The Village Idiot

May 2000 Issue

In the past I've spent considerable time writing about the proper cars to use in your village, how to make use of perspective and layering to create realism and excitement, as well as the importance of scale in all things. An important feature of all of those articles that has never been explored in depth has been -- the people --. Where did they come from? How big are they? How many should there be. are all important questions that I am going to attempt to answer in this article. Let's start with the group in the pic at the top. There are people from my three favourite manufacturers represented. Some of the people are "stock" out of the package and some have been heavily modified in the Village Idiot custom shop. ( and you thought I only customized cars in there).

I'm going to give you a brief rundown of the three manufacturers a brief description of their product lines and what I like / dislike about each one.

My Favourite: Omen Minatures.
The woman in the green dress (all the way to the left) in the top picture and on this month's cover ( top left), the woman in the yellow dress who was featured in the article on perspective in this issue (above). The woman in the red skirt who was featured on the cover of the April Issue, (left) are all Omen Minatures. They are, by far, my absolute favourites. They are diecast (that's right as in metal like the cars) and they are extremely well crafted. They have fine features, great details and attractive faces. The only drawback to these figures are their price. They cost between eighteen and forty dollars apiece. They have a great variety of different figures from all different time periods and they run the gammet from very innocent to extremely risque'. So that you can use them in just about any kind of scene you can possibly imagine. They are EXACTLY 1/43 scale perfect for use with a village of ceramic lightups. (such as Department 56, or the Coca-Cola Village.) The best source that I knew of to aquire Omen Minatures was EWA. Unfortunately it looks like EWA is not going to carry them any more. I hope that Omen is going to continue making them. As of this writing I was able to locate a few other dealers on the web that list Omen Minatures in their stock but I haven't been able to find out if the figures are still available. Omen Minatures are sold individually.

Second Favourite: Like-Like Train's people. After Omen Minatures my next favourite are Life-Like Train's people (left). They are available in all Model Railroad Scales (HO, O, N, etc) and they run a pretty close second to Omen in a lot of respects. They are pretty realistic have nice features and nice faces but they don't have the precision of Omen's figures. They are made of some kind of rubbery plastic. Which means that you could probably rework them a bit and change their poses. They are sold in sets of six and they have different people doing different things in each set. The O scale is a pretty good size for a village of ceramic light ups. (Click on the pic to see a bigger version).

In this pic we see a similar life-like figure(left) and The Omen Minatures woman in the green dress(right). The biggest difference as you can see, is in the face although both figures have pretty nice facial features. But the black dot eyes on the Life-Like figure are a drawback (but not a serious one) Of course facial features aren't really a big concern where your village is concerned since it's nearly impossible to see the figures' faces anyway. And these pics don't do either figure justice since it's extremely difficult to photograph something this small and capture the detail without distorting. Life-Like figures sell for about 6.25 a set or about a buck apiece. That gives them an advantage over Omen Minatures right there. Since they are so inexpensive you wouldn't have to worry about modifying them. Making modifications are something I'm sure you can do easily even though I haven't actually tried it yet. (Click on the pic to see a larger version).

Third Favourite: Model Power. My Third favourite are the people made by Model Power. They are my third favourite for using right out of the package that is. For modifying they are my first favourite. Largely because they are made from some kind of plastic that's rigid and stiff but still soft enough that you can sculpt it. And you can use good old Testors model cement to make changes to them or glue them as needed.
They have pretty good detail as well but you really have to get rid of the big black eye dots that are about three times too large. The pic at left from April's issue shows four Model Power figures. As you can see they have pretty good poses and they are fairly useful. Their biggest drawback is that they tend to be dorky. Fortunately they can be modified.
For some reason they give great attention to the details of the men. Especially the old men who have wrinkles and mustaches. But they don't give the same effort to the women. Most of the women are cartoon-like with hardly any detail to their faces at all. They also don't really have much of a shape. As if that weren't enough most of the women in Model Power's sets are old women who are dressed in hats and shawls and covered head to toe. I believe, the only exceptions being the waving woman in the pink shirt and the sitting girl in red and yellow (above left). I have nothing against figures of old men and women but if you have nothing but old men and women in your scene it's going to be pretty boring. Perhaps they think they are filling a niche in the market if that's so I can understand it. Life-Like, for example, doesn't have any old people in it's sets at all. (click pic to see larger version)

Needless to say it would be hard to produce a scene like this with nothing but old people. (click pic to see larger version)

The pics at left shows a selection of Model Power people. The one's that are probably the most useful are the various working people. Life-Like and Model Power's people are widely available at hobby and model railroad stores, or you can just click here.

This pic shows some Model Power figures undergoing customization. They weren't completely done as of this writing but they are done enough for you to get an idea of what you can do. The standing figures were all made from the waving girl with the pink shirt. The two outside figures were repainted and resculpted to give them a better shape. The two sitting figures were made from the same "old lady" figure.
The standing figure in the center was the most interesting case. The body is the "waving girl" figure, (now this might seem a little gruesome to some of you) with her head removed. I then used a head wearing a hat from an old man figure and attached it to her body using Testors model cement. I removed the mustache and gave her a nose job to make her more feminine. I cut off all the brim except for the front to turn the hat into a ball cap and painted it black. I gave her long hair by putting strings of Testors model cement down her back and letting them dry then painting them auburn. (click to see the back of the standing figures.)
Note: The people I'm referring to in this article are all 1/43 scale or O scale consistent with a village of ceramic light up houses. In HO scale my Favourites are Life-Like Railroad people ( which are the same people in the same poses as in O Scale) and Atlas Model Railroad people. These people come unpainted and you have to paint them yourself but you get a lot of them in a little tiny box. You saw Atlas and Life-Like HO scale people in April's issue in the article "Where's the Fire?" You'll be seeing them again in the next article as well.
If you have any questions about this article drop me a line at [email protected] or
just press here. Webmaster

	In the past I've spent considerable time writing about the proper cars to use in your village, how to make use of perspective and layering to create realism and excitement, as well as the importance of scale in all things. An important feature of all of those articles that has never been explored in depth has been -- the people --. Where did they come from? How big are they? How many should there be. are all important questions that I am going to attempt to answer in this article. Let's start with the group in the pic at the top. There are people from my three favourite manufacturers represented. Some of the people are "stock" out of the package and some have been heavily modified in the Village Idiot custom shop. ( and you thought I only customized cars in there).
	I'm going to give you a brief rundown of the three manufacturers a brief description of their product lines and what I like / dislike about each one.
	My Favourite: Omen Minatures. The woman in the green dress (all the way to the left) in the top picture and on this month's cover ( top left), the woman in the yellow dress who was featured in the article on perspective in this issue (above). The woman in the red skirt who was featured on the cover of the April Issue, (left) are all Omen Minatures. They are, by far, my absolute favourites. They are diecast (that's right as in metal like the cars) and they are extremely well crafted. They have fine features, great details and attractive faces. The only drawback to these figures are their price. They cost between eighteen and forty dollars apiece. They have a great variety of different figures from all different time periods and they run the gammet from very innocent to extremely risque'. So that you can use them in just about any kind of scene you can possibly imagine. They are EXACTLY 1/43 scale perfect for use with a village of ceramic lightups. (such as Department 56, or the Coca-Cola Village.) The best source that I knew of to aquire Omen Minatures was EWA. Unfortunately it looks like EWA is not going to carry them any more. I hope that Omen is going to continue making them. As of this writing I was able to locate a few other dealers on the web that list Omen Minatures in their stock but I haven't been able to find out if the figures are still available. Omen Minatures are sold individually.
	Second Favourite: Like-Like Train's people. After Omen Minatures my next favourite are Life-Like Train's people (left). They are available in all Model Railroad Scales (HO, O, N, etc) and they run a pretty close second to Omen in a lot of respects. They are pretty realistic have nice features and nice faces but they don't have the precision of Omen's figures. They are made of some kind of rubbery plastic. Which means that you could probably rework them a bit and change their poses. They are sold in sets of six and they have different people doing different things in each set. The O scale is a pretty good size for a village of ceramic light ups. (Click on the pic to see a bigger version).
	In this pic we see a similar life-like figure(left) and The Omen Minatures woman in the green dress(right). The biggest difference as you can see, is in the face although both figures have pretty nice facial features. But the black dot eyes on the Life-Like figure are a drawback (but not a serious one) Of course facial features aren't really a big concern where your village is concerned since it's nearly impossible to see the figures' faces anyway. And these pics don't do either figure justice since it's extremely difficult to photograph something this small and capture the detail without distorting. Life-Like figures sell for about 6.25 a set or about a buck apiece. That gives them an advantage over Omen Minatures right there. Since they are so inexpensive you wouldn't have to worry about modifying them. Making modifications are something I'm sure you can do easily even though I haven't actually tried it yet. (Click on the pic to see a larger version).
	Third Favourite: Model Power. My Third favourite are the people made by Model Power. They are my third favourite for using right out of the package that is. For modifying they are my first favourite. Largely because they are made from some kind of plastic that's rigid and stiff but still soft enough that you can sculpt it. And you can use good old Testors model cement to make changes to them or glue them as needed. They have pretty good detail as well but you really have to get rid of the big black eye dots that are about three times too large. The pic at left from April's issue shows four Model Power figures. As you can see they have pretty good poses and they are fairly useful. Their biggest drawback is that they tend to be dorky. Fortunately they can be modified. For some reason they give great attention to the details of the men. Especially the old men who have wrinkles and mustaches. But they don't give the same effort to the women. Most of the women are cartoon-like with hardly any detail to their faces at all. They also don't really have much of a shape. As if that weren't enough most of the women in Model Power's sets are old women who are dressed in hats and shawls and covered head to toe. I believe, the only exceptions being the waving woman in the pink shirt and the sitting girl in red and yellow (above left). I have nothing against figures of old men and women but if you have nothing but old men and women in your scene it's going to be pretty boring. Perhaps they think they are filling a niche in the market if that's so I can understand it. Life-Like, for example, doesn't have any old people in it's sets at all. (click pic to see larger version)
	Needless to say it would be hard to produce a scene like this with nothing but old people. (click pic to see larger version)
	The pics at left shows a selection of Model Power people. The one's that are probably the most useful are the various working people. Life-Like and Model Power's people are widely available at hobby and model railroad stores, or you can just click here.

	This pic shows some Model Power figures undergoing customization. They weren't completely done as of this writing but they are done enough for you to get an idea of what you can do. The standing figures were all made from the waving girl with the pink shirt. The two outside figures were repainted and resculpted to give them a better shape. The two sitting figures were made from the same "old lady" figure. The standing figure in the center was the most interesting case. The body is the "waving girl" figure, (now this might seem a little gruesome to some of you) with her head removed. I then used a head wearing a hat from an old man figure and attached it to her body using Testors model cement. I removed the mustache and gave her a nose job to make her more feminine. I cut off all the brim except for the front to turn the hat into a ball cap and painted it black. I gave her long hair by putting strings of Testors model cement down her back and letting them dry then painting them auburn. (click to see the back of the standing figures.) Note: The people I'm referring to in this article are all 1/43 scale or O scale consistent with a village of ceramic light up houses. In HO scale my Favourites are Life-Like Railroad people ( which are the same people in the same poses as in O Scale) and Atlas Model Railroad people. These people come unpainted and you have to paint them yourself but you get a lot of them in a little tiny box. You saw Atlas and Life-Like HO scale people in April's issue in the article "Where's the Fire?" You'll be seeing them again in the next article as well. If you have any questions about this article drop me a line at [email protected] or just press here. Webmaster