have my collection spread out between two different places and I don't have a Papo elephant here. I have a shelf comparison photo that may help:
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While you are here Christophe, do you know whether the Starlux WWF okapi, gorilla and hartebeest are 1:32 scale? When I find them, they will probably be expensive so I'd only buy them if they are in this scale.