Favorite Figure Manufacturers

[Lagartija Mike]

Years ago when I first came into the hobby the figures (especially anything below 25/28mm) were squat and brutish, as if they’d been thumbed together from steaming piles of dog byproduct. Today you have to go out of your way to find a truly ghastly figure. Who are your current favorite manufacturers/sculptures?

[paintpig]

What, for sub par…. I mean sub 25mm?

I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel
Slowly Over A Low Flame

[Iain Fuller]

AB – either their 15/18mm or 20mm ranges. Just a joy to paint and they look terrific.

[Steve Johnson]

Pendraken Miniatures. Excellent customer service, great prices and lovely sculpts, especially anything by Clibinarium. They also listen to what customers want to see, hence the newly announce WWII Poles and Aztecs.

Commission Figurines. 6mm MDF figures that have a wonderful ‘Pippin Fort’ quality to them. Superb value and when on the games table you can’t tell that they are mdf figures.

[A Lot of Gaul]

My current favorites are 18 mm figures from Blue Moon Manufacturing and Xyston Miniatures. Figures from both lines have a very pleasing combination of proportion, animation and detail, and they paint up beautifully.

Honorable mentions go to AB Figures by Anthony Barton, and the Testudo miniatures originally sculpted by Giuseppe Rava.

"Ventosa viri restabit." ~ Harry Field

[willz]

My favorite figure manufacturers are 25mm/28mm Crann Tara Miniature’s, RSM miniatures, Elite Miniatures, Warrior Miniatures, Irregular Miniatures.

[Otto Schmidt]

Dear list

Fro me, they are still the 30-33 mm Stadden and Surens of my youth, purchased from Tradition of London. The only ones that come close are those put out by Dayton Painting Consortium

I prefer figures with human proportions.

 

 

[Nick the Lemming]

S0 many…for 3mm, PicoArmor / O8, for 6mm, Baccus and Adler, for 10mm, Pendraken and Good Ground, for 15mm, Blue Moon, Forged in Battle. I think they’re my main ones, though I’m probably forgetting some others that I really like.

Glory Eagles de l'Empereur! blog

[Lagartija Mike]

Lately I’m in love with the wackier types of interwar armor available from Minairons (it’s strange to see that the art movements of the time had such an effect on something as nominally removed from the abstract as tank design).

[Mr. Average]

I’m definitely a great supporter of Oddział Osmy, Plasmablast, Microworld, and GZG.

[Lagartija Mike]

I’m not a fan of 15mm and smaller scales but I’ve been tempted for a long time to buy from Xyston. An amazing amount of detail and charisma in each tiny gobbo. I just wished they’d do more exotic ranges.

[Not Connard Sage]

I’m a Front Rank fanboi. I’ve hundreds of the buggers, and none of them have ever required extensive cleaning up before they were fit to paint, unlike other purveyors of 28s I could mention. ‘Anatomical accuracy, they’re fat bastards’ I hear you say. ‘Bugger off’ I reply, ‘anatomical accuracy is a chimera’.

Baccus are rather good too

Obvious contrarian and passive aggressive old prat, who is taken far too seriously by some and not seriously enough by others.

[Lagartija Mike]

The detail on the Austrian grenadiers sold me on Front Rank, though I’m still undecided about which army to field. I was never a fan of the Perry’s, I felt their Crusades, Sengoku and Imjin War ranges (except for the excellent Koreans) were grossly overated. But I’m determined to put together a Russian Retreat French from their Napoleonics (I like their Confederation of the Rhine stuff too).

[Etranger]

Some of my favorite figures are from Mike Broadbent, mostly through Eureka in their 28mm and 15mm ranges, but he also does work with other companies. Anatomically realistic (IMHO) & his 18mm Napoleonics are designed to be compatible with AB. In the sci-fi/fantasy field There are some very nice figures coming out of the various 15mm.co.uk brands these days too.

I’ve got the 15mm Tom Meier sculpts from  (LM ) Khurasan & they’re superb but mostly he works in a larger scale.

In 28mm, Bob Murch’s Pulp figures are (deliberately) cartoonish but full of charm, I’m a fan of Paul Hicks’ figures and of Mark Copplestone.

[willz]

Not Connard Sage wrote:

I’m a Front Rank fanboi. I’ve hundreds of the buggers, and none of them have ever required extensive cleaning up before they were fit to paint, unlike other purveyors of 28s I could mention. ‘Anatomical accuracy, they’re fat bastards’ I hear you say. ‘Bugger off’ I reply, ‘anatomical accuracy is a chimera’. Baccus are rather good too

I think Front Rank a beautiful figures and they are easy to paint.  I bought several hundred of the SYW the figures when he first produced them in the 80’s, sadly the one’s he produces now are just too big to fit in with the earlier ones.  (I assume he uses a different sculptor / production method).

 

[teppsta]

Empress miniatures. Love everything they do especially the ECW range.

[Cerdic]

In 6mm Baccus and Rapier are my favourites.

 

When it comes to 28mm there are so many! Front Rank and Perrys both do some great figures, as do Gripping Beast, Offensive, West Wind, Shieldwall, Musketeer. The list goes on. Very hard to pick a favourite! Empress and Gringo 40s both spring to mind for making some really lovely figures.

http://28mmreview.blogspot.co.uk

[Lagartija Mike]

I love the Gringo 40s Mexican cavalry but, unfortunately, they’re in incompatible 40mm.

[Bandit]

Many people like AB in the ranges they offer, they are quite nice.

Personally I prefer Blue Moon for 15/18mm.

Old Glory 15s (19th Century Miniatures) look quite sharp when painted well.

For 10mm I think Magister Militum has an excellent line.

Bigger? I don’t follow 😉

Cheers,

The Bandit

[Spurious]

Hard to say, I tend to consider miniatures as secondary in terms of purchases and given the stuff I play, I often don’t have that much choice in who to buy from to do the particular thing in the scale I desire. So I’ll just go with who I’ve bought from in recent years, though not necessarily who I have bought the most from, and who I’d like to buy from more. I have a feeling I am massively over thinking this. But no matter!

Heroics & Ros; without them I’d own no-where near as many BMPs as I do.

Otherworld miniatures. Really love their attention to detail and well-grounded style for fantasy bods.

Citadel Miniatures circa 1987-89. My ebay purchases attest to this all too well.

Elheim. One of these days I’ll convince (yeah, right!) everyone to get in on 20mm instead of 28mm for their post-WW2 games somehow, and these guys will be at the forefront of that effort.

Honorary shout-outs to Hirst Arts and Mad Mecha Guy for their terrain things.

[Mike Harrop]

6mm GHQ, Baccus, Heroics and Ros
18mm AB and Blue Moon
20mm Elheim, CP Models, AB, S & S Models, Warmodelling
28mm Crooked Dice, Heresy, Otherworld

I’ve not had any truly bad minis for a while, though Skytrex 1/72 WW2 stuff was a bit crap and Irregular 6mm are a bit hit and miss

"This lighthouse is under attack, and by morning we may all be dead!" The 4th Doctor - Horror of Fang Rock

[Lagartija Mike]

I’d love to put together a Maratha army from Indus but the range, though well-sculpted, is too small. I could stand some recommendations for 28mm Indians from the FIW as well.

[Norm S]

For my 10mm I like Pendraken, 12mm Kallistra (they are like original 15’s), but I an being increasingly drawn to the world of 28mm and since plastic is more practical for me, I would have to say Perry.

[Not Connard Sage]

Lagartija Mike wrote:

I could stand some recommendations for 28mm Indians from the FIW as well.

 

That’ll be Front Rank. Again. Not a huge range though.

 

http://www.frontrank.com/product-category/18th-century/the-french-indian-war/indians/

 

It’s becoming a bit embarrassing 

Obvious contrarian and passive aggressive old prat, who is taken far too seriously by some and not seriously enough by others.

[Altius]

I tend heavily toward 25/28mm figures. For those, my favorites are Copplestone, Gripping Beast, Footsore (ex-Musketeer), Perry and Foundry, as well as Boot Hill Miniatures. For smaller scales, I like Pendraken, Peter Pig, and Khurasan. For 10mm, I don’t think anything comes close to Copplestone’s fantasy range.

Where there is fire, we will carry gasoline

[William Jones]

In no particular order and for various reasons, Donnington, Baccus, QRF, Khurasan, Old Glory, Plank Road by Good Ground.  Over the decades Donnington has probably gotten close to half of my money spent on miniatures.

[Author]

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