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[Tellusora]

(Disclaimer: Nothing sexual, nothing too personal, and nothing intimate. If this thread seems inappropriate in any way, feel free to lock it or remove it)

What I've been wondering about for a while now is the height and weight of the QC cast, and how they measure up to one another. For example, exactly how thin IS Marten? I'm pretty thin myself, and I'd love to know.

So what do you guys think? Height and weight only guys. =P

[Blood-Tree]

I would guess that Marten is about average height, which means 5' 10", and if that's true then Dora is probably about average as well, which would mean 5' 4".

If you can figure out the height of those two then you can extrapolate everyone else; Faye's a few inches shorter so maybe 5' 1"?

[Omega Entity]

Is 5'4" average for a woman? That seems a bit short to me. Also, Dora appears to be almost the same height as Martin - she's always struck me as being tall and lithe.

[Tellusora]

So I've been looking through a few comics and I've found that:

Steve is taller than Marten by about an inch, who is the same height as Hannelore
Marten approximately the same height as Dora, both of whom are taller than Faye.
Marigold is the same height as Faye.

I don't think any character other than Tai is 5"1. That is seriously short.

[Barmymoo]

5'4" is the average height for British and American women, it is shorter than in some countries (for example Holland, I think). I don't think Faye is particularly short, it's never been commented on. I'm 5'3" and people are always pointing out that I'm short. So I'd suggest that everyone is a bit taller than has been suggested so far. My impression of Marten is that he's quite lanky.

[Near Lurker]

I would say Dora's above average height, and that Marten hasn't got a full six inches on her - 5'7"?  Hannelore's a little taller, I think - 5'8"?  Faye I'll say is 5'4", Marigold maybe 5'5", Raven 5'2", Tai, 5' even.  Penny's pretty tall, though a hair below Dora, it looks like - 5'6"?  Steve's a six-footer, and I'll say Angus is about 5'10".

Marten, I'd say, weighs around 150.  Steve probably about 190, Angus 170-180.  Dora, 120-130, Faye, 140, Marigold, 150-160, and I think Tai outright said once she weighed 100 lb.  Hannelore, 110 sounds about right, because she looks so emaciated.

[Redball]

and I think Tai outright said once she weighed 100 lb. 

I recall seeing Tai as slender, but, what with my BD and all, I remembered this http://www.questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=1914 and thought she'd put on some weight.

[Omega Entity]

Faye's maybe 2", 3" shorter than shorter than Dora, tops:

http://questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=2186

I still say Dora's about the same height as Marten...

http://questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=1965

...as is Hannelore, with Marigold being 4-5" shorter:

http://questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=2189

Steve is maybe an inch taller than Marten, but no more than that, I'd say:

http://questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=2174

Sven is much taller than Dora:

http://questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=2191

And of course, no one's disputing that Tai is tiiiiny:

http://questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=2106

So, if Marten is average height (I'd say, 5'10"), that puts them as follows:

Marten 5'10"
Dora 5'10"
Faye 5'7"
Hanners 5'10"
Steve 5'11"
Sven 6'6" (being generous)
Marigold 5'5"
Tai 5' (5'2", tops)

[Is it cold in here?]

I can't find it easily, but there's a strip in which Tai talks about how little it takes to get her drunk and may have mentioned her weight.

[Tellusora]

Do you really think there's a 40 pound difference between Hanners and Marten?
Marten looks incredibly skinny, as skinny as many of the women in the strip. Faye's arms/wrists are thicker than his.

I'm around Marten's height (5"9) and am 112 pounds (please don't rush to feed me).
Given how thin Marten looks, and how others have remarked on his weight, I think Marten should be much lighter than 150.
150 is actually a pretty average weight for a guy of his height. Of course, I'm judging with teenager-proportions, so I could be way off there.

[Omega Entity]

Women, however, generally have lower muscle mass and lower muscle density, which is why they often weigh (often much) less than men, inch for inch. men also have denser bones, which means more weight there, as well.

From Wikipedia:

Males weigh about 15 % more than females, on average. For those older than 20 years of age, males in the US have an average weight of 86.1 kg (190 lbs), whereas females have an average weight of 74 kg (163 lbs).[5]
On average, men are taller than women, by about 15 cm (6 inches).[1] American males who are 20 years old or older have an average height of 175.8 cm (5 ft 9 in). The average height of corresponding females is 162 cm (5 ft 4in).

[Tellusora]

First of all, I find it incredible that the average weight for a male of average height in the US is 86 kilos (190 pounds).
Doesn't that strike anyone as abnormally heavy? Yes, there's the obesity epidemic and all, but it's strange to find that that's the average. (I'm aware of the error of conflating average with normal)

Over here where I live, Marten's proposed weight of 68 kilos (150 pounds) is perfectly normal for a person of his height (who isn't overweight).

A 5"9/10 person who isn't underweight or overweight should be around 150 pounds.
Marten, thin as he is, strikes me as underweight, and should be somewhat lighter than that.

[Redball]

Yes, there's the obesity epidemic and all, but it's strange to find that that's the average.

Googling around the subject, that appears to be exactly the reason average U.S. weights are so high.

[Near Lurker]

It might just be my rather lofty perspective, but 190 seems a pretty good weight for an athletic man, although hardly a weight I'd aspire to myself.  I still think that's probably around Steve's weight, and Angus probably isn't that much smaller, although they are both visibly overweight.  Jimbo, though, has got to be at least 200, probably up around 220.

Ah - forgot Dale and Sven.  I'd say they're both around my height and weight, 6'2", 160 for Sven, 6', 170 for Dale.

[Jabberwocky]

Yes, there's the obesity epidemic and all, but it's strange to find that that's the average.

Googling around the subject, that appears to be exactly the reason average U.S. weights are so high.

I was shocked to find out that 50% of the population weighs more than the average person.   

[DSL]

I was actually told by a teacher once hat the average IQ in the US was 90 or thereabouts.
"So the average person is below average?"  I asked, not at all innocently.
"Yes," she said, in all seriousness.

This from someone who made fun of me in class for reading SF.

[Tellusora]

190 seems a pretty good weight for an athletic man

I'd agree in the case of Steve, who's quite well-built and athletic. Angus strikes me as pretty average, though I'd always imagined him to carry a little pudge on his tummy.

"So the average person is below average?"  I asked, not at all innocently.

I'd have wondered if this bright teacher would consider herself to be in the average category. Heaven forbid this was a maths class.
I read SF&F all the time in secondary school, and in class too! Always had to sneak it under the table. The one time I got caught was with a math teacher, reading a paragraph on physics and quantum leaps. She got quite into it, nodding all the while in agreement and handed it back to me happily. Wonderful woman.

[Redball]

This report http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/ad/ad347.pdf points out that mean weight for both U.S. men and women increased about 24 pounds from 1960-2000, and mean height for both increased an inch.

[Omega Entity]

Ah - forgot Dale and Sven.  I'd say they're both around my height and weight, 6'2", 160 for Sven, 6', 170 for Dale.

Looking at Sven compared to Dora, there's no way he's only 4" taller than she is; I'd put him at 6", at the very least.

[Carl-E]

Please remember the density of muscle.  Steve, who appears to exercise and stay fit post DoKYA, may well be a fit 180-190 for a near six footer.  Sven, taller (6'4"?) is probably muscularly unerdeveloped (he's a musician, after all...), so he may well be a few pounds lighter, despite being taller (170 or so?).  Marten could easily be under 150, dude's a bag of bones.  And Hanners, despite her height, is very slightly built, and through her OCD is probably malnourished, so a lower weight (110 - 120) is pretty likely despite her height.  Dora, of similar height, is probably heavier (130?) just from muscularity (I like the "lithe" description, it fits).  Faye is shorter, but voluptuousness requires more body fat, and that requires more leg muscle to get you around (not to mention killer glutes...), so she's probably a bit heavier than Dora. 


Pintsize weighs in at about 15 - 20 lbs (or the duct tape wouldn't work), and Winslow's a slim 6 lbs.  Momo's new chassis is probably about 80 lbs, comparable to Sam. 

Marigold?  Shorter, but probably a bit heavier than, Faye. 


Elliott's 240.  That man's a brick wall.  Just... big.  All over. 

[Tellusora]

Not so sure about Elliot being 240. Over 200 for sure, but only serious, supermuscle-y bodybuilders usually hit that weight. Excepting of course, the obese.

Carl-E, I like your numbers. They seem the most fitting/accurate so far.

Faye at 140-150?

On another note, is malnourishment a symptom/consequence of OCD? I can see how it could be, but wonder if it actually is a common occurrence among OCD folk.

[jwhouk]

FWIW, Doctor Case did allude to the fact they had to do some force-feeding of Hanners to keep her from starving.

[Boxilar]

Not so sure about Elliot being 240. Over 200 for sure, but only serious, supermuscle-y bodybuilders usually hit that weight. Excepting of course, the obese.

Carl-E, I like your numbers. They seem the most fitting/accurate so far.

Faye at 140-150?

On another note, is malnourishment a symptom/consequence of OCD? I can see how it could be, but wonder if it actually is a common occurrence among OCD folk.

I can defnately see Elliot being 240 or more. Muscle is heavy. It has always bugged me when reading fiction and you come across a description that gives a character "tree trunk legs" and "shoulders as wide as the doorway" and then the writer drops his weight as being "around 150".

[Carl-E]

 

I have't seen 150 since 6th grade...

Oh, except for the summer in college I lived on $50 a month.  Mac and cheese once a day...


But yeah, muscle's heavy.  I still sink in the swimming pool.  Most people peg me around 170-180, I'm over 200. 

[Tellusora]

The more I find out about other 'norms' of height/weight, the more I find myself doing this  o.O

Let's see...I was much tinier in 6th grade. Under 40 kilos (88 lbs) I should think. Now I regret not tracking my height-weight progression throughout the years.

Humour me a little: It's possible to sink in the swimming pool while holding your breath? I thought all the air would keep people afloat!

[Carl-E]

The buouancy of about a quart of air in the lungs is enough for most people, yes.  But not everyone.  I never got by swimming merit badge in scouts because I couldn't float for more than a few seconds with a lungful of air.  I'd drift straight to the bottom of the lake...

Fat is less dense than water and so it floats.  Muscle is a little more dense, and sinks.  I'm not sure about bone,  it's probably pretty close to the edge, I imagine people with bone density losses are more "floaty" than those without.  One of the tests for BMI is a floatation test (this is why the height/weight BMI charts are nonsense). 

Also, everyone floats in the dead sea and the great salt lake, The dissolved salt increases the water desity.  It's also easier to float in the ocean than in a lake or pool for that same reason. 

And the only reason I remember my height/weight from 6th grade (5'6", 150 lbs) is gym class.  I was the second tallest kid in school, and the second heaviest (the tallest and heaviest were not the same guy).  I spent years struggling with what was called a "weight problem" in those days (the early 70's).  I then stopped dead in my growth, and watched everyone pass me.  I picked up a inch to 5'7" at 25.  Suddenly, all my pants were too short...

The 50 pounds were picked up after I got married to a wonderful cook, who still hasn't figured out how to cook for fewer than 6 - 8 people...   

And I'm definitely more "floaty" than I used to be, I now can float in the ocean.  Makes it harder to find interesting shells on the bottom like I did when I was younger! 

[Redball]

I'm 5'10" and 180 pounds, a lot of that in my potbelly.
I could do a dead man's float in a swimming pool when I was 19, same height and 130 pounds -- lungs full of air, limp, face down, head mostly under water, knees naturally rising a little. (The rest of the exercise: I learned to push down with both hands, pushing my face out of the water, quickly exhale, inhale and relax back under water. You can stay afloat for hours that way.)
And I can still do it. If I exhale, I'll drop to the bottom of my pool.

[Near Lurker]

On another note, is malnourishment a symptom/consequence of OCD? I can see how it could be, but wonder if it actually is a common occurrence among OCD folk.

It can be, the same way their living spaces can look like hospital rooms or the Aegean stables.

[Akima]

One of the tests for BMI is a floatation test (this is why the height/weight BMI charts are nonsense).

Possibly terminology is different in the USA, but in Australia the floatation test is used to calculate Body Composition, and particularly Body Fat Percentage (%BF), rather than Body Mass Index (BMI). BMI is just a number relating height to body mass, and it needs to be interpreted intelligently with an understanding of its considerable limitations as a diagnostic tool:


BMI was originally intended for statistical studies, not clinical diagnosis, and its main virtue is ease of calculation. No competent medical professional should use it as the sole criterion for judging whether an individual is over or under weight. Simple height vs. weight tables are particularly potentially misleading when applied to athletes, children and adolescents (school nurses please note), elderly people, and people who are unusually short or tall because the height/weight ratio in BMI doesn't correctly reflect the way real human bodies "scale" (My hometown boy Yao Ming, pictured above, has a BMI of around 27. Overweight? Not so much, I think).

The criticism of BMI I read in forums like this one focuses entirely on the perception that BMI over-diagnoses overweight condition in fit muscular people, but BMI also under-diagnoses obesity in people with levels of body-fat strongly correlated with bad health outcomes. As the authors of the paper I link above put it:

"The implications of mislabeling patients are not trivial. By using BMI as a marker of obesity, we misclassify ≥ 50% of patients with excess body fat as being normal or just overweight and we miss the opportunity to intervene and reduce health risk in such individuals. Conversely, BMI may lead to misclassification of persons with normal levels of fat as being overweight, a fact that could cause unnecessary distress and prompt to unnecessary and costly interventions. In addition, such mislabeling has a deleterious effect on public trust for healthcare providers, particularly from fit patients with evident preserved muscle mass."

Having said all that, BMI is not without some value because of its simplicity. If you are a fairly sedentary urban adult, as opposed to an athlete or person engaged in heavy manual labour, and your BMI suggests that you are overweight (25+), you possibly are, and you should consider talking to your doctor about it. If your BMI is over 30 you probably are, and you definitely should.

I obviously spend way too much time around doctors...

[Lasttimeiposthere]

Just to further speculations, there are some "Word of God" statements about the characters respective height (taken from Jeph's tumblr) :

"Tai is short. I imagine her to be 5’2’ at most." (Question dump #43)

"I used to think she [Hanners] was the same height as Marten, but 
lately I feel like she might be a teensy bit taller than him. She’s 
gangly." (Question dump #14)

"[Hannelore is] Taller than Faye, about the same height as Marten, 
shorter than Sven." (ibid.)

"[Marten is] 5’8” - 5’10”, I think?" (Question dump #23)

[Is it cold in here?]

Welcome, new person!

Would you like to add that information to the character entries in the wiki?

[Omega Entity]

Saweet. That means my figuring is potentially pretty dead on.

[Lasttimeiposthere]

Isitcold... --> Sure, will do. Thanks for the welcoming.

Omega Entity --> Er...sorry ? (At least, you figures were very accurate !)

[Omega Entity]

Sorry for what? I'm just basking in the glow of potentially being right. It doesn't happen often