Recent acquisitions

[bmathison1972]

those are some great, and very sought-after, fish species, @JimoAi - congrats!

[JimoAi]

Another one that is pretty good but too strikingly big is the Kaiyodo Japanese spiny lobster (Panulirus japonicus) from the Enoshima aquarium series. After having bought it, Blaine published an entry about it in his Museum thread, indicating a scale of 1:7, which surprised me. But now, having the lobster in hand, I see that certainly it's far from the 1:15-1:20 ideal scale that I would wish for a crustacean.



Certanly, too striking sized when compared with my only other crustaceans. Suggestion of realistic crustaceans done at roughly same scale than the Kaiyodo crabs shown below, are welcome!


@Isidro a suggestion is the kaiyodo Tasmanian giant crab at the 1/20 scale but its pretty expensive. i too got the king and spider crabs u got to replace the yujin and epoch ones

[Isidro]

Many thanks JimoAi, I will add the Tas giant crab to my wishlist!
Do you have any idea of realistically done smaller species of crustaceans done at same scale?

[JimoAi]

Many thanks JimoAi, I will add the Tas giant crab to my wishlist!
Do you have any idea of realistically done smaller species of crustaceans done at same scale?

nope, my egg crab and box crab are 1:3/1:4


edit: the kaiyodo american lobster is but u alr have it on ur wishlist
@Isidro

for others, the favorite co Giant pavofic may fit, favorite go giant trevally, yujin longtooth grouper is in the 1:15 scale, the aquameridian giant grouper is nice but a juvenile and the kaiyodo red emperor fits in the 1:10-1:21 scale as theres a subadult and a mature adult released. i have the subadult and its 5cm long and the largest specimen is 116cm. both sculpts r the same btw

[Isidro]

Many thanks, very useful tips! Tough I don't understood what is the giant pavofic. Thanks to you post I just discovered that the adult red emperors doesn't have the delicious markings of juveniles that I associated with this species.

[sbell]

The last part of my birthday haul and arguably the most expensive haul I've had so far: each figures sans the penguin and hammerhead shark are at least USD 30 each. Included is my holy grail: the kaiyodo emperor angelfish. Other items includes the kaiyodo banded archerfish, red bellied piranha, which I was initially hesitant due to the hole looking too obstructive,subadult red emperor, scalloped hammerhead and threadfin butterfly as well as the yujin longtooth grouper and Takara Tomy secret blob sculpin figure and the wonderful Papo emperor penguin father with chick.

That archer fish is probably one of the most innovative Kaiyodo bottlecap figures from any series...and yeah, one of the most expensive. That whole set is still pretty hard to get hold of.

[JimoAi]

Many thanks, very useful tips! Tough I don't understood what is the giant pavofic. Thanks to you post I just discovered that the adult red emperors doesn't have the delicious markings of juveniles that I associated with this species.

giant pacifi my bad

[Isidro]

OK thanks, I still don't know what species do you mean. Maybe Giant pacific octopus? Giant pacific salamander?

[JimoAi]

OK thanks, I still don't know what species do you mean. Maybe Giant pacific octopus? Giant pacific salamander?

giant pacific Octopus.

[Isidro]

Thanks, I took a look about it and it's indeed a very nice figure of ideal size for me. To my wishlist now!

[bmathison1972]

The first few Papo 2023 figures have hit the market: Vietnamese potbelly pig, seahorse, and flying squirrel; I got the latter two. The flying squirrel does indeed to be modeled after a North American flying squirrel (Glaucomys); I am databasing mine as the southern flying squirrel, G. volans. The seahorse wasn't marketed at the species level, but I feel it is a good representative of the common seahorse, Hippocampus kuda.

Papo just keeps getting better and better with these smaller species!

[JimoAi]

The first few Papo 2023 figures have hit the market: Vietnamese potbelly pig, seahorse, and flying squirrel; I got the latter two. The flying squirrel does indeed to be modeled after a North American flying squirrel (Glaucomys); I am databasing mine as the southern flying squirrel, G. volans. The seahorse wasn't marketed at the species level, but I feel it is a good representative of the common seahorse, Hippocampus kuda.

Papo just keeps getting better and better with these smaller species!

where did you obtain these samples?

[bmathison1972]

I bought them from German eBay dealer spieleundkonsolen; I've gotten all my Papo from them in the last few years since they get them earlier than others.

[EpicRaptorMan]

He seems to only have a couple Papo ready to sell right now. I think I'll hold off due to shipping costs.

Hopefully HappyHenToys will get a supply of them soon.

[JimoAi]

I bought them from German eBay dealer spieleundkonsolen; I've gotten all my Papo from them in the last few years since they get them earlier than others.

oh got a link? i cant seem to find it. would like to know if he shipped internationally

[bmathison1972]

I bought them from German eBay dealer spieleundkonsolen; I've gotten all my Papo from them in the last few years since they get them earlier than others.

oh got a link? i cant seem to find it. would like to know if he shipped internationally

https://www.ebay.com/str/spieleundkonsolen

[bmathison1972]

Schleich 2022 black swan. This figure replaces the Science and Nature black swan in my collection. It was a tough decision, but this Schleich figure bears the characteristic white ring around the bill that the S&N figure lacks. The only other black swan figure I am aware of that has the white ring is the original Australian Cadbury Yowie. The Schleich black swan was a 'special release' figure in late 2022 and is merely a repaint of their mute swan that came out the previous year. Luckily the 2021 mute swan didn't have such a large knob above the bill, which is nature is much less pronounced in the black swan. Papo also tried to create a black swan by repainting a mute swan, but overall it was a failure since the sculpt on their mute swan so clearly represented the latter species. I bought this figure from a European eBay dealer since it was never released in the US and may never be.

[NSD Bashe]

I have obtained a couple more of my "holy grail" figures.  Behold:



These are the final two fish in the deep sea Toy Major line and I now have the complete set (not counting alternate paint jobs).  The top one is a flashlight fish of course, but the pale blue guy I've speculated was "some type of lantern fish" is in fact...



a pine-cone fish.  I now know at last.  I will probably discuss these further and post images of the full set in the deep sea channel when I get the chance but for now, it's good to finally have these guys back.  These two in particular took a long time re-obtain. 
Friends do keep this in mind if and when you ever decide to get rid of your collections; if there are even just a few in particular you feel you might regret selling off, especially obscure ones, you might wanna just keep em around somewhere, just in case.  And good luck to all others searching for particularly rare models, they can turn up eventually.

[bmathison1972]

Very nice @NSD Bashe - you should consider reviewing some of these for the Blog     

[Fembrogon]

It's been a month of waiting from AliExpress, but my first figures from Bandai's Diversity of Life series are here at last!



I was getting antsy because they were a couple days late; but they're here, safe and sound. And they do appear to be the real deal as far as I can tell, thankfully.
They are SO CUTE. They're a tad smaller than I realized, but the sculpting and painting is excellent and the articulation is pretty great too. I honestly feel like I'm only a couple of steps away from holding the real thing!
I'm definitely in love right now; I'm hungry for more.

(and I'm already considering writing a review for this set in the future)