dragon vs tamiya?

I like Dragon's myself. Although I don't have much experience w/ Tam's figures outside those they put in kits.

As far as the prices ... your not going to get something great for free!?!

EliteModelling wrote:

im not asking for a free model im looking at if dragon is better than tamiya.

I was simply saying that if you want nice figures, you're going to pay for them. I wasn't talking literally "free".

Part of your answer depends on what figure set you are looking at. Newer Tamiya are better than old Dragon, but new Dragon are just a tad better detailwise than Tamiya IMO. Tamiya usually has a better fit. But Dragon has a far larger line of choices out there. Is there any type or set you are looking at in particular?

im looking for a wehrmacht tank crew squad for my Marder 3 Ausf M. i think dragon has a set like that.

I tend to like Tamiya better...just my opinion.  Dragon, while they make good figure kits (as Stikpusher noted, the newer ones are better than the older ones), seem pretty "inflexible" as to the poses they offer.  They also tend to have similar poses with every kit; 1 or 2 guys "in action" and the rest hanging back, watching.  I like modifying Tamiya figures better. 

I like dragon figures specificly for the faces, the uniforms and such I havent seen MUCH diffrence, there some though.  Old tamiya faces are just horrible.  If thats the case, just swap the heads for good ones.  Thing about dragon I dont like is I have quite a few of their figure kits, and got some with my miniart buildings, but I think there may be... 1 figure in firing position, the rest arent.

On the tamiya side, kits like the russian tank riders in 1/35th, well if I do a russian tank again im gona buy another set, they were nicley molded, the poses were good, and I quite enjoyed working on them.

there is also another thing to buying figures.  you get back what you put into them.  Granted, a crappy face cant be fixed, but a nice paint job can make a eh figure great, and a bad paint job can make a great figure eh 

well i was not really planing to leave the big guys. thank you

-Adam

Re: dragon vs tamiya?    Neither one. Not anymore Both are mastered from a distinctly asian point of reference. Have'nt you guys noticed that both makers provide kinda shrimpy figures? I mean they are 1/35 scale, but a kind of consistaintly skinny and short take on  what a man looks like. Like Hans said, they are useful when cut into pieces, and used to create figure conversions, but if  you want good styrene figures look at Masterbox. They take just as much clean-up, but you end up with something with good proportion and pose. I know Dragon makes some interesting sets(mainly german) and they vary in quality as all they guys will tell ya(I've made use of some OOB), but in general they don't live up to the boxart. The Masterbox ones actually do!

thank you. i will take a look at thoes figures. i have used dragon for a long time now and i will try to use a another company but i will never leave dragon. thank you

 -Adam

Well, in the defense of the "Asian" POV, Indy... A 6-foot tall, size 10 combat boot-wearing GI wasn't the norm back in WW2... The average height for US Soldiers was about 5'9"... According to what I've read, it was due to the Depression and a decided lack of a proper diet that kids didn't grow as tall as they have in subsequent generations...  WW2 GIs that were nicked "Stretch" or "Bull" were likely guys that were 6'-6'1 and in the 190 lbs. range... Pretty average for today.  Tamiya figures scale out, generally, to 70 inches tall, or 5'10"..

 The best way to make scales match up in mixing figures is use a weapon for scale.. That's where manufacturers have to be watched, IMHO... If the M1 or KAR-98 scale out properly, use that as a "ruler"... Also, don't mix weapons from manufacturers... If you're using say, Dragon's weapons & figures, but mix Dragon, Tamiya, and ICS figures, use ONLY the Dragon weapons...

Also, it's easy enough to "stretch" a figure if modifying them is your bag... You can add a bit more putty-leg or torso-plug here & there...

The WORST culprits for figures in the 1/48th range are definately Tamiya's though... They don't even match the scale of their 1/48th aircraft figures... They scale out to about 5'3" tall in both the German and US Infantry sets...