Best of Sketchfab: Toys

Before I applied to work at Sketchfab three years ago, I didn’t have much experience in the 3D world. To learn more about 3D scanning, I explored my parents’ house for something worthy of scanning into 3D immortality. Eventually, I found myself deep in the basement, digging through my childhood toys. With that, my first upload to Sketchfab was a Trnio scan of my Mighty Morphin’ Power Ranger Megazord. There is probably more to my hiring, but I think the glory of my scan really sealed the deal and got me the job.

Today, I’m still here, helping Sketchfab users upload their own work. And when I’m not working from my home office, I’m building my own side business (Flipshark Figures), buying action figures and stuffed animals from thrift stores and selling them on the Internet.

With all that being said, I thought, why not highlight what I know best—toys. Let’s explore what the Sketchfab community has done to take their childhood toys to the next dimension.

1998 TMNT Party Wagon Toy by Javi Garcia

Before the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers blasted onto the scene, I loved another bunch of butt-kickin’ heroes—the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Being a group of good guys, they were immediately collectible and every kid needed a way to cart them all around. Enter one of their coolest vehicles—the Party Wagon! This model makes great use of animated elements, showing off all the moving parts of the vehicle. Plus, Javi (javiryo) took advantage of the default environment choices (found in 3D Settings), making it look like the Party Wagon rolled out of the box and onto the living room table.

1980’s Lego Spaceman Set by James Culley

LEGOs never made it to my living room table, but they were perfect for sprinkling all over the carpeted basement floor. I had tons and I’m not the only one. They still hold their value today and they’re even sold at random, by the pound, on the Internet! They’ve been a classic toy for decades and this model features the classic LEGO Minifigure design with some fly 1980s spaceman attire.

Mario Themed Tamagotchi by atomicpang

Before anyone even dreamed that our phones would fit into our pockets, we kids had video games. The 1990s were the era of the Nintendo Gameboy and Super Mario was king. But as the decade came to a close, another Japanese toy would capture childrens’ attention, the Tamagotchi. Sketchfab user atomicpang created a hybrid of both games with this submission to osidinum’s 2019 Tamagotchi Twitter Challenge. The details are amazing, right down to the dirt on the piece itself and the Chain Chomp bead on the ball chain. It truly comes to life!

Pokemons in Your Bathroom by Akiko.Tomiyoshi

Just when the world thought Nintendo was falling back on the adventures of their flagship Italian plumber, they dropped an entirely new world on kids like me—Pokémon. Just like that, there was a whole bunch of pocket monsters unleashed on the world and you had to catch ‘em all! This Sketchfab model features Vaporeon relaxing in the bathtub and was inspired by artist @oshiruko_s2 on Twitter. I really like the depth and dimension that Akiko.Tomiyoshi was able to add to the scene with hanging plants and a bonus Pokémon in the background! Plus, it answers the age-old question, “What would it really be like to keep a Pokémon as a pet?”

Playstation 1 by Hyohnoo

The release of PlayStation 1 felt like a giant leap for gaming. As kids, we went from blowing in Nintendo cartridges to renting PlayStation discs from the local Blockbuster franchise. This PlayStation 1 model is a perfect pixelated representation of entering that digital universe. The voxel 8-bit style may not be as technically difficult as a fully-textured 3D model, but it brings me back to the days of tube televisions and Tetris blocks. Not only that, Hyohnoo makes great use of the solid color background to create a consistent style across his entire Sketchfab profile.