M is for Mini Micro Men Mecha's & Monsters

As I mentioned the other day, Brian Berke has sent another lovely parcel to the Blog, and I will cover it fully after I've done Peter's parcels and the last show-report, as it has some very interesting stuff in it, but some of it was so interesting it was deserving of a seperate post, and this is that post!

 

When he emailed me to let me know the parcel was on its way, he added "There is a small box of possibly the smallest plastic figures ever, I would paint them if I could see that well!", and I replied that I could only think of some which came with either a space station or nuclear submarine kit, some of/one of which lots I have in storage, but badly painted (in red & black so probably from the space station kit), so I was looking forward to seeing what he sent, and what he sent was beyond my imagination!

 

There were actually two little boxes, one stuffed with figures I did recognise, the other having all sorts of kit figures from Tamiya's 1:35th downwards, to the diminutive little chaps seen here!

The ones I recognised were the MPC/AMT/Ertl figures from the Battle of Hoth model kit, part of the Star Wars range! On the left we have the Hoth Base's Rebel defenders, with (top left) an X-Wing pilot (who can be 'Luke'), on the right the Imperial Snow Troops, although I'm not sure about the pointing rebel, he may be a turncoat Imperial trooper!

 

During it's 1980's meltdown Airfix carried some of these, and I have a few in that washed-out shiny-grey 'styrene they used, but I only have three Rebel poses I think, so this, nine-poses, was a real surprise, and in a neutral fawn, better for painting . . . if you have the eyesight! And there's probably a hundred in the box, so you could incorporate them in some wargame with maybe Galoob's mini space-craft/vehicles?

I thought these two might belong with the Mecha's below, but they might be from one of the Lost In Space kits, as why would they be taller than giant robots! But clearly measuring something much taller than themselves, and in typically 1960's 'space' fatigues!

These are those mentioned Mecha's, and probably from a more modern kit, but all this stuff goes back to the 1980's now, so maybe not THAT new, and again, from the size of the bot's, something much larger, like a huge space-ship or diorama kit? Possibly, of course, a more esoteric board-game?

These have to be a space-station kit? Or one of several Apollo kits, I've recently picked up the Revell 1:96th kit, and I think the Revell 1:48th kit's figures were elsewhere in Brian's parcel, so who did a 1:150 (approximately N-gauge) NASA type space kit? Aren't they charming? They may be from an International Space Station kit, if that's a hatch-cover he's waving about?

 

 

On the right is another of the AMT-Airfix (et al)'s kits, this one is actually 1:72, and obviously Jabba's Kowakian monkey-lizard; Salacious B. Crumb (the 'monster' of the title), from the Throne Room kit, we looked at some of them here.

 

The coffin lid is a complete mystery, looks like the same plastic as the mega-bots, but a totally different subject mater? Maybe some Aurora horror kit which has escaped my attention, or a detailing on one of those Ed Roth'esque custom-car/cartoonish vehicle kits?

The NASA type is around 9mm, and the Lost in Space chap is a good 15mm, with the Star Wars upright pilot & bino's guys around 14mm. A lovely bunch to find in a parcel, and many thanks to Brian for sending them all to the Blog.

 

Meanwhile, in the sands of the deserts of Egypt, especially the plain behind the great pyramids, the wind occasionally reveals these teeny-tiny sculptures, likely religious tokens, votive offerings or similar keepsakes, here a cast-gold antelope and a small lioness, probably carved in turquoise, the stone, although it could be glazed-clay 'faïence'?

 

The image was from the internet, and has been sitting in Picasa for years, waiting for exactly this post, it knew . . . It knew! And that's the gods of the Pharaohs for you, don't mess with them!

New Product Review - Modelleisenbahn-Figuren

An odd one this, I received these figures as promotional samples at no cost to myself, and thought they were nice enough to wax lyrical about, I still do, but the review will contain a few caveats, and my feeling is 'You pays your money and you takes your choice'...caveat emptor and all that.

The first thing is that while they seem to be called Modelleisenbahn-Figuren, (Model Railway Figures) they are also called Modellbahnfiguren (model road figures?)...Modellbaufiguren (Scale Model Figures) and one or two other's to boot! Seemingly differing on each page of the website, presumably for Google search result optimisation (more on this below).

The second thing is that while I seem to have dealt with Germans from Germany (by eMail), the company claims the US of A as it's corporate HQ (Modelleisenbahn-Figuren Limited Liability Company (LLC), 16192 Coastal Highway, Lewes - Delaware, 19958, County of Sussex, USA), yet are clearly a Chinese/HK concern. The website looks like it came out of an early 90's of-the-peg website catalogue, and communication with the 'Germans' was how shall we say...'problematic.

Top and middle; 1:25th scale figures 'Old Design'

Bottom; 1:30th scale 'Indoor'

The company came to my attention through a junk-mail shot, I get a lot of junk mail from toy companies, plastics factories and general casting factories mostly based in China, due to the tags I use and the fact that my eMail in on the page...marketing robots trawl the bloggosphear and catch my eMail with die-cast or poly-something or toy-something and I get junk.

My standard reply to the toy and plastics mails is "Send me some samples and I'll review them on the blog", after a week or so I mark the mail as spam and never hear from them again, but this time some samples were duly dispatched and an eMail conversation ensued in which I tried to get a competition organised as is my wont, to get some freebies for you dear readers!

However this was all over a year ago and the closer we got to a prize deal, the less keen they were to return my eMails. Also; what you see is pretty-much what they sent, very small samples of a few figures for across the range. Read-on this is going somewhere....

Above; 1:87th scale 'Seated' figures

Bottom right; 1:50th scale mix

Bottom left; comparison between 1:50th and 1:25th scale figures - in the same pose

So, while I am happy to show these figures, and do like them and will recommend them for what they are, well sculpted civilians in modern dress, painted to a fair standard for 'toy figures'; I must also warn you that if you purchase some, you are likely to generate spam and or become part of a marketing exercise.

During the email conversation with the chaps, I said "...they seem better-painted than those bulk lots on eBay", in point of fact: They are those bulk lots on eVilbay! Not only that, the website will only allow you to purchase them in frankly huge amounts, not much use for war-gaming or diorama building, but useful if you're equipping a large railway layout, trouble is only the very wealthiest train collectors are likely to be doing so to such a degree?

 

Clockwise from top left; five popular gauges equating to 10, 15, and 20mm/1:87, 25mm/1;72 and 28/30mm RPG gaming sizes.

Recent Hornby US/NATO troops challenge some unauthorised civilians in a goods-rail siding

Merten Arabs compared to the new figures

Comparison with old Hornby styrene and new Hornby Hobbies PVC figures

However - every cloud has its silver-lining, and these are they...modern Muslims in typical North African/Gulf-Arab dress. Easily converted and/or coloured for other Africans, Asians or Afghans to pose a few ideas. A further confusion lies in the fact that while I have labelled them in gauges and compared them to gaming sizes, they are actually sold in architects ratios, so the Arabs in the top left shot above are 1:200, 150, 100, 87, 75 and 50.

So - well worth a look if you need civilians, or Arabs...but; The company is difficult to deal with, you need to buy them in quantity and you may have to put up with junk-mail as a result. They are reasonably priced though. I'm not knocking them, I'm just saying a few alarm-bells have gone off since they came to my attention.