Kikimalou's "Scale" collection - 1/18 shelves - Updated May 13 2023

Lots of beauties again. It's hard to take a favourite from this lot, but the Tibetan bear is indeed amazing and the group of wild goats win the team prize.

I always wondered what scale the models from the main brands are, so it's nice to see where they fit. Interesting that you have tigers from the main brands in both 1/15 and 1/18. No lions in 1/15?

Edit: I forgot to say that the CollectA brown bear has a relatively small head compared to the other bears. I use the mini version of this brown bear for 1/32 scale and then it has a similarly small head compared to other bears. Brown bears have a wide size range. I wonder what would happen if you assume that it is a very large bear and use it for a smaller scale (perhaps 1/22 or so). Its head may be better to scale.

Papo Tigers can live in different scales because of the sexual dimorphism with females smaller than males.

For the lions, they could match 1/16 for smaller specimens but not 1/15. At that scale, the best is to look for Safari Ltd.

The CollectA Brown bear scale is between 1/13,2 and 1/22,4. The 1/18 scale fits for an average one. Since my only other "mainstream collection" Brown bear is around 1/30 I won't move the CollectA to a smaller scale, but a good Brown bear addition could change my mind of course.

At last I added last month the last Papo Puma so my Guanaco isn't alone anymore.

Argentina
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And the CollectA common zebra is living now as a Grant zebra in the East African savannah
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I don't know a guanaco is so happy to be joined by a puma. Both are beautiful and the African animals too. The zebra looks good and I love the lioness too.

I guess the Guanaco preferred to be alone but life isn't easy everyday.

The zebra have a default but it isn't visible as long as it is not in front. Instead of getting closer the legs are a little too far apart for more stability unfortunately.

Yes the Lioness is beautiful, I bought her in 2006 when Papo paintings were absolutely awesome.

rogerpgvg wrote:

I don't know a guanaco is so happy to be joined by a puma. Both are beautiful and the African animals too. The zebra looks good and I love the lioness too.

Kikimalou wrote:

I guess the Guanaco preferred to be alone but life isn't easy everyday.

The zebra have a default but it isn't visible as long as it is not in front. Instead of getting closer the legs are a little too far apart for more stability unfortunately.

Yes the Lioness is beautiful, I bought her in 2006 when Papo paintings were absolutely awesome.

Lovely figures and photos!

So I love how you can put a dinosaur at this scale. Shoebills are huge and it does not look terribly huge in that photo, it looks just right for a huge bird. Well, that lioness is the Queen and earlier models were painted as it is supposed for a queen. These topics are so useful, it is not easy for me to take precise measurements and I work a lot instinctively. I would easily be tempted to put the puma and the lioness in a larger scale but they work beautifully here.

Roger wrote:

So I love how you can put a dinosaur at this scale. Shoebills are huge and it does not look terribly huge in that photo, it looks just right for a huge bird. Well, that lioness is the Queen and earlier models were painted as it is supposed for a queen. These topics are so useful, it is not easy for me to take precise measurements and I work a lot instinctively. I would easily be tempted to put the puma and the lioness in a larger scale but they work beautifully here.

I had the opportunity to frequent a few Shoebills in my life and I can assure you that they are not that big.

Instinct... In fact Rogerio, it was my instinct that made me not trust my instinct.

I have been seeing collectors for years, with joy and sometimes with irritation. How many times have I discussed with admirers of Schleich convinced that there is a Schleich scale and that everything must be measured from that, when all you have to do is put a zebra, a rhino and a fox of this brand side by side to find that there is a big problem of scale. How many times have I heard the speech of vintage collectors, especially French and English, about the famous scale 1/32? No brand really practices 1/32, even Britains Ltd and I'm not talking about Starlux Lol.
Everyone has their own idea and these ideas are like white rabbits, they come out of a hat.
What you call instinct and what others call truth, certainty or axiom is only an illusion.
All these first truths annoyed me so much that I decided to put them in order, starting by being wary of my own certainties.
That's why I measure all my critters avoiding my preconceptions and the first certainty that fell was that it would be easy and without pitfalls.

Your explanation of choosing between accurate scale and artistic quality for shelf display is really interesting. I couldn't dream of breaking up a matched series like the turtles, and I see the same impulse is true here. I guess it is not at all uncommon for even a matching series to not be in scale to each other, maybe it is actually much more unusual that they are made in scale to each other?

I notice in your other thread you have taken into account at time the variation possible within individuals. Is that frequently part of the decision process? I know two black bears, one of whom is half the size of the other, and so as models they would look possibly like two different scales! But I suppose both fall into the standard range of the species. That is a lot to take into account when doing all this deciding.

You have so many beautiful figures. The excellence of your efforts at creating realistic scale is only increased by your selection of really nice examples.

Jill wrote:

Your explanation of choosing between accurate scale and artistic quality for shelf display is really interesting. I couldn't dream of breaking up a matched series like the turtles, and I see the same impulse is true here. I guess it is not at all uncommon for even a matching series to not be in scale to each other, maybe it is actually much more unusual that they are made in scale to each other?

I notice in your other thread you have taken into account at time the variation possible within individuals. Is that frequently part of the decision process? I know two black bears, one of whom is half the size of the other, and so as models they would look possibly like two different scales! But I suppose both fall into the standard range of the species. That is a lot to take into account when doing all this deciding.

You have so many beautiful figures. The excellence of your efforts at creating realistic scale is only increased by your selection of really nice examples.

Very few are the series with a coherent scale, there are Safari Ltd salamanders and series of insects from Japanese brands and they are almost always 1/1 scale figures.

When I measure a model, I start by researching the different sizes possible for an animal, I record the minimum size of an adult and the current maximum size, sometimes I add the size of exceptional individuals.
Once this work is done, I measure the beast with the method that I consider most appropriate, finally I choose the scale where the newcomer will live.
This is when I really rack my brains the most. Which size to choose, the minimum, the maxi, a medium size or an exceptional size? The answer depends on what I want to show of the animal and also the animals already present on the different shelves. To take an example, not at 1/18, my Kit fox can go to 1/10 scale as a small individual or 1/12 scale as a male at full species size. My desire is to make it live in a 1/10 desert, alas I have no animal from North America on this scale. So I chose to leave it at 1/12 where it's in good company. It is of course temporary, it is enough that one day I fall for Americans in 1/10 scale and my little fox will change shelves.
On the other hand there is in my 1/15 Australian collection the CollectA Cassowary, it represents an individual in the average and as the possible variation goes from 1/13.4 to 1/17.9, it cannot play large beefy upstairs 1/18.
For the blue whale, I would choose a model and a scale that clearly expresses the gigantism of the animal. That's why I don't have a blue whale right now because the only ones I like are overpriced.

I'm glad you like my figurines, I only collect the model because of love affair. For example, even if I bought it to deceive the loneliness of Papo Guanaco, the puma only joined my collection because I liked it with its slightly weird look. I never have the idea of buying an animal I don't like to complete a series.

I only just became aware of this topic. I love seeing models in scale with one another, so I've really enjoyed scrolling through!

And I know it's already been said, but I have to add that I also really love the Tibetan blue bear! What a great custom!

Very interesting animals here: Guanaco, puma, shoebill and antelope.

I don't know why but I always missed to add the Nayab Andean condor to the party
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It's interesting to see how large the condor is relative to the puma and llama.

rogerpgvg wrote:

It's interesting to see how large the condor is relative to the puma and llama.

It is indeed a large one, this model scale is between 1/14.3 and 1/18.8

It is surprising to see how large an Andean condor is. Females are as massive as a velociraptor, I guess. When these birds open their wings they surely look huge!

Well. A Condor can reach 130cm in lenght from the beak to the end of the tail and a puma can reach 90cm at shoulders

Kikimalou wrote:

Well. A Condor can reach 130cm in lenght from the beak to the end of the tail and a puma can reach 90cm at shoulders

Right, I was not contesting the calculations, I was just enjoying how figures at a correct scale give us a contrasting impression to what we intuitively try to guess. It turns the scale aninteresting factor into this collecting hobby.