Knight Models Spider-Man [WIP - Assembly & Priming]

On account of my other projects stalling due to not yet having the correct acrylic paint colours at hand, I turned to assembling the Knight Models Spider-Man to get my hobby fix. As I haven't done much conversion projects, this miniature was actually one of the very few resin/metal combo kits that I have worked on. Spider-Man is wholly metal while the main body of the taxi is resin with metal trimmings comprising the side-view mirror, door handle and roof signage. All in all a cool model kit.

Dry-fitting Spider-Man on top of a taxi

Use of a taxi as Spider-Man's base was certainly an inspired choice because nothing says New York City like the yellow cab. After all in the Marvel Universe, Spidey is synonymous with the most populous city in the United States. Spidey' dynamic pose atop the taxi helps bring it all together.

Resin and metal parts of the Knight Models Spider-Man

Assembling the taxi can be considered tricky due to the small metal parts involved. But if you use the pure baking soda-super glue combo to help you out, the task then becomes much much easier. I used this very combo technique when gluing the side-view mirror and door handle to the taxi.

Base of the Knight Models Spider-Man miniature is a New York City taxi

Initially, I had some difficulty fitting Spider-Man on top of the taxi. But I then realised that Spidey was a metal miniature and thus his fingers could be bent and positioned so that they made optimal surface contact with the roof of the taxi (see topmost photo of this blog post).

Knight Models Spider-Man, assembled and awaiting a primer coat

A very dynamic pose as should be the case for Spidey

Itsy bitsy spider went up the water sprout ...

Top-back view of the Knight Models Spider-Man, with his costume's classic spider symbol

After patching up some small gaps in between the joints with a bit of Games Workshop green stuff, and a primer coat of black for the taxi and light grey for Spidey himself, I am all set to begin painting this model kit proper. Although priming the taxi black might have seemed counterproductive seeing that I am going to paint it yellow, I had needed the primer coat to be extra smooth to closely approximate the surface of a car's metallic bodywork. In the perennial trade off between smoothness and less work in layering in colours, a light grey primer was then an acceptable next best option for Spider-Man as having a less smooth primer coat was not an issue for Spidey's organic surface.

Filling the gaps (top row) and priming (bottom row)

Most likely I will start painting the taxi first before focusing on Spider-Man himself. Peter Parker was my favourite comic book hero as a child before I slowly gravitated more towards the X-Men as I grew older. But Spidey is still special to me and I plan to enjoy bringing him to life as a miniature.