Recent acquisitions

[Beetle guy]

One I am going to review shortly; Bandai's Ceratocanthinae (Coleoptera: Hybosoridea), a beete that can roll into a ball.
I find it one of the best beetle figurines in years by far! Such great Japanese design and detail....man, one of the best in my collection.

I asked a Japanese friend to translate the paper that came with it, but there is no specific species mentioned he said. I have done some searching and sofar I think it is a Ceratocanthus sp. or Philharmostes sp.

it's 2000% of the actual size! The size of a tennis ball. So soon a complete review on the ATF blog!

[bmathison1972]

Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiice. I have one secured through Brett's contact but it is still in Japan. One of the most exciting figures in a long time (for us).

EDIT: @Beetle guy we should consider Madroaostes as a genus to consider as well.

[Beetle guy]

Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiice. I have one secured through Brett's contact but it is still in Japan. One of the most exciting figures in a long time (for us).

EDIT: @Beetle guy we should consider Madroaostes as a genus to consider as well.

Yes, the expected metalic ones are Madroaostes I think they are a bit more easy to trace than this one.
You will love it, it is of far better quality than I expected!! Even"under the hood" it is full of detail.

[Isidro]

After a long pause, it's time to show here my newest acquisitions!

These figures were bought in two shops during my trip to USA last July. Maybe you're asking: wow, you went in July and you publish here in September? What a delay! But well, during the whole August I've passed entirely my free time passing the tons of photos of animals, plants and other lifeforms that I've took in the zoos (2), aquariums (1), botanical gardens (2), museums of natural history (3) and in the wild in these two weeks in Boston and New York. Since here are the best natural history museums of the world, I've took more photos here than in any other museum visited ever
Strangely enough, I didn't found any worthy figure in the shops of the museums and zoos. Harvard Museum of Natural History have a good stand, but all of them are Schleichs's. Schleich is the German brand, the easiest to get where I live, and the brand that excite less me because their species choice are not obscure. Only one took my attention a bit, the Arctic fox, but in my wishlist I chosed the Safari LTD arctic fox instead, so I rejected it. The American Museum of Natural History have a four floor shop! (actually is a four floor museum with a shop occuping the fourth floors in vertical). However, all what they have in figurines are dinos and very very scarce sealife in the upper floor (basically orcas, great white sharks and not much more). Great white is pending for my collection, but here they had the Safari one with open mouth, and I wanted the Safari one with closed mouth. Finally, both Museum of Sciences and the zoos visited, have mostly just stuffed animals and a few badly done and not interesting chinamals.

However, I've managed to buy figures outside of these places. The best thing was to find a toy shop in a street very close to the one where we was hosted. And they have a lot of Safari's! (and nothing more than Safari's). That's what I wished to find before travel, as Safari is the USA-based brand! Well, they have not great diversity of my wishlist figures, but they have some that  had in it! These three figures that now I can delete from my wishlist are:

1. The shortfin mako shark, Isurus oxyrhynchus. The figure have some minor scratches of paint, but I fell in love with it and it's much cheaper than buying a new one in perfect condition adding the expensive shipping costs from online shops And I suppose that actual alive mako sharks also can have scratches in the skin Anyway, I've tried to correct them a bit, but the result is worst than before so I've let it. They're small and not striking.
And coming back to the figure, it's supeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerb. I felt in love overall with the very well done, sharp teeth. It's difficult to find figures with accurately sharp parts, for security reasons. So we find a lot of antelopes with blunt horns, birds with blunt beaks and... sharks with blunt teeth. But this one is just a perfect mako Also the shape of the gills is lovely and accurate, as well as the very sharp muzzle that give the species its name (oxyhynchus = sharp nose), the big round black eyes, the pale bluish skin, the perfect shape of the fins... It's a great addition to my shark collection




Second figure was another shark, the bottom-dwelling Reef White-tipped Shark (Triaenodon obesus). Another figure to be admired! The eyes with vertical pupils are sooo lovely, the wide flat muzzle is accurate for this shark that passes is time resting in the seafloor and eating crustaceans from crevices, and of course the fins with lovely white tips (first dorsal and caudal) are so beautiful!





For size comparison, here are both sharks together with the amazing Papo's whale shark, that is in my opinion the best whale shark figurine in the market without doubt :-)



And the third figurine bought in this shop is also sealife, but of a very different kind. The Safari LTD's harp seal (Phoca groenlandica). The figure have a perfect shape and texture, and I like harp seals very much because of its striking coloration. But talking about coloration, this figure had to be repainted. The shape of the dark patches is perfect, but they're... SILVER. Pure metallic silvery paint. So I've took my black aquarell pencil and painted over the silver blotches, turning them black as they should be. The result is this:




Here together with my ribbon seal (customized ex Schleich's harbour seal):



Our Papo's polar bear that already appeared in other of my histories, try again. He didn't not succeeded with the caribou, so he now run to catch the harp seal, while both the harp seal and the ribbon seal tries to reach the sea in opposite directions. But the bear is too close! Will our hungry bear catch finally its meal...?

[Isidro]

But the things don't end with this shop. I also visited a shop in Boston specialized in artistic material. Here, casually, I've found a stand full of the Safari's Good Luck Minis. These are miniature figures, including everything: bigger animals like gorillas, elephants, etc, dragons and unicorns, babies (my mother bought one), etc. But I was, of course, searching for smaller animal species, that fits in scale with my bigger models. I've found two: a chameleon and a bat.

It's strange that I bought so generic figures, not identified to species level. But I've tought that here whe can think in a species for each.

The chameleon measures 3,2 cm lenght, and I've tought that it must be a medium-big species. Maybe Calumma parsonii could be a good match? What are your toughts and suggestions for species of chamaleons that matches this figure?




And for the bat... It measures 3 cm wingspan and is blakc, with big rounded ears. It should be a medium-sized species, not as small as most vesper bats. I've tought that due to shape and size of ears, shape of face and scale, it could fit with a molossid maybe. Toughts and suggestions?





But things don't end here! In this shop I've also bought a pen, with the exclusive reason of include the Skipjack tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis) in my collection. This is a fish I've got with Colorata's set of marine fishes, but I didn't included in my collection because the colours are too inaccurate. Metallic blue is a colour that I can't repair with repainting with my aquarell pencils. So I've left the fish in a board appart of my collection. But now that I had the metallic blue pen, I repainted the skipjack tuna and now he's happily swimming with the school of my other Colorata fishes

Before repainting: blue that ends abruptly at operculum  , series of blue blotches alined near caudal peduncle (why?), and blackish lines convering into a strange pattern.


After repainting: metallic blue shade covers all these unrealistic features and turn the figurine into a convincet skipjack tuna


The pen:


And with the other scombrids of Colorata, the blue-finned tuna and Pacific mackerel

[AnimalToyForum]

Congratulations @Isidro , sounds like you had a busy and fruitful summer! 

[Badger]

Yesterday I received this group of 4 Kaiyodo Birdtales (Series 2) figures:

[bmathison1972]

Yesterday I received this group of 4 Kaiyodo Birdtales (Series 2) figures:

Review one of them for the blog, @Badger 

[AnimalToyForum]

Yesterday I received this group of 4 Kaiyodo Birdtales (Series 2) figures:

Review one of them for the blog, @Badger 

Yes, some of them are unusual looking birds! 

[Badger]

Review one of them for the blog, @Badger 

Will do so in due time!

Yes, some of them are unusual looking birds! 

Yeah, despite the name of the series, only one of the figures I received depicts birds.

[Isidro]

Three new magnific additions thanks to a very nice trade!

1. European Bison aka Wisent, from Bullyland. This figure is retired so it's great to have it before it becomes impossible to get!

It's a great figure and I think that is the best figure for this species. Schleich made a good one too, long time retired, but I think Bullyland's is better.
This is my second Bullyland figure after the Asian black bear. It have the same soft, slightly rubbery touch, and the same very light weight. But the quality is amazing despite not being the same harder material than most brands.




In a Polish temperate forest, a red deer try to tell the bison that it's too close to his female deer herd... the deer don't want intruders here. But the bison just ignorate it and follow his way slowly and peacefully. The deer must wait patiently until the bison is far...


Comparison with other big bulls full of muscles: CBIOV takin, CollectA musk ox, Mojo African buffalo

[Isidro]

2. Adelie Penguin from Kaiyodo, Penguins Lunch set. This piece is fantastic. I's difficult to get a Japanese set figure alone instead of all the figures of the set, that are offered from time to time in Ebay. I could easily buy all the set but I was only interested in some of the figures, and the most interesting for me was the Adelie penguin.

The figure is fantastic. It's very realistic (unlike a lot of penguin figures from western brands), and it's absolutely perfect in scale.



It comes with a base that imitates a block of ice, and this base can be attached to a bottlecap. However, since I avoid bases in my figures when possible, I displayed it without base - I cutted the two short sticks under its feet, that allow to attach it to the ice block.



Adelie's penguin is perfect in scale. My only other penguin, the Safari LTD toob Chinstrap Penguin, is a bit too big tough. Maybe the chinstrap was fed with hormoned fishes...


Adelie penguin knows that elephants seals are just big noisy piles. Altough he knows some of its cousins were rolled by one of these giants, these are rare accidents.


But take care my penguin friend... not every pinniped is unworrying!


Adelie penguin see its last minutes of life. Everybody must eat...

[Isidro]

3. And last, the best of all the figures, the superdreamed California Condor from Safari LTD Wings of the World. A retired figure that went impossible to buy online. And now it's finally mine, hanging from a thread over my land mammals!!!!
This bird is absolutely perfect to the least detail. The head is amazingly well done. The white patches under the wings are accurate and the fine white lines over the secondary feathers too. Wing shape are totally accurate (unlike many western brand raptors that often have primary feathers too wide and rounded at tips). Eyes, feet... everything is so perfect and the species is a so classic mythical dream!

I have no more raptors nor Californian animals for make a diorama, but the bird alone is enough marvelous itself!

[bmathison1972]

nice additions, @Isidro . Which elephant seal is that? Papo? Papo is the one I have on my wishlist!

You should review the condor (others?) for the Blog 

[Isidro]

Yes, is the Papo elephant seal I've presented it already in the past, and after as companion for the Chinstrap penguin too

The Papo elephant seal is perfect in proportions, sculpture, paiting and everything, except the size. It's fairly small. For an animal as big as a rhino, it's much smaller than my ideal 1:20. But at least fits well with some medium-sized cetaceans...

I'm too lazy for make reviews in the blog THese reviews are very exhaustive and I'm unable to write a so long info Anyway I'm not a blog man, never had one or participated in one except by small puntual and sparse comments in already done entries

[AcroSauroTaurus]

[Beetle guy]

A week or so ago these came in from New Zealand! I found them in an online shop which had some interesting frog (and other animal) figurines.
Specially since it were all species from New Zealand or Australia and having mainly Japanese figurines these are welcome additions.
Quess I was just in time to snatch these and a bunch of other frogs up, for the New Zealand and Australian webshop have shut down a week after these came in. Well their are a extremely hard find now.

These are the beautiful frogs I recieved. The sculpt is by Jane Elwell. They were released in 'The Hollow Log Collection - Encounter Wildlife with Jane Elwell". There is no release date known to me. I know there are some birds and Australian mamals in the series.

The Frogs represent the species Red-eyed Tree Frog Litoria chloris and the Dainty tree frog Litoria gracilenta, both new species in my collection.

The frogs and their bases are cast in resin (one piece) and have pretty good detail. I love the poistures of the frogs, very lifelike. The scale is 1:1 (which I am a sucker for!) I will slightly sand down some rough edges and repaint them. The paint is rather good, but hopefully I can push it up a notch with detail to even more realistic. The Dainty Tree Frogs' log can be attached to the wall (there is a hole in the back of the log).

The Dainty Tree Frogs, Litoria gracilenta


Red-eyed Tree Frogs, Litoria chloris





So, very happy with these!!

[stargatedalek]

I was briefly very confused, oh the joys of common names!

[bmathison1972]

I had seen 'red-eyed tree frogs' by Australian companies, but for some reason assumed it was the familiar Agalychnis callidryas. I hadn't realized there was a native species with the same common name. I will have to pursue one from somewhere.

[stargatedalek]

I had seen 'red-eyed tree frogs' by Australian companies, but for some reason assumed it was the familiar Agalychnis callidryas. I hadn't realized there was a native species with the same common name. I will have to pursue one from somewhere.

It certainly doesn't help that they have very similar proportions. I may need to reevaluate a few "red-eyed treefrogs" that I wrote off as lazily painted.