The MLP Arena
Pony Talk => Pony Corral => Topic started by: dannahbanana on March 23, 2021, 10:13:43 PM
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I have only been a collector for 5 months in total, but even in that short amount of time I have seen a sharp rise in pony prices, especially for one pony in particular...Mimic. I started out seeing her at $250 USD and even lower, and now she has been soaring over $1000 in some places. What is the cause of this Mimic craze? My theory is that Covid and quarantine has made people a bit restless, causing them to turn to hobbies and collecting more than before. But on the same note, many people are struggling financially during this time, so I don't quite see why these ponies are selling for such high prices. Why is Mimic so popular right now? I think she is beautiful, but what about her makes people pay over $1000 for her? Why does it seem like everyone wants her, but when I look on social media it seems like so many people already have her? Is she really as rare as it seems? Do you think pony prices will go back down, or is it just going to go uphill from here? Share your thoughts!
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When I started, I'm pretty sure she was just a $100-150 pony at most.
She's not the most rare, just sought after.
I didn't get her yet, I'm expecting her price to go back down after a little while.
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Even a year ago when I started getting back into collecting, I was seeing her going for $100-$150-ish. I think prices in general have increased during that time; lots of other ponies have shot way up since then too; Glow-n-Shows didn't used to be so high either, for example. I don't know why.
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Years ago I read somewhere (could be inaccurate) That Mimic didn't sell so well on her release, hence she showed up MOC a lot on the internet. Can anyone fact check this? I find it hard to believe she wasn't always popular, due to her unique and colourful design.
She's probably the most well known "rare" pony - particularly to non collectors- which could explain the price, despite her not being the rarest ever.
I'd love to have one myself but it is unlikely I will ever afford it ! There's loads of beautiful customs of her I've seen on the Arena ^.^
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Dragglereeka - I think you're remembering the "church of MOC Mimic" which was (IIRC) a joke site that claimed to worship the "ultra rare" MOC Mimic and etc. Satirical, but I think a lot of people took it seriously.
I know there's been rumours aside from that, that Mimic didn't sell well, but I don't think we've ever found any actual concrete evidence for that... it's theoretically possible there are less of that wave *in general* since second waves do tend to be a little harder to find (stores may not order the second wave if they still have a lot of wave 1 on the shelves), but I don't think Mimic in particular is that HTF really... I think much of it is just the hype around her. Everyone knows Mimic's "the rare pony" so her prices tend to reflect that.
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Mimic was the first pony I traded for, in November 1997. At the time I didn't know she was rare especially, although my first trade partner did tell me she was a bit tricker to get than some of the others...and did I mind if the pony had a few flaws. As it happens my Mimic only has ink on her hooves, she's otherwise fine - and that's not really a flaw for me. But the point is that idea of her being 'rare' was already around in 1997.
I think part of it was because of the Magic Horseshoes. I know that was why I wanted her - because I didn't know she existed before then.
Her distribution is also more limited - she was sold in Italy, the US, Canada - I'm not sure if anywhere else. So there's a global market looking for a pony with a limited release.
On the MOC front - I have no idea where that rumour came from. It was generally believed back in the old days of early online collecting that MOC Mimic did not exist. That's where the Church of the MOC Mimic came from. The idea that no such MOC existed, and was somehow the pony 'holy grail' as a result. The less I say about that the better.
When the first MOC Mimic did show up, after several years of this idea it didn't exist, people thought it was the only one and bid stupidly on it. It went well over $1000 at the time. Since then there have been at least five or six other MOC Mimics. There are not and have never been 'loads' of MOC Mimics - certainly no more than others from her set, and probably fewer if I'm honest. But there are more surviving than there are the whole set of Mountain Boy ponies, which also sell for four figures when they do come up for sale.
The idea of her not selling well is an urban myth without any actual evidence behind it. Likewise the idea there were fewer of Mimic in a box from Hasbro - I don't think we've ever proven that to be the case. Mimic herself shows up enough to suggest she was maybe less well sold than some of the other ponies from the time, but nowhere near as limited in her quantity than some of the more sought after mail order ponies.
Mimic was never sold here in the UK but I have found her here second hand. To put that in context, I've never found a HK Firefly, Medley, Powder or Skyflier here second hand - they were also not sold here.
So to summarise - Mimic is a bit harder to find than the most common ponies from that year, but probably not more hard to find than, say, Bright Eyes, who has a similar release range and timeline. The reason she's more expensive is probably a self-fulfilling prophesy, because she's always been more expensive and that's just become entrenched over time.
Some people also treat Mimic as a status symbol. But when I traded for Mimic back in 1997, I traded Gypsy for her. And honestly, in terms of rarity - if not price - I still think that's an equal trade. It's just that Mimic has been blown out of all proportion by 25 years of hype.
ETA: Ninja'd by Carrehz xD.
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Mimic's been one of the more sought after ones for longer than I've been collecting (which has been very close to 10 years now). I don't think she specifically is getting more popular at the moment, but rather G1 MLP as a whole is. More people, as far as I'm aware, have been getting into G1 ponies, and the average price of every G1 is raising as a result. The balance between G1 ponies' worth to one another is about the same I believe, but they're all increasing in price.
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The idea of her not selling well is an urban myth without any actual evidence behind it. Likewise the idea there were fewer of Mimic in a box from Hasbro - I don't think we've ever proven that to be the case. Mimic herself shows up enough to suggest she was maybe less well sold than some of the other ponies from the time, but nowhere near as limited in her quantity than some of the more sought after mail order ponies.
Out of curiosity I dug out my '87 Hasbro catalog and it mentions that set being boxed at 24 pieces a box. No mentions of quantity of each. Every normal pony set released that year appears to be 24 per box. Curiously, even though they were never released the pony friends & dolls set is listed as 12 dolls per box and 24 animals per box, so not equal. And soft sleepy newborns (of which there are 3) are 4 per box. I wonder which one was the duplicate...
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I think overall the idea of Mimic being well loved and sought after is what makes her prices so high is probably the biggest contributing factor
I've found 3 of her in the wild (technically 4 but the seller had already taken some ponies out of the lot for her granddaughter and of course one of them was mimic, in this case I did believe the seller actually kept the ponies most cases that's a sad excuse when some other buyer swoops in and steals a sale) and there are ponies that are more common and less valuable that I have never found in the wild
In regards to prices going back to normal. Hmm, no I don't think they will go back to the 100-150$ range but they will probably come back down from the current craziness. As more and more collectors enter the community there's less and less to go around so as the years go on it will just get more expensive
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The idea of her not selling well is an urban myth without any actual evidence behind it. Likewise the idea there were fewer of Mimic in a box from Hasbro - I don't think we've ever proven that to be the case. Mimic herself shows up enough to suggest she was maybe less well sold than some of the other ponies from the time, but nowhere near as limited in her quantity than some of the more sought after mail order ponies.
Out of curiosity I dug out my '87 Hasbro catalog and it mentions that set being boxed at 24 pieces a box. No mentions of quantity of each. Every normal pony set released that year appears to be 24 per box. Curiously, even though they were never released the pony friends & dolls set is listed as 12 dolls per box and 24 animals per box, so not equal. And soft sleepy newborns (of which there are 3) are 4 per box. I wonder which one was the duplicate...
I would expect the extra SSN to be the pink one >.> just because ;)
24 makes sense for the TEs. They're a set of six, so 4 of each would be logical, right?
I have a 1990 UK catalogue from Hasbro and I think it does give exact quantities for some of the sets that are unevenly distributed...obviously that's circumstantial, but I'd assume 24 means 4 of each pony. That would mean that you'd expect Speedy to be the most common from the set being that it was her second release, and the others to all be around the same availability...
However that changes a little when you add in the global market, because Locket and Tic Tac Toe also had a release in other places outside the US, Canada and Italy, where Mimic was available. So that should mean Locket and TTT are also a bit more common than Quackers, Mimic and Bright Eyes...
Which I think is probably true?
Quackers tends to make people picky because of her discolouration problems. But Bright Eyes and Mimic have both always seemed about the same to me. However...I picked up Bright Eyes MOC for way less than MOC Mimic sells for. Go figure.
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When I started collecting, Mimics were at the $70ish range. Munchy used to be around that price but has gone up in price as well. Not to Mimic levels, but still more than she's worth.
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I used to walk to the nearby "Alco" where they sold ponies almost every day. I saw the first set of Twinkle Eyes and So-Softs but never the second set and it was a long time before I even found out about the 2nd sets. I knew about Mimic from the show. I just didn't know she was a real pony. But, a year later I saw the First Tooth Ponies and Merry-Go-Round ponies at the local mall. So maybe the 2nd sets were distributed in different venues.
But, I did really want Mimic and I'm sure others were looking too. It might be less about being short-stocked and more about her already being sold before the next kid got there.
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I think its people's addictions to parrots.
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If you have me on Discord in any server, you already know my struggles with Mimic, lol. I feel like the ones on eBay right now going for $1,000+ is just simple price gouging due to people in the US getting stimulus checks. I despise price gougers because they know what they're doing and it's scummy.
People have told me that she used to go for about $150+ a few years ago, and then once Covid hit her prices soared. It could be a mix of simple inflation of prices with the pandemic and rise in collecting and nostalgia raising the prices. The $1,000+ Mimics are severely overpriced due to price gouging.
I personally love Mimic because she has a nice pose, beautiful colors, and she is a twinkle eye, which is my favorite G1 gimmicks. Not everyone is a fan of her, but to those who do love her it's hard to see these prices...
:yikes:
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I think its people's addictions to parrots.
That's the logical conclusion. :)
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In my unofficial research - I gather Hasbro did not make as many Mimics as many of the other ponies. Therefore there were less of her to collect!
As she was rather unique with her colour etc. I guess people (kids) looked after her and so over time her price has increased.
I recently sold a Mimic and was quite stunned by the price.
She was certainly unique!
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The Golden Horseshoes has always been one of my favorite episodes. As a kid, though, I'm not sure that I realized that she was an actual toy, or I wasn't vocal about wanting her. I got Quackers and Locket from the second set. I learned about all of the other ponies I didn't have or see as a kid from Dream Valley when we got internet service at home in 1998.
When I started actually collecting as an adult, Mimic was typically $75. She steadily increased to double that over the years, but I've watched her reach $200-400 over the course of the pandemic. I'm not sure whether or not prices will ever go back down to early 2000s levels since we're 20 years later now, but I hope the market does eventually level a little and keep hoping for lucky wild finds.
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I've seen Mimic come up for sale more often than Quackers, TBH.
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I got mine for around $200 plus shipping, and it was only about a year ago.
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I think its people's addictions to parrots.
Not going to lie, I was addicted to parrots as a child. Wanted to walk around with one on my shoulder like a pirate.... still do.
Post Merge: March 24, 2021, 06:08:11 PM
I got mine for around $200 plus shipping, and it was only about a year ago.
That is pretty reasonable! I'd pay that for her. I'm glad you found her.
Post Merge: March 24, 2021, 06:19:41 PM
If you have me on Discord in any server, you already know my struggles with Mimic, lol. I feel like the ones on eBay right now going for $1,000+ is just simple price gouging due to people in the US getting stimulus checks. I despise price gougers because they know what they're doing and it's scummy.
People have told me that she used to go for about $150+ a few years ago, and then once Covid hit her prices soared. It could be a mix of simple inflation of prices with the pandemic and rise in collecting and nostalgia raising the prices. The $1,000+ Mimics are severely overpriced due to price gouging.
I personally love Mimic because she has a nice pose, beautiful colors, and she is a twinkle eye, which is my favorite G1 gimmicks. Not everyone is a fan of her, but to those who do love her it's hard to see these prices...
:yikes:
I agree, her pose and colors are beautiful. When I first started collecting I didn't care for twinkle eyed ponies, since the eyes of a pony are the most charming to me and I thought the gem took away a bit of their personality by covering their eyes. But now I find them beautiful. I'd love to have a Mimic, but I don't want to pay more than $250 for her, if that is even possible anymore. I saw that she sold in Japan for about $150 last year, unfortunately I wasn't collecting then, so I didn't get the chance to get her. I've had dreams about finding her in the wild. It looks like from other posts it may be possible. Hopefully my dream will come true. But honestly, there are other ponies that I want more than her, such as the Mountain Boys, especially Sunburst.
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I think its people's addictions to parrots.
Not going to lie, I was addicted to parrots as a child. Wanted to walk around with one on my shoulder like a pirate.... still do.
Post Merge: March 24, 2021, 06:08:11 PM
I got mine for around $200 plus shipping, and it was only about a year ago.
That is pretty reasonable! I'd pay that for her. I'm glad you found her.
Post Merge: March 24, 2021, 06:19:41 PM
If you have me on Discord in any server, you already know my struggles with Mimic, lol. I feel like the ones on eBay right now going for $1,000+ is just simple price gouging due to people in the US getting stimulus checks. I despise price gougers because they know what they're doing and it's scummy.
People have told me that she used to go for about $150+ a few years ago, and then once Covid hit her prices soared. It could be a mix of simple inflation of prices with the pandemic and rise in collecting and nostalgia raising the prices. The $1,000+ Mimics are severely overpriced due to price gouging.
I personally love Mimic because she has a nice pose, beautiful colors, and she is a twinkle eye, which is my favorite G1 gimmicks. Not everyone is a fan of her, but to those who do love her it's hard to see these prices...
:yikes:
I saw that she sold in Japan for about $150 last year, unfortunately I wasn't collecting then, so I didn't get the chance to get her. I've had dreams about finding her in the wild. It looks like from other posts it may be possible. Hopefully my dream will come true. But honestly, there are other ponies that I want more than her, such as the Mountain Boys, especially Sunburst.
I wonder how much that shipping would be from Japan to here (US for me). I have a subscription box from Japan that costs about $15 for shipping!! I've also seen those posts about wild Mimics, and I honestly don't know how I would be able to handle myself if I found her somewhere like a garage sale or thrift shop!!
I hope you're able to get those Mountain ponies! Always feels great to get your dream ponies, especially if they aren't as much as an investment as Mimic is >_<
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I got mine for around $200 plus shipping, and it was only about a year ago.
That is pretty reasonable! I'd pay that for her. I'm glad you found her.
I forgot to mention that shipping was another $100 ;)
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I wonder how much that shipping would be from Japan to here (US for me). I have a subscription box from Japan that costs about $15 for shipping!! I've also seen those posts about wild Mimics, and I honestly don't know how I would be able to handle myself if I found her somewhere like a garage sale or thrift shop!!
I hope you're able to get those Mountain ponies! Always feels great to get your dream ponies, especially if they aren't as much as an investment as Mimic is >_<
I live in Japan so shipping for her would have been free! But unfortunately I missed out. In general ponies here are priced higher than abroad, but for some reason really rare or sought after ones tend to go for less than they do in US/Europe/etc. There was a bundle of two Glow N Shows for just $30 a few months ago that I missed out on.
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Mimic has always been a pricey pony and her price never really comes down. I remember when G1 were still very common at yard sales, etc. and people would complain, "OMG she's the $30 MLP, I'll never afford her!" Now... yeah...
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In my unofficial research - I gather Hasbro did not make as many Mimics as many of the other ponies. Therefore there were less of her to collect!
As the thread already mentioned, there is no evidence that this is true. Or at least, there is no evidence that fewer Mimics were made than the other ponies in her set with the same distribution - who sell for far less.
I am only calling this out because opinions like this help to cause panic buying and push up prices of ponies unnecessarily. There are probably as many Mimics out there as Quackers and Bright Eyes at least. I feel like it's impossible to bring her price down to their price level, but it is possible for people to stop and refuse to pay ridiculous amounts for her :/
Obviously I'm happy for anyone selling who randomly got a huge price for their item - but I feel like there's a danger of normalising the high price spike if we keep reinforcing the unproven assumption she was somehow not produced in as great a quantity as her set-mates.
Look at what happened with Rapunzel (who is rarer, but not the rarest MO pony). When I came online, her price was around $80-$150. Now it's at a stupid level. If we don't want that to be normalised with Mimic, I feel like we have to be responsible with the information we relay to others.
The reality is that Mimic was produced for the largest existing MLP markets in the 1980s - the US and Canada. There are many ponies produced only for smaller markets who sell for less than Mimic does, even some Nirvana ponies.
Don't get me wrong - I really love this pony. But I would love to see her appreciated more for her aesthetic and less for her price tag, which often seems entirely unnecessary.
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I got mine for around $200 plus shipping, and it was only about a year ago.
That is pretty reasonable! I'd pay that for her. I'm glad you found her.
I forgot to mention that shipping was another $100 ;)
Shipping gets me every time :drunk: :drunk:
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I think Taffeta makes a good point. I think it’s easy to assume that a popular vintage collectible is expensive because it’s rare, but that’s not always the case. Many things can drive up the price on collectibles and perceived rarity is only one aspect (I say “perceived “ rarity because we’re often told that something is hard to find when a little digging proves otherwise. There’s also a tendency for collectors to assume that because something is expensive it must be HTF).
My own personal anecdote on Mimic is that, as a child I first encountered her in a pamphlet and immediately fell in love. I loved everything about her and I wanted one badly. However, I only saw her in stores once and at the time I elected to buy Jangles and Tangles instead because I was away from home and thought ponies with accessories would be more entertaining for the week. But I never saw another Mimic to buy.
What I take away from this memory is not that Mimic was short packed or harder to get, but that possibly the whole second set of TE were. Note that, at the time Mim was on shelves in Canada I was buying instead a twin set from the previous year, indicating that new and older stock were available together. If anything, it supports the theory that 2nd waves are harder to find in stores, something we’ve seen happen in G3 and G4.
Memory is a tricky thing and not entirely to be trusted. But I’m fairly confident of this one because I only had one twin set as a child, and I’m sure that if I’d seen Mimic for sale again at a later time I’d have snapped her up. So it’s possible that the whole set was a little harder to find back in the 80s. Of course, this is anecdotal at best.
About current pricing, I do think we’ll see the market fluctuate down again, but I don’t think it will go back to pre-pandemic prices. I expect prices to stay slightly inflated (we’ve seen that prices for G1s generally had been going up for years before that). But remember that for collectors, patience is a virtue. People still find rare ponies second hand and it is possible to get a bargain if you don’t mind waiting.
Elf
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It does generally seem to be the case that a lot of 2nd and 3rd set ponies are harder to find relatively speaking than their first set peers - or that second releases of a pony are less common than the original. So maybe it's a case that stores wanted to move on to the new gimmick to attract the kids...TAF set 1 ponies are quite common in comparison, and they and the first set princesses would have also been out at this time? (Although they were sold globally so that may be misleading). Not to mention the twins, like Elfpony mentioned.
I think it's more likely the whole set was a bit harder to find, rather than one individual pony.
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Elfpony's right, this is a distribution thing common in Canada. It's why you are much more likely to find the Wave 2 Sea Ponies up here.
Canada tries to order what the USA orders, there aren't enough, but there IS demand, so Canada gets shipment #2. ponies, vaccines, luxury goods, cars, you name it. LOL
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Elfpony's right, this is a distribution thing common in Canada. It's why you are much more likely to find the Wave 2 Sea Ponies up here.
Canada tries to order what the USA orders, there aren't enough, but there IS demand, so Canada gets shipment #2. ponies, vaccines, luxury goods, cars, you name it. LOL
I hadn’t thought of that but now that you mention it yeah. We saw some of that with early G4, where the States had tonnes of Mane Six but Canada got lots of the original characters. Conversely, in G3, we got hardly any of the TRU exclusive ponies. Bringing it back to Mimic, it’s likely that this kind of buying was also in play back in the 80s that resulted in some sets being harder to find in some areas.
Elf
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Yeah i don't really feel like Mimic is that rare. Almost every time I look there is at least 1 available. Usually at a high price. But she seems to be easier to find in good condition than Quackers, Tic Tac Toe, or Bright Eyes. I looked for those 3 last summer and could not find them in good condition.
I listed mine to see what would happen. I'm not sure if i want to sell unless I get a lot for here. Maybe there are other sellers doing the same thing. Just seeing if they can get a good price right now.
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People like ponies. People like money. People like status symbols. Mimic is a pony, green like money, makes people money and is a collector status symbol. That's my personal hypothesis.
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People like ponies. People like money. People like status symbols. Mimic is a pony, green like money, makes people money and is a collector status symbol. That's my personal hypothesis.
Hrm. Our lowest denomination note is the green one here...I guess that's why she wasn't sold here? Didn't make enough money?? xD
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People like ponies. People like money. People like status symbols. Mimic is a pony, green like money, makes people money and is a collector status symbol. That's my personal hypothesis.
Hrm. Our lowest denomination note is the green one here...I guess that's why she wasn't sold here? Didn't make enough money?? xD
She's sure pulling in the :money: now. Life's funny that way. :shrug:
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Goodness, I had no idea Mimic went for so much these days. I've got her, but only because she was part of a friend's childhood collection that they kindly passed on to me. She's a lovely pony, and I can see why people really want her, but I don't think I'd have bought her for so much money.
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I think I'm going to try to make one...I have an HQG1C blank in her pose laying around, and if I can get the green dye right I'm going to give it a go. While I'm still hoping to randomly find her in the wild for like, $1(keep dreaming, right?!), I'm not paying $400 for her on Ebay.
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I think I'm going to try to make one...I have an HQG1C blank in her pose laying around, and if I can get the green dye right I'm going to give it a go. While I'm still hoping to randomly find her in the wild for like, $1(keep dreaming, right?!), I'm not paying $400 for her on Ebay.
Can't wait to see
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I think I'm going to try to make one...I have an HQG1C blank in her pose laying around, and if I can get the green dye right I'm going to give it a go. While I'm still hoping to randomly find her in the wild for like, $1(keep dreaming, right?!), I'm not paying $400 for her on Ebay.
Can't wait to see
I'll post her for sure! I'm just really leery about getting the color right...usually when dyeing a pony I have another pony to compare it to so I know I get it right...wish I had a local friend I could borrow a Mimic from for a day! And Rit dye doesn't have a real great shade of green in their Dyemore arsenal...
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I think I'm going to try to make one...I have an HQG1C blank in her pose laying around, and if I can get the green dye right I'm going to give it a go. While I'm still hoping to randomly find her in the wild for like, $1(keep dreaming, right?!), I'm not paying $400 for her on Ebay.
Can't wait to see
I'll post her for sure! I'm just really leery about getting the color right...usually when dyeing a pony I have another pony to compare it to so I know I get it right...wish I had a local friend I could borrow a Mimic from for a day! And Rit dye doesn't have a real great shade of green in their Dyemore arsenal...
I picked up a neon green. Maybe if you combine it with pale or neon yellow? Mimic never seems to be one color anyway. I've seen her white tinted with green, honeydew green and a light sickly yellow.
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Admittedly I've only ever had three or four in person, but I don't think there's a variation in her body colour so much as it's a really difficult colour to photograph well. It's a yellow-green colour, but the exact way to describe it otherwise, I'm not sure. I can't think off the top of my head of a pony with the same colour scheme (although I could go look...I can't think of any off the top of my head, they're all a shade or two out).
The Mimics I've had in my possession were all exactly the same colour, anyway. And I know people sometimes say she looks whiteish, but that's a trick of the lighting imo.
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Admittedly I've only ever had three or four in person, but I don't think there's a variation in her body colour so much as it's a really difficult colour to photograph well. It's a yellow-green colour, but the exact way to describe it otherwise, I'm not sure. I can't think off the top of my head of a pony with the same colour scheme (although I could go look...I can't think of any off the top of my head, they're all a shade or two out).
The Mimics I've had in my possession were all exactly the same colour, anyway. And I know people sometimes say she looks whiteish, but that's a trick of the lighting imo.
Only 3 or 4 she says. :rolleyes: But yeah, I hear ya on some ponies being difficult to capture the color of.
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I think I'm going to try to make one...I have an HQG1C blank in her pose laying around, and if I can get the green dye right I'm going to give it a go. While I'm still hoping to randomly find her in the wild for like, $1(keep dreaming, right?!), I'm not paying $400 for her on Ebay.
Can't wait to see
I'll post her for sure! I'm just really leery about getting the color right...usually when dyeing a pony I have another pony to compare it to so I know I get it right...wish I had a local friend I could borrow a Mimic from for a day! And Rit dye doesn't have a real great shade of green in their Dyemore arsenal...
There's an HQG1C Mimic (https://www.instagram.com/p/CH_ozYjAU-P/) custom on Instagram! Maybe you could ask them what combo they used for her?
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I think I'm going to try to make one...I have an HQG1C blank in her pose laying around, and if I can get the green dye right I'm going to give it a go. While I'm still hoping to randomly find her in the wild for like, $1(keep dreaming, right?!), I'm not paying $400 for her on Ebay.
Can't wait to see
I'll post her for sure! I'm just really leery about getting the color right...usually when dyeing a pony I have another pony to compare it to so I know I get it right...wish I had a local friend I could borrow a Mimic from for a day! And Rit dye doesn't have a real great shade of green in their Dyemore arsenal...
There's an HQG1C Mimic (https://www.instagram.com/p/CH_ozYjAU-P/) custom on Instagram! Maybe you could ask them what combo they used for her?
They did a spectacular job. If it weren't for the eyes, I'd have thought her a double.
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Admittedly I've only ever had three or four in person, but I don't think there's a variation in her body colour so much as it's a really difficult colour to photograph well. It's a yellow-green colour, but the exact way to describe it otherwise, I'm not sure. I can't think off the top of my head of a pony with the same colour scheme (although I could go look...I can't think of any off the top of my head, they're all a shade or two out).
The Mimics I've had in my possession were all exactly the same colour, anyway. And I know people sometimes say she looks whiteish, but that's a trick of the lighting imo.
Only 3 or 4 she says. :rolleyes: But yeah, I hear ya on some ponies being difficult to capture the color of.
3 or 4, including mine, in 25ish years? :) And honestly, all of them were at least 20 years ago xD.
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I think I'm going to try to make one...I have an HQG1C blank in her pose laying around, and if I can get the green dye right I'm going to give it a go. While I'm still hoping to randomly find her in the wild for like, $1(keep dreaming, right?!), I'm not paying $400 for her on Ebay.
Can't wait to see
I'll post her for sure! I'm just really leery about getting the color right...usually when dyeing a pony I have another pony to compare it to so I know I get it right...wish I had a local friend I could borrow a Mimic from for a day! And Rit dye doesn't have a real great shade of green in their Dyemore arsenal...
I picked up a neon green. Maybe if you combine it with pale or neon yellow? Mimic never seems to be one color anyway. I've seen her white tinted with green, honeydew green and a light sickly yellow.
I know, every picture I see of her looks different! The one on the wiki site looks almost neon, or at least a bright lime, but then some look whitish or almost yellow green, you are right. I chalked it up to differences in photography/lighting, like Taffeta mentioned, but fading could be a factor, too. Is your neon green Rit dye, or a different brand? I think I saw on their website they carry neon green in regular dye but not for synthetics, but it might still work. I thought about using Koolaid, but I've never heard of anyone using that to dye pony bodies, only hair, so I'm not sure. I'll have to try it on a bait pony first...
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I think I'm going to try to make one...I have an HQG1C blank in her pose laying around, and if I can get the green dye right I'm going to give it a go. While I'm still hoping to randomly find her in the wild for like, $1(keep dreaming, right?!), I'm not paying $400 for her on Ebay.
Can't wait to see
I'll post her for sure! I'm just really leery about getting the color right...usually when dyeing a pony I have another pony to compare it to so I know I get it right...wish I had a local friend I could borrow a Mimic from for a day! And Rit dye doesn't have a real great shade of green in their Dyemore arsenal...
I picked up a neon green. Maybe if you combine it with pale or neon yellow? Mimic never seems to be one color anyway. I've seen her white tinted with green, honeydew green and a light sickly yellow.
I know, every picture I see of her looks different! The one on the wiki site looks almost neon, or at least a bright lime, but then some look whitish or almost yellow green, you are right. I chalked it up to differences in photography/lighting, like Taffeta mentioned, but fading could be a factor, too. Is your neon green Rit dye, or a different brand? I think I saw on their website they carry neon green in regular dye but not for synthetics, but it might still work. I thought about using Koolaid, but I've never heard of anyone using that to dye pony bodies, only hair, so I'm not sure. I'll have to try it on a bait pony first...
It's Ritdye.
Post Merge: April 01, 2021, 05:03:46 PM
Admittedly I've only ever had three or four in person, but I don't think there's a variation in her body colour so much as it's a really difficult colour to photograph well. It's a yellow-green colour, but the exact way to describe it otherwise, I'm not sure. I can't think off the top of my head of a pony with the same colour scheme (although I could go look...I can't think of any off the top of my head, they're all a shade or two out).
The Mimics I've had in my possession were all exactly the same colour, anyway. And I know people sometimes say she looks whiteish, but that's a trick of the lighting imo.
Only 3 or 4 she says. :rolleyes: But yeah, I hear ya on some ponies being difficult to capture the color of.
3 or 4, including mine, in 25ish years? :) And honestly, all of them were at least 20 years ago xD.
4 score and 20 years ago, our Pony Peep Founders...
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I think I'm going to try to make one...I have an HQG1C blank in her pose laying around, and if I can get the green dye right I'm going to give it a go. While I'm still hoping to randomly find her in the wild for like, $1(keep dreaming, right?!), I'm not paying $400 for her on Ebay.
Can't wait to see
I'll post her for sure! I'm just really leery about getting the color right...usually when dyeing a pony I have another pony to compare it to so I know I get it right...wish I had a local friend I could borrow a Mimic from for a day! And Rit dye doesn't have a real great shade of green in their Dyemore arsenal...
There's an HQG1C Mimic (https://www.instagram.com/p/CH_ozYjAU-P/) custom on Instagram! Maybe you could ask them what combo they used for her?
Ooh, that's exactly what I was hoping mine would turn out like. I don't have an Instagram account, so I'm not sure I can ask them. I saw in the comments they said who the artist was, but it wasn't a link, just a name. If anyone who has an account can ask for me what dye they used, I'd be eternally grateful!
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wow that one is gorgeous!
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I find Mimic to be fascinating. I have always heard that her production run was small and that's even mentioned in her Wiki page, but I have always been weary of that. Has that ever been proven? And how would anybody know if it was smaller unless there's some fact based behind it? Somehow this rumor got started that her production was smaller and that may be the case, but I agree that Quackers and Bright Eyes probably had the same number and they don't go nowhere near as much as Mimic does.
Mimic is definitely not as rare as people make her out to be. There's three listings of her on Ebay right now (going for $700, $900, and over $1,000!!!) I find there's usually at least one listing of her on Ebay. I know because I'll check periodically out of curiosity to see how much she's going for.
Mimic is an athletically pleasing and interesting pony. You never see that yellow-green color on any other pony. I almost think she could fit in with the Tropical Ponies with her colors and parrot symbol. Of course, her name would have to be changed to Rain Forest or Island Bird or something like that!
Anyone lucky to have had Mimic as part of their childhood collection? Anyone have her and are willing to disclose how much they paid for her? Anyone looking to get her and willing to disclose how much they would pay for her? I'd pay $50 for her, but let's honest: Mimic would never be up for only $50 dollars and even if she started that low, the price would climb astronomically! So basically what I'm saying is that Mimic will never be part of my collection!
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I find Mimic to be fascinating. I have always heard that her production run was small and that's even mentioned in her Wiki page, but I have always been weary of that. Has that ever been proven? And how would anybody know if it was smaller unless there's some fact based behind it?
It has never been proven.
As far as I can tell, it's an assumption someone came up with to explain why Mimic was expensive. Somewhere along the line it went from, maybe she was shortpacked, to she must have been shortpacked, to she was definitely shortpacked so fewer of her exist. But there has never been anything concrete to back this up. As someone mentioned, the Hasbro catalogue talks about this set being distributed in boxes of 24. It's not stated that any of the ponies were disproportionately packed (although I have a catalogue which does specify when this happens). Mimic's set contains 6 ponies. 24/6 is 4. It makes sense that 4 of each pony was sent in each box, and to date there is no evidence anything else happened.
It's really not that unusual for something without any basis to become 'fact' over a number of years. People leave the community, new people come in, and the information doesn't get transmitted quite properly.
Wiki also is not an entirely reliable source at times. It does contain hearsay and it does contain errors. It's created by humans, and humans make mistakes.
Back in the late 1990s, when information about ponies outside the US was really a new concept, about 50% of the material circulating as 'fact' was entirely made up. Things like the existence of a white haired Posey variant, for example. There's nothing concrete to support such a thing, just a lot of faded poseys that showed up at carboot sales. People assumed they must be variants and some unscrupulous folks decided to make money off it by selling it as an actual variation. So people believed in it and paid money for it - despite it being entirely false.
I think the Mimic being shortpacked rumour is the same, only without the actively malicious intent behind it. Mimic was always expensive even back in the 1990s, and at the time the feeling seemed to be that it was because she was in the animation. But when you have a pony who has been expensive for 20+ years, and a community where most of the members have not been online for all that time, you end up with newer collectors inheriting the damage created by the previous generation xD.
And so here we are.
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With Transformers from the same period, Hasbro often shortpacked the characters that were reissued from the previous year. It'd make sense if they did this for MLP too, considering how uncommon the curly-haired year 3 versions of Applejack/Bowtie/Firefly/Medley are compared to other ponies from their set (even if you just account for the US market). If that was the case for the year 5 TE set, Speedy would've been the shortpacked one, Mimic was one of the new characters for the year. Then again, it's not impossible that due to her color scheme she was not expected to be a big seller compared to say, Locket (I have a feeling pink ponies were basically never shortpacked. If anything there might've been one extra of them compared to the others). But even then that alone wouldn't make Mimic special enough to warrant all this hype.
There are a lot of factors as to why things have turned out this way with Mimic, which is difficult to grasp right away when you're new to the community. Which is why a lot of new collectors always assume Mimic must've had a more limited distribution, since that's most logical, simplest explanation. So it's unfortunate that MyLittleWiki just straight up states that this was the case, without providing any evidence for it. When you've been collecting for a while you start realizing that rare doesn't equal expensive. There are some things that are incredibly rare, but not sought after by many and doesn't demand high prices. Mimic seems like a pony a lot of collectors are eager to add to their collection, but I'm speculating she's also one that quickly gets sold again when someone is in need of funds or want to downsize their collection. Hence why we see so many up for sale and being sold all the time.
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Yeah, what Lilja said.
On the shortpacking of the rereleases - it's also as possible that they weren't shortpacked, but that they sold in smaller quantities because they had already been successful in a previous year and kids already had them. Unfortunately it's impossible to know with Speedy as she's not the variant, both US releases are the same across the two sets :/ but it would be interesting if there is actual evidence of shortpacking the re-releases. It would make some sense to do that...but...yeah.
I guess you could have extra of Locket because she's pink, so more Lockets than Speedys - but is Locket more common than Tic Tac Toe? Unfortunately you can't compare Locket to Mimic because unlike Mimic, Locket was sold across a more global area. So there will always be more Lockets than Mimics because of that fact. And we don't know how she was packed in those places. I do have scans for the 1987 UK catalogue for Hasbro - seems to just say 24, like the US catalogue, without mentioning separate quantities.
It's all so very muddled by this point - I'm not sure we'll ever know for sure unless someone finds an unopened Hasbro case of 1987 TEs. xD.
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It's all so very muddled by this point - I'm not sure we'll ever know for sure unless someone finds an unopened Hasbro case of 1987 TEs. xD.
Oh, if only! :biggrin:
Basically as far we know, every factor that might make Mimic rarer than any other TE also applies to Bright Eyes and Quackers. What we're left with is that Mimic was the only one out of these three to appear on the cartoon. She's not the only Year 5 pony to get a brief appearance, but there might've been something special about her depiction and the episode itself that made it stick out in people's minds. And there's been some mythos building around her in the collector community ever since it was first formed on the early internet.
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It's all so very muddled by this point - I'm not sure we'll ever know for sure unless someone finds an unopened Hasbro case of 1987 TEs. xD.
Oh, if only! :biggrin:
Basically as far we know, every factor that might make Mimic rarer than any other TE also applies to Bright Eyes and Quackers. What we're left with is that Mimic was the only one out of these three to appear on the cartoon. She's not the only Year 5 pony to get a brief appearance, but there might've been something special about her depiction and the episode itself that made it stick out in people's minds. And there's been some mythos building around her in the collector community ever since it was first formed on the early internet.
I think so.
But all I remember my trade partner saying to me in 1997 when she acquired my Mimic for me was that she was a bit more sought after as a lot of people wanted her. I associated that with the cartoon representation because it made her stand out, but that also may be assumption.
Also the range of ponies we knew about was much less than it is now, so ponies like Mimic were existing status symbols from the dominant US line. This was still the time when european ponies were selling and trading for silly money ($300 for baby AJ anyone?), but that was pretty recent to 1997. WHen I came online then, a lot of ponies, like the Mountain Boys etc were not widely known about and were just rumours. I have a letter from my trade partner thanking me for sending her photos of some of those ponies as she'd never seen them before. Mimic's sought after status must have come about pretty early into online collecting. And it makes sense that when people first got online, they'd maybe try to collect ponies from the TV series...
Mimic and SS Twilight both meet that criteria :/ Although others in Twilight's set are also quite expensive. Bright Eyes went through a phase of being more expensive but seems to have dropped off (unless she's gone up again?)...whereas Mimic kind of held firm.
Perhaps it's the fact she did hold firm through all the madness around international ponies that has made her such a collecting icon. But it's probably also the idiotic Church of the MOC Mimic that didn't help dispel the idea of her being special.
Edit: Pulling out my trade partner's letter - dated August 20th, 1997 - she mentions Mimic. She says,
"I have ordered a Mimic from another collector here so that I will have one for you. Unfortunately it is not in very good condition but it is one of the more hard to find ponies so I thought that I should buy it anyway."
So that's from the very early days - my trade partner considered her 'hard to find' even in 1997.
I don't know if it adds anything, but still :)
As I mentioned before, she actually was in decent condition - just ink on the hooves.
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Hm yeah, could someone w/ an account edit that bit out of Mimic's article? I'd do it myself but I don't have an account on there; maybe it could just be rewritten to make it clear that's speculation and not proven fact?
Going off this thread, I think the Mimic "thing" is a combination of lots of factors:
- possibly lower distribution of TE wave 2 in general (shops not ordering as many since they still had plenty of wave 1 left, etc) as well as some countries maybe getting more of that wave than others
- definitely think the "Mimic is a status symbol" thing is a factor
- I could believe she was slightly shortpacked due to her colour (green toys not generally selling as well, for whatever reason), but there doesn't seem to be much evidence for that one
- self-fulfilling prophecy (we all say she's rare/desirable/pricy/etc so she is)
- time - G1s in general have been going up in price lately, I guess it's to be expected this many years after their initial release. plus again, all the years of her being touted as The Rare One are going to take their toll
- think her cartoon appearance is probably a factor too, or at least I think it was in the beginning, back in the early days of pony collector... dom (?? words), not so much nowadays
Did I miss anything?
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I got rapunzel before I got mimic hahah XD she isn’t worth the hype IMO
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@Taffeta Bright Eyes ping pongs all over the place. I've seen her for as low as $35, to as high as $70.
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Oh goodness, I hope we don't see Bright Eyes and Quackers, or even Tic Tac Toe skyrocket in the future...they are on my want list and and hope I don't regret not paying the $30-$70 people want for them now instead of the $200 they might be next year... :cry:
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Oh goodness, I hope we don't see Bright Eyes and Quackers, or even Tic Tac Toe skyrocket in the future...they are on my want list and and hope I don't regret not paying the $30-$70 people want for them now instead of the $200 they might be next year... :cry:
Unintentional pun there??
I'm not so surprised about Bright Eyes. She always seemed to be hit and miss on the price depending who was buying. Quackers it usually depends on the whiteness - also don't see her come up MOC that often either?
I doubt TTT will go through the roof though. Unlike the others she had a more global release.
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Oh goodness, I hope we don't see Bright Eyes and Quackers, or even Tic Tac Toe skyrocket in the future...they are on my want list and and hope I don't regret not paying the $30-$70 people want for them now instead of the $200 they might be next year... :cry:
Unintentional pun there??
I'm not so surprised about Bright Eyes. She always seemed to be hit and miss on the price depending who was buying. Quackers it usually depends on the whiteness - also don't see her come up MOC that often either?
I doubt TTT will go through the roof though. Unlike the others she had a more global release.
Yeah Bright Eyes and Quackers can be hard to find in good condition. When I was collecting last summer they were available but not in great condition. With the prices so high i doubt i'll replace the ones i've sold. I always end up selling the more expensive ponies whenever I need money anyway -_-
Sometimes i think it's more about the hunt for me.
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Oh goodness, I hope we don't see Bright Eyes and Quackers, or even Tic Tac Toe skyrocket in the future...they are on my want list and and hope I don't regret not paying the $30-$70 people want for them now instead of the $200 they might be next year... :cry:
Unintentional pun there??
I'm not so surprised about Bright Eyes. She always seemed to be hit and miss on the price depending who was buying. Quackers it usually depends on the whiteness - also don't see her come up MOC that often either?
I doubt TTT will go through the roof though. Unlike the others she had a more global release.
It was sort of intentional. I realized it as I typed the word, and almost said something about it, but didn't because I tend to get wordy, and figured I'd leave it to see if anyone caught it. Glad someone did!
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Admittedly I've only ever had three or four in person, but I don't think there's a variation in her body colour so much as it's a really difficult colour to photograph well. It's a yellow-green colour, but the exact way to describe it otherwise, I'm not sure. I can't think off the top of my head of a pony with the same colour scheme (although I could go look...I can't think of any off the top of my head, they're all a shade or two out).
The Mimics I've had in my possession were all exactly the same colour, anyway. And I know people sometimes say she looks whiteish, but that's a trick of the lighting imo.
You know when you visit a hardware store (such as B&Q in the UK) and the paint section has this area with those little colour-swatch cards?
It might be a fun challenge for our lucky Mimic owners to visit their store and post photos of the closest-match of these colour-cards (with the colour code reference number) against their version of Mimic?
Imagine if Pantone had a shade called "Mimic"! LOL
It would be great for folk who want to make a paint-custom to have a better idea on what shade & hue to aim for :)
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Hm yeah, could someone w/ an account edit that bit out of Mimic's article? I'd do it myself but I don't have an account on there; maybe it could just be rewritten to make it clear that's speculation and not proven fact?
I'm running off to work right now, but I caught this and edited the article. Left the sought after part there as she is... well, sought after. We're just not sure why. :lol:
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Admittedly I've only ever had three or four in person, but I don't think there's a variation in her body colour so much as it's a really difficult colour to photograph well. It's a yellow-green colour, but the exact way to describe it otherwise, I'm not sure. I can't think off the top of my head of a pony with the same colour scheme (although I could go look...I can't think of any off the top of my head, they're all a shade or two out).
The Mimics I've had in my possession were all exactly the same colour, anyway. And I know people sometimes say she looks whiteish, but that's a trick of the lighting imo.
You know when you visit a hardware store (such as B&Q in the UK) and the paint section has this area with those little colour-swatch cards?
It might be a fun challenge for our lucky Mimic owners to visit their store and post photos of the closest-match of these colour-cards (with the colour code reference number) against their version of Mimic?
Imagine if Pantone had a shade called "Mimic"! LOL
It would be great for folk who want to make a paint-custom to have a better idea on what shade & hue to aim for :)
That would be helpful! I suppose hardware stores are all regional and vary by country, but if multiple people living in various countries did it, we could all get our perfect match. Call it the 'Mimic Paint-Chip Challenge'!
I had a disastrous dye experiment yesterday trying to get that color right, and 2 bait ponies sacrificed their remaining beauty for science (Rit Neon Green is NOT neon green! :mad:). I'm back to the drawing board for ideas to get this pony the color I need her to be. :huh:
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Admittedly I've only ever had three or four in person, but I don't think there's a variation in her body colour so much as it's a really difficult colour to photograph well. It's a yellow-green colour, but the exact way to describe it otherwise, I'm not sure. I can't think off the top of my head of a pony with the same colour scheme (although I could go look...I can't think of any off the top of my head, they're all a shade or two out).
The Mimics I've had in my possession were all exactly the same colour, anyway. And I know people sometimes say she looks whiteish, but that's a trick of the lighting imo.
You know when you visit a hardware store (such as B&Q in the UK) and the paint section has this area with those little colour-swatch cards?
It might be a fun challenge for our lucky Mimic owners to visit their store and post photos of the closest-match of these colour-cards (with the colour code reference number) against their version of Mimic?
Imagine if Pantone had a shade called "Mimic"! LOL
It would be great for folk who want to make a paint-custom to have a better idea on what shade & hue to aim for :)
That would be helpful! I suppose hardware stores are all regional and vary by country, but if multiple people living in various countries did it, we could all get our perfect match. Call it the 'Mimic Paint-Chip Challenge'!
I had a disastrous dye experiment yesterday trying to get that color right, and 2 bait ponies sacrificed their remaining beauty for science (Rit Neon Green is NOT neon green! :mad:). I'm back to the drawing board for ideas to get this pony the color I need her to be. :huh:
Yeah, I found that out the hard way, as I'm doing a custom. After multiple dunkings, her hair is just pale green. Phooey!
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Admittedly I've only ever had three or four in person, but I don't think there's a variation in her body colour so much as it's a really difficult colour to photograph well. It's a yellow-green colour, but the exact way to describe it otherwise, I'm not sure. I can't think off the top of my head of a pony with the same colour scheme (although I could go look...I can't think of any off the top of my head, they're all a shade or two out).
The Mimics I've had in my possession were all exactly the same colour, anyway. And I know people sometimes say she looks whiteish, but that's a trick of the lighting imo.
You know when you visit a hardware store (such as B&Q in the UK) and the paint section has this area with those little colour-swatch cards?
It might be a fun challenge for our lucky Mimic owners to visit their store and post photos of the closest-match of these colour-cards (with the colour code reference number) against their version of Mimic?
Imagine if Pantone had a shade called "Mimic"! LOL
It would be great for folk who want to make a paint-custom to have a better idea on what shade & hue to aim for :)
That would be helpful! I suppose hardware stores are all regional and vary by country, but if multiple people living in various countries did it, we could all get our perfect match. Call it the 'Mimic Paint-Chip Challenge'!
I had a disastrous dye experiment yesterday trying to get that color right, and 2 bait ponies sacrificed their remaining beauty for science (Rit Neon Green is NOT neon green! :mad:). I'm back to the drawing board for ideas to get this pony the color I need her to be. :huh:
Yeah, I found that out the hard way, as I'mdoing a custom. After multiple dunking, its just pale green. Phooey!
It's weird, almost like the dye wasn't mixed well, even though I shook it up. I tried both a white bait and a yellow bait, but it didn't take to either very well. It looked an uneven aqua-ish green until I washed them off, and then most of the dye came off, leaving the palest tint that was not anything close to neon. Weirder still, the dye water I dumped out looked yellow! I dipped a corner of a microfiber diaper liner in to check what it would look like on cloth, and it was various shades of blue, yellow and green. I thought my dye was defective, but if yours wasn't neon either then it must just be that way. Either way, I'm glad I didn't just blindly throw my expensive HQG1C pony in there!
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Here is a moment of silence for poor Goody Scumdrop and Crud-ershy, who will live out the rest of their lives as Swamp Ponies! (The hind legs of the white pony are a different color due to a different failed dye experiment a few weeks ago...the whole pony went into the neon dye, not that you can tell!)
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Admittedly I've only ever had three or four in person, but I don't think there's a variation in her body colour so much as it's a really difficult colour to photograph well. It's a yellow-green colour, but the exact way to describe it otherwise, I'm not sure. I can't think off the top of my head of a pony with the same colour scheme (although I could go look...I can't think of any off the top of my head, they're all a shade or two out).
The Mimics I've had in my possession were all exactly the same colour, anyway. And I know people sometimes say she looks whiteish, but that's a trick of the lighting imo.
You know when you visit a hardware store (such as B&Q in the UK) and the paint section has this area with those little colour-swatch cards?
It might be a fun challenge for our lucky Mimic owners to visit their store and post photos of the closest-match of these colour-cards (with the colour code reference number) against their version of Mimic?
Imagine if Pantone had a shade called "Mimic"! LOL
It would be great for folk who want to make a paint-custom to have a better idea on what shade & hue to aim for :)
That would be helpful! I suppose hardware stores are all regional and vary by country, but if multiple people living in various countries did it, we could all get our perfect match. Call it the 'Mimic Paint-Chip Challenge'!
I had a disastrous dye experiment yesterday trying to get that color right, and 2 bait ponies sacrificed their remaining beauty for science (Rit Neon Green is NOT neon green! :mad:). I'm back to the drawing board for ideas to get this pony the color I need her to be. :huh:
Yeah, I found that out the hard way, as I'mdoing a custom. After multiple dunking, its just pale green. Phooey!
It's weird, almost like the dye wasn't mixed well, even though I shook it up. I tried both a white bait and a yellow bait, but it didn't take to either very well. It looked an uneven aqua-ish green until I washed them off, and then most of the dye came off, leaving the palest tint that was not anything close to neon. Weirder still, the dye water I dumped out looked yellow! I dipped a corner of a microfiber diaper liner in to check what it would look like on cloth, and it was various shades of blue, yellow and green. I thought my dye was defective, but if yours wasn't neon either then it must just be that way. Either way, I'm glad I didn't just blindly throw my expensive HQG1C pony in there!
visitors can't see pics , please register or login
(https://postimg.cc/FYTY3wpB)
Here is a moment of silence for poor Goody Scumdrop and Crud-ershy, who will live out the rest of their lives as Swamp Ponies! (The hind legs of the white pony are a different color due to a different failed dye experiment a few weeks ago...the whole pony went into the neon dye, not that you can tell!)
I had that same exact problem, with it washing out and leaving only a faint tint. I dipped a piece of paper towel in, to see what color it would dry, and it was somewhere between neon and mint. l wish I could get my money back. The dye was a lie. The neon Easter dye I bought did a better job then that. Geeze! Wish I'd saved some.
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Admittedly I've only ever had three or four in person, but I don't think there's a variation in her body colour so much as it's a really difficult colour to photograph well. It's a yellow-green colour, but the exact way to describe it otherwise, I'm not sure. I can't think off the top of my head of a pony with the same colour scheme (although I could go look...I can't think of any off the top of my head, they're all a shade or two out).
The Mimics I've had in my possession were all exactly the same colour, anyway. And I know people sometimes say she looks whiteish, but that's a trick of the lighting imo.
You know when you visit a hardware store (such as B&Q in the UK) and the paint section has this area with those little colour-swatch cards?
It might be a fun challenge for our lucky Mimic owners to visit their store and post photos of the closest-match of these colour-cards (with the colour code reference number) against their version of Mimic?
Imagine if Pantone had a shade called "Mimic"! LOL
It would be great for folk who want to make a paint-custom to have a better idea on what shade & hue to aim for :)
That would be helpful! I suppose hardware stores are all regional and vary by country, but if multiple people living in various countries did it, we could all get our perfect match. Call it the 'Mimic Paint-Chip Challenge'!
I had a disastrous dye experiment yesterday trying to get that color right, and 2 bait ponies sacrificed their remaining beauty for science (Rit Neon Green is NOT neon green! :mad:). I'm back to the drawing board for ideas to get this pony the color I need her to be. :huh:
Yeah, I found that out the hard way, as I'mdoing a custom. After multiple dunking, its just pale green. Phooey!
It's weird, almost like the dye wasn't mixed well, even though I shook it up. I tried both a white bait and a yellow bait, but it didn't take to either very well. It looked an uneven aqua-ish green until I washed them off, and then most of the dye came off, leaving the palest tint that was not anything close to neon. Weirder still, the dye water I dumped out looked yellow! I dipped a corner of a microfiber diaper liner in to check what it would look like on cloth, and it was various shades of blue, yellow and green. I thought my dye was defective, but if yours wasn't neon either then it must just be that way. Either way, I'm glad I didn't just blindly throw my expensive HQG1C pony in there!
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(https://postimg.cc/FYTY3wpB)
Here is a moment of silence for poor Goody Scumdrop and Crud-ershy, who will live out the rest of their lives as Swamp Ponies! (The hind legs of the white pony are a different color due to a different failed dye experiment a few weeks ago...the whole pony went into the neon dye, not that you can tell!)
I had that same exact problem, with it washing out and leaving only a faint tint. I dipped a piece of paper towel in, to see what color it would dry, and it was somewhere between neon and mint. l wish I could get my money back. The dye was a lie. The neon Easter dye I bought did a better job then that. Geeze! Wish I'd saved some.
I am planning of making a custom Mimic as well in the near future. To me it seems that her colour is mainly neon yellow with a hint of neon green. I am thinking of experimenting with the colour on white cloths first until I get it right, then on a bait, and finally on the HQG1C pony. Once I have the results of my experiment I will let you know :) (although it might take a while)
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@Nienor: Yes, please do let us know if you try it! I see on their website that Rit has a neon yellow available, although I didn't see that one at the craft store when I went there the other day. I've also been researching Dharma acid dye, which is supposed to work on synthetics, but I haven't heard of anyone using it for ponies yet. They have several greens on their website that might be okay, although the 'Radioactive' color that appears to be the most likely candidate, seems to be sold out.
@LaW: I never thought about Easter Egg dye! I never did buy any this year...I'll have to check if any stores have any leftover. At least it would be on clearance if they do!
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If I was to describe Mimic's colours in terms of anything specific, it kind of makes me think that she's the colour of one of those chalky fizzy sweets if they made one in lime or lemon/lime. That's a really unhelpful description, I know, but she's always felt like that's the kind of colour she is.
I've seen her colour described as chartreuse, neon green, yellow-green, pastel green, pistachio.
I am not sure which of those is most applicable...
Maybe I'll get mine out with some similar shaded ponies and see if I can create a pony rainbow.
She's definitely not yellow. But she's also not a convincing green either. She's...Mimic-colour.
Edit -ok, this is a super bad picture because the sunlight in my room doesn't want to be cooperative, but the closest colour match I found was the blind bag pony sitting on her leg. I don't know the name, someone else will - but her colour, while slightly greener, is the closest shade to Mimic in my collection as far as I can see. I'm only sharing the picture so that someone can ID what the blind bag pony is, if it's helpful.
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The Tootsies in the image are Basic Fun and Spanish, not regular.
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If I was to describe Mimic's colours in terms of anything specific, it kind of makes me think that she's the colour of one of those chalky fizzy sweets if they made one in lime or lemon/lime. That's a really unhelpful description, I know, but she's always felt like that's the kind of colour she is.
I've seen her colour described as chartreuse, neon green, yellow-green, pastel green, pistachio.
I am not sure which of those is most applicable...
Maybe I'll get mine out with some similar shaded ponies and see if I can create a pony rainbow.
She's definitely not yellow. But she's also not a convincing green either. She's...Mimic-colour.
Edit -ok, this is a super bad picture because the sunlight in my room doesn't want to be cooperative, but the closest colour match I found was the blind bag pony sitting on her leg. I don't know the name, someone else will - but her colour, while slightly greener, is the closest shade to Mimic in my collection as far as I can see. I'm only sharing the picture so that someone can ID what the blind bag pony is, if it's helpful.
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The Tootsies in the image are Basic Fun and Spanish, not regular.
Blind bag pony is Wave 6 Peachy Sweet! :)
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If I was to describe Mimic's colours in terms of anything specific, it kind of makes me think that she's the colour of one of those chalky fizzy sweets if they made one in lime or lemon/lime. That's a really unhelpful description, I know, but she's always felt like that's the kind of colour she is.
I've seen her colour described as chartreuse, neon green, yellow-green, pastel green, pistachio.
I am not sure which of those is most applicable...
Maybe I'll get mine out with some similar shaded ponies and see if I can create a pony rainbow.
She's definitely not yellow. But she's also not a convincing green either. She's...Mimic-colour.
Edit -ok, this is a super bad picture because the sunlight in my room doesn't want to be cooperative, but the closest colour match I found was the blind bag pony sitting on her leg. I don't know the name, someone else will - but her colour, while slightly greener, is the closest shade to Mimic in my collection as far as I can see. I'm only sharing the picture so that someone can ID what the blind bag pony is, if it's helpful.
visitors can't see pics , please register or login
The Tootsies in the image are Basic Fun and Spanish, not regular.
Thanks for posting this! She does look a little close-colored to the bottom Tootsie, at least the way the light hits them in the pic. Hopefully somebody can identify the little blind bag pony!
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Yes, she seems to be somewhere between yellow and green, so playing with a mix of those two colours should be the key.
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If I was to describe Mimic's colours in terms of anything specific, it kind of makes me think that she's the colour of one of those chalky fizzy sweets if they made one in lime or lemon/lime. That's a really unhelpful description, I know, but she's always felt like that's the kind of colour she is.
I've seen her colour described as chartreuse, neon green, yellow-green, pastel green, pistachio.
I am not sure which of those is most applicable...
Maybe I'll get mine out with some similar shaded ponies and see if I can create a pony rainbow.
She's definitely not yellow. But she's also not a convincing green either. She's...Mimic-colour.
Edit -ok, this is a super bad picture because the sunlight in my room doesn't want to be cooperative, but the closest colour match I found was the blind bag pony sitting on her leg. I don't know the name, someone else will - but her colour, while slightly greener, is the closest shade to Mimic in my collection as far as I can see. I'm only sharing the picture so that someone can ID what the blind bag pony is, if it's helpful.
visitors can't see pics , please register or login
The Tootsies in the image are Basic Fun and Spanish, not regular.
Blind bag pony is Wave 6 Peachy Sweet! :)
Peachy Sweet?! She sounds like she belongs on the post about the Society for Ponies with Non-indicative Names! Hasbro seems to have a thing for making peach-themed ponies that don't actually have any peach coloring on them. Sorry for the off-topic comment...couldn't resist.
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If I was to describe Mimic's colours in terms of anything specific, it kind of makes me think that she's the colour of one of those chalky fizzy sweets if they made one in lime or lemon/lime. That's a really unhelpful description, I know, but she's always felt like that's the kind of colour she is.
I've seen her colour described as chartreuse, neon green, yellow-green, pastel green, pistachio.
I am not sure which of those is most applicable...
Maybe I'll get mine out with some similar shaded ponies and see if I can create a pony rainbow.
She's definitely not yellow. But she's also not a convincing green either. She's...Mimic-colour.
Edit -ok, this is a super bad picture because the sunlight in my room doesn't want to be cooperative, but the closest colour match I found was the blind bag pony sitting on her leg. I don't know the name, someone else will - but her colour, while slightly greener, is the closest shade to Mimic in my collection as far as I can see. I'm only sharing the picture so that someone can ID what the blind bag pony is, if it's helpful.
visitors can't see pics , please register or login
The Tootsies in the image are Basic Fun and Spanish, not regular.
Blind bag pony is Wave 6 Peachy Sweet! :)
Peachy Sweet?! She sounds like she belongs on the post about the Society for Ponies with Non-indicative Names! Hasbro seems to have a thing for making peach-themed ponies that don't actually have any peach coloring on them. Sorry for the off-topic comment...couldn't resist.
Your not wrong. Lol
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Definitely more gooseberry than peach.
...Maybe that's Mimic's colour. Gooseberry.
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Hm yeah, could someone w/ an account edit that bit out of Mimic's article? I'd do it myself but I don't have an account on there; maybe it could just be rewritten to make it clear that's speculation and not proven fact?
I'm running off to work right now, but I caught this and edited the article. Left the sought after part there as she is... well, sought after. We're just not sure why. :lol:
Awesome, thank you! <3
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Update: I experimented a bit with different dye colours to create my custom mimic. First, I tried the neon Rit dyes (a combination of neon yellow and neon green) on a custom blank pony. Unfortunately this type of dye does not seem to work. I ended up boiling the pony for 1 hour within the dye until it had some colour and of course the pony was burnt by then. I believe that the issue was that this type of dye is for fibres that contain up to 35% synthetic materials, so not ideal for ponies. I then tried the Rit dye for synthetic fibres, although they do not come in neon colours, so I tried a combination of the daffodil yellow and the peacock green colours. I did not boil the pony this time, but had a stainless steel bowl on low heat instead. Fortunately, I tried it on the burnt pony from the previous experiment, because this one was a failure as well, as I probably put too much dye and the end result was a khaki-green-coloured pony. At the final attempt, I used the neon colours again with a tiny bit of the synthetic colours on a new custom blank pony, which worked, although most probably it was the synthetic colours that did the work. I think the result is quite good and the colour seems very close to that I see online. I included a link with a picture, although I think the colour seems more yellowish than it actually is.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XB4wDVAACrtBDef-P8Mz9vAD39nq3BTe/view?usp=sharing
Some tips in case you want to experiment as well: 1. use just a little bit of dye (better to submerge the pony a couple of times than to end up with a very dark colour), 2. I suggest to use a ratio of about 1:10 (G:Y) of green and yellow, although you might want to try out different ratios, 3. do not boil the water- heat the water in low heat instead, 4. as the first attempt might be a failure, you might want to get a spare or two of blank ponies, or experiment on a white bait first.
Hope this helps :biggrin:
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Update: I experimented a bit with different dye colours to create my custom mimic. First, I tried the neon Rit dyes (a combination of neon yellow and neon green) on a custom blank pony. Unfortunately this type of dye does not seem to work. I ended up boiling the pony for 1 hour within the dye until it had some colour and of course the pony was burnt by then. I believe that the issue was that this type of dye is for fibres that contain up to 35% synthetic materials, so not ideal for ponies. I then tried the Rit dye for synthetic fibres, although they do not come in neon colours, so I tried a combination of the daffodil yellow and the peacock green colours. I did not boil the pony this time, but had a stainless steel bowl on low heat instead. Fortunately, I tried it on the burnt pony from the previous experiment, because this one was a failure as well, as I probably put too much dye and the end result was a khaki-green-coloured pony. At the final attempt, I used the neon colours again with a tiny bit of the synthetic colours on a new custom blank pony, which worked, although most probably it was the synthetic colours that did the work. I think the result is quite good and the colour seems very close to that I see online. I included a link with a picture, although I think the colour seems more yellowish than it actually is.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XB4wDVAACrtBDef-P8Mz9vAD39nq3BTe/view?usp=sharing
Some tips in case you want to experiment as well: 1. use just a little bit of dye (better to submerge the pony a couple of times than to end up with a very dark colour), 2. I suggest to use a ratio of about 1:10 (G:Y) of green and yellow, although you might want to try out different ratios, 3. do not boil the water- heat the water in low heat instead, 4. as the first attempt might be a failure, you might want to get a spare or two of blank ponies, or experiment on a white bait first.
Hope this helps :biggrin:
Thank you! The khaki color was what I was hoping to avoid with the synthetic colors...that was why i was hopeful about the neon colors. I didn't realize you could actually burn the pony...I'm lucky that didn't happen to the one I tried (I made a post about my Mimic-dye experimentation in the HQG1C forum somewhere), since I did the exact same thing you did with the mixture of neon green and yellow dyes, and left her in for close to an hour! I got the pony to take the color, but it looks more like a mint green.
Guess I'll pick up a bottle of the synthetic Peacock color and see if I can tweak something to look like yours...I already have the Daffodil. Thank you for posting these tips and ratios, it is helpful!
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I found some "Mimic" swatches at B&Q, there are some fun colour names here!
Problem: I do not own an original Mimic, so cannot do a proper comparison!!
oh no, imgur has changed, cannot get a link to the foto, will try to see if I can edit this post later...