About Me

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No Fixed Abode, Home Counties, United Kingdom
I’m a 60-year-old Aspergic gardening CAD-Monkey. Sardonic, cynical and with the political leanings of a social reformer, I’m also a toy and model figure collector, particularly interested in the history of plastics and plastic toys. Other interests are history, current affairs, modern art, and architecture, gardening and natural history. I love plain chocolate, fireworks and trees, but I don’t hug them, I do hug kittens. I hate ignorance, when it can be avoided, so I hate the 'educational' establishment and pity the millions they’ve failed with teaching-to-test and rote 'learning' and I hate the short-sighted stupidity of the entire ruling/industrial elite, with their planet destroying fascism and added “buy-one-get-one-free”. Likewise, I also have no time for fools and little time for the false crap we're all supposed to pretend we haven't noticed, or the games we're supposed to play. I will 'bite the hand that feeds', to remind it why it feeds.
Showing posts with label Dark Dream Studios. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dark Dream Studios. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 23, 2023

H is for How They Come In - London, March, Boxed & Bits

Playing catch-up again with the show reports! Back to the end of March and the London Toy Soldier show first, where I wasn't expecting to pick-up much but ended-up with some useful stuff anyway.
 
 Worth mentioning, that while there was some pessimism around the new combined (soldiers and modellers/wargamers) one day show, it seems to have gone well, and most I chatted with were pleased or pleasantly surprised; next one's only about six-weeks away now!

I don't actually know (or remember my reasoning) why most of these weren't subsequently photographed, but with the exception of the Kinder barbarian (bottom left) they haven't been? I know the EMCE (top) are featuring in a forthcoming post, but why the rest were spirited off to their TBS boxes without a photo', is now a mystery.
 
Points to note include two Fontanini Nappies, a Cane Turk, a nice bag of khaki infantry types, two UNA in sand, a small bag of post-Giant Romans, and . . . the Guardsman pen with flocked bearskin????? I took him off to shoot the rest of the Novelty ceremonials (we looked at on the 4th May), and forgot to come back and shoot the rest didn't I? That's what happened!

As soon as we arrived I asked one seller if he had anything nice, and he basically said I need to shift these, they're yours for [insert ridiculously low price here] if you'll take them, so I was off to a good start with mostly Atlantic small scale!
 
Also boxed were these two Minikins sets which will be part of a bigger post but not for some time, while the farm animals are Tamiya, and I bought them from one of the kit-dealers in the other - additional - room! Just for fun, really!
 
Other boxed items from the 'other team's' stallholders include the JB Models (now Airfix) 105's, I intend to do one in Wainwright two-tone, towed and the other firing in Falklands black & green. The ACE Models half-track 'Diana' SPG, is a nice variant, while I think I already have the space set (from Dark Dream Studio), but I'll de-runner these and make-up the assemblies.
 
I bought this from the Legendary James Opie's table, although I believe his colleague is behind them, there were several, but I thought this had potential for a lot of different figures/eras? Obviously you trim-back to the base of the fort and stand it at the back of a display shelf, there were a whole bunch of them. The fat chap in a bicorne wasn't a purchase on the day, but happened to be to hand for an example of how they look!
 
I have several of these now, they tend to come in with mixed lots and are mostly - I suspect - from cheap, rack-toy 'knock-off' action figures, god knows if I'll ever get them all ID'd, but there are sites which look at all the also-ran's, so one day . . . maybe!
 
This is fun, I saw a heated discussion out of the corner of my eye, toward the end of the show, and when it had petered-out, I wandered over and asked what was the interest, and the seller explained the buyer had wanted one building, but that as it was a complete run, he wanted to sell them all together, and for only twenty-quid, so I handed over the money before anyone else realised what was happening!
 
In the event I found two duplicates and one missing, but they seem to appear on feebleBay regularly, so I'll find the missing one soon for the complete set. In the meantime they are an interesting thing, Waddington's HO-gauge scaled building that slot together without glue and which can be collapsed and put away again when Mum needs the table back! Eight of the smaller/medium-sized ones were also issued as Weetabix premiums.

Tuesday, September 19, 2017

I is for Itlerpud - Part Four; Small Scale Scurvy Scallywags

I don't know how these guys have evaded their 'fifteen minutes' for the first eight years of ITLAPD, but time's winged chariot caught them in time for this year's, and then it's back to the relative obscurity they've enjoyed thus far!

We'll be looking at the sets 72001 Sea Warriors English Pirates 18th Century from Orion and set 31 Pirates by LW.

According to PSR's entry the LW set is supposed to contain 16 figures in various singles and pairs along with a two-man gun-crew and two-part gun, however; mine has one each of the pirate poses, two each of the gun crew and two guns (four parts), this disparity will not be a surprise to anyone who has bought multiples of LW or the other brandings in that stable (EVO[lution], HYTTY, Kervella, or Odemars) and I'm sure the boxed re-pack of the same figures; Set 2014 Buccaneers is subject to an equal variety of contents? As a small set it has also been issued as EVO set EVF 016

Two quarters of the Orion set, some (many!) of the figures may look familiar, because they are scale-downs of larger figures from Marx's Warriors of the World, as a result it's a half-reasonable set, given a lot of that early (1997,8,9) Eastern European stuff was a tad . . . err . . . crude - You can shoot the messenger but it doesn't change the message!

The other runner has another 12 figure poses, and to prove the point re. the copies being superior, a skeleton, semi-flat; depicts a man who in life stood about nine-foot-six in his stocking, which look like they were pulled over size 26 feet! Good for 28mm D&D gaming!

Above the left runner we see a couple of the clone-donors for comparison, changes are slight; the oar has been angled the other way, the shovel turned to face the front. Above the right-hand sextet are the LW figures, made from a plastic which is more glass than grey and a bugger to photograph, indeed, they don't show much detail to the naked-eye, but are actually quite nice figures; certainly equal to the Orion sculpts.

Back of the pack for Orion finds them all titled by runner-number, the pick of the 'new' poses has to be the chap with a blow-pipe (16); very different! And both the female figures are nice, one heavily armed and looking for trouble (15) and the other (8) described as "Resisting Pirate", but could as easily be scolding her 'old man' in a dockside- pub, or with a scrap of super-glued tissue - waving-off her beau, hair blowing in the onshore-breeze, rather than being pulled by 7 as is intended - if they are assembled together as a vignette!

In the Legion of Nightmare (set PF12, bottom-left) from Odemars we get three passable pirates, passable that is, in a universe where everyone has been stripped back to an empty-socket, eyeless-skull! Set them to looking for their nine-foot skeletal mate!

On the left is a chap looking more like a Venetian cut-purse or Medici's assassin, a proper pirate geezer in the middle has a proper wooden-leg and everything proper piratey (no parrot, or monkey though!) while the guy on the right is really a French pre-revolution musketeer, but is suitably attired for a bit of pirating.

Is there such a thing? I think Pirates indulge in piracy, but go a'pirating? There's probably a degree-course in there somewhere! For people who haven't got enough B's and C's for Meeja Studies or 'The Comic as a Cultural Phenomena in the 20th Century' - who am I to scoff; I collect plastic toys!

The other two shots are the respective gun-crews, who can combine to create a landing force of some power . . .

 . . . which is why it's an absolute, 22-carat pure gold fact, that my pirates have a gun-line which is 100% more effective than my British Grenadiers gun-line!

Why did Airfix never do AWI artillery? Especially as they had the really useful chap carrying a powder-barrel! Because of the way he's sculpted you can't see his cross-straps as you can with the rest of the two AWI sets' figures, so he makes a very passable pirate, while his officer (both from the Washington's Army set, there are no suitable Grenadiers) with his open flapping coat feels/looks equally at home under the Jolly Roger!

Which is not to say there's no place for Airfix's Grenadiers - someone has to provide 'revenue men' or the pirates will take over and not just on TLAP Day "Aa'haarr!"

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

O is for Orion (and Dark Dream Studios)

This has been imported from 'Boring Blog' (which I will close down) and may have images or other text added in the future. Already needs updateing, best place to go is PSR, link to left in bloglist.

Orion/Dark Dream Studio
Dark Dream range
72001 -
72002 - Landsknechts (Sword/Arquebus)
72003 - Pilots of the First World War
72004 - Landsknechts (Pike)
72005 - European knights
Orion Range
72001 - English Pirates
72002 - Chechen Rebels
72003 - Modern Russian Federals
72004 - Vikings
72005 - Gladiators
72006 - Roman Sailors
72007 - Polish Winged Hussars
72008 - Roman Siege Troops
72009 - Boxer Rebellion
72010 - Turkish Janissaries
72011 - Red 1st Cavalry
72012 - Modern Israeli Army [still only ‘announced’, true to mid-2010]
72013 - Ukrainian Foot Cossacks and Artillery
72014 - Cossack Cavalry
72015 - Medieval Siege Engines Part 1
72016 - Medieval Siege Engines Part 2
72017 - Volkssturm
72018 - German Paratroopers
72019 - Medieval Siege Troops
72020 - Turkish Cavalry [still only ‘announced’, true to mid-2010]
72021 - Parthian Heavy Cavalry
72022 - Assyrian Rams
72023 - Assyrian Siege Tower
72024 - Scythian Cavalry
72025 - Scythian Infantry
72026 - Basmachi
72027 - Byzantine Infantry
72028 - Slavic Warriors
72029 - Early Rus Warriors
72030 - Khazar Army
72031 - Rus Foot Knights (Druzhina)
72032 - Kievan Rus Infantry
72033 - Rus Mounted Knights [still only ‘announced’, true to mid-2010]
72034 - Cumans (Polovets) and Pechenegs [still only ‘announced’, true to mid-2010]
72035 - Iberian Infantry [still only ‘announced’, true to mid-2010]
72036 - Soviet Tankmen and Crew (Summer Campaign Dress), [still only ‘announced’, true to mid-2010]