Embiggening Bones? Scale creep in recent models

[Pancakeonions]

Hey folks,

 

Is it my imagination, or are some Bones of late getting "bigger" when they probably shouldn't?  I'm thinking about the Bones V 3-headed troll (15k backer bonus) as an egregious example, but a few others seem much larger than they need to be (e.g., the pumpkin beholder) - and it looks like Reaper folks have just taken a digital sculpt and enlarged it by 150% (the 3-headed troll has exaggerated features that look really weird against other 30mm figures).

 

I'm really hoping this is an aberration, and that this isn't going to happen to other models.  Have they said anything about this?

[Chris Palmer]

Could agree with you more.  

 

The Spell Effects from Bones 5 are another example.  Two were kept normal sized, the floating sword and floating disc; and the hand spells were doubled in size.  You can even see they all have the same cobbled floor sculpt, but the ones on the hands are twice as big from being enlarged.     They take up too much space when trying to use them in a dungeon room full of figures.  

[Werkrobotwerk]

1 hour ago, Chris Palmer said:

Could agree with you more.  

 

The Spell Effects from Bones 5 are another example.  Two were kept normal sized, the floating sword and floating disc; and the hand spells were doubled in size.  You can even see they all have the same cobbled floor sculpt, but the ones on the hands are twice as big from being enlarged.     They take up too much space when trying to use them in a dungeon room full of figures.  

Absolutely a thing.

There've been a few dwarfs of late that are nearly as tall as older human. 

[haldir]

It's not just Bones, it seems like the "standard" mini size these days is 32mm. There are allot of stl designers that make that their default size. It gets annoying. It might make for a easier mini to paint or shows up better on a battle map, but they just look odd at the size & it's a pain to re-size (since you can't use pre-supported when you change the size).

 

Just look at the first Bones USA offering. Awesome miniature & it shows how detailed the material can get, but her overall size is off putting when you compare her to most minis in Reaper lineup.

[vpoirier000]

the hand spell were large in older editions, must come from there

[Chaoswolf]

Yes, I have noticed some pretty bad cases of scale creep through Reaper's line of figures, especially the newer ones. I have absolutely no proof, but I feel that digital sculpting and/or 3D printing may be contributing to this. My thought process here is that figures sculpted the old fashioned way (i.e. by hand) are a physical thing that can be compared to other physical things to check size, whereas it's much harder to compare the relative size of a digitally sculpted piece.

I could be way off, though; that's just my opinion.

 

If I had any complaint about Reaper, this is it. They don't necessarily have to make their figures compatible size wise with figures from other companies (though it'd be nice), but they should at least have internal  consistency among all of their own figures.

[Nunae]

Scalecreep isn't unique to Reaper, but it is annoying anyway. GW has a lot of their "standard" infantry people on 32mm these days. 

Dwarves seem especially prone to this, in some cases they just seem to have different proportions, instead of being noticeably smaller. We have one RBG dwarf and one GW dwarf in our D&D group and the difference is quite funny. 

Reaper has had some stylistic differences in their line for some time (the Werner Klocke elves look gaunt compared to the other elves and humanoids) since they seem to value artistic license over an uniform look (like an army for GW or the Wizkids line up) which I generally like. And ofc tastes change over time. Newer miniatures seem to be a bit ... softer, with bigger faces and eyes and generally more exaggerated features. And ofc, making the figure just a tiny bit bigger means you can get more facial expressions or details on there.

 

In theorie, it should be easier with digital sculpting to get the correct scale. You can just reprint it a tad bit smaller, while it's difficult to do that with a physical sculpt. We see them previewing volumetric print to check out scale all the time. But maybe it's not a priority to keep the humanoids at 28 a more consistent scale?

[Pancakeonions]

Hmm.  OK, not just me.  It irks me enough that I'll reach out to the team, and ask them to knock it off (or give us a warning or something!)

Who knows if it'll make a difference, but if enough folks tell them it's annoying, maybe they'll cut it out. 

[kristof65]

It's not just you. I was annoyed that the wood elves unit from Bones 5 were all noticeably larger than the two existing sculpts they were based on. 

Scale creep will likely push me to use my 3d printer more than anything else will. 

[haldir]

10 hours ago, kristof65 said:

It's not just you. I was annoyed that the wood elves unit from Bones 5 were all noticeably larger than the two existing sculpts they were based on. 

Scale creep will likely push me to use my 3d printer more than anything else will. 

 

Yah I don't mind a variety of heights but if a elf miniature (which btw, is a gorgeous sculpt) looks like more like firbolg on the table when next to other elves. Yah, it's disappointing.

[zemjw]

Yup, it's something I've noticed with the few Bones USA figures I have.

 

Sadly it's not just Reaper, and I've almost become resigned to collecting separate 28mm and 32+mm science fiction stuff.

 

Infinity had a huge size jump a couple of years ago, to the point where some Stargrave figures barely come up to their chest. The new Bones USA ones, however, fit in nicely with the newer Infinity.

 

I accept people (and aliens) are different sizes, so one or two larger/smaller figures in a group are fine. However, when half the party is 5' 10" and the other half is 6' 10", it looks wrong.

 

I wish you

15 hours ago, Pancakeonions said:

Hmm.  OK, not just me.  It irks me enough that I'll reach out to the team, and ask them to knock it off (or give us a warning or something!)

Who knows if it'll make a difference, but if enough folks tell them it's annoying, maybe they'll cut it out. 

Good luck with your quest. However, when manufacturers can't even decide if 28mm is to the eyes or the top of the head, I'm not sure how successful you will be.

 

As an aside, who has ever said "I'm 6" tall to my eyes" ⁉️

[Chaoswolf]

6 hours ago, zemjw said:

and I've almost become resigned to collecting separate 28mm and 32+mm science fiction stuff.

I've been doing the same for  awhile now, but with all of my older 25mm stuff versus the newer 28s.

[Chris Palmer]

I believe the use of eyes as a measuring point was mostly a product of historical miniatures where the majority of figures had a hat, hemet, shako, etc., on top of their head.  This meant the actual top of the head was ambiguous.  Measuring to the eyes gave a constant point, no matter the headwear.  It prevented the confusion of saying a figure was 25mm tall, when in reality it had 5mm of bearskin helmet on its head making it actually 30mm tall.

 

Still, as zemjw points out, it did create a duality of measurements that has sewn confusion since. 

 

You also see things now like figures being called "28mm Scale", which, while we all know what it means, is odd since 28mm is a measurement not a scale. 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 5, 2022 by Chris Palmer

[Great Khan Artist]

I was actually surprised at how small some of the Bones 5 mins were when I got them in hand. Of note were a number of the sculpts in Fan Favorites. The fauns and Arabian catfolk were smaller than I wanted, but I still love them.  

[Nunae]

2 hours ago, Great Khan Artist said:

I was actually surprised at how small some of the Bones 5 mins were when I got them in hand.

True. The miniatures in the female vampire encounter are also smaller than expected. They do have the typical "modern digital sculpting style" but are still tiny. It is a bit odd.