Marvelous Custom Spotlight #1: 4 Spider-Man Customs by Valenzze.

Ryno - March 10, 2007

Welcome to the very first edition of Marvelous Custom Spotlight where we take a very special in-depth look at an outstanding Marvel custom figure and the customizer who created it.

We are kicking off Marvelous Custom Spotlight with yes, the web-slinger himself Spider-Man in not one but four incarnations created by Valenzze. Featured today are Black Costume Spider-Man, Scarlet Spider, Ben Reilly Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2099.

Here is what the customizer Valenzze had to share about his customs.: For years we have gotten many incarnations of Spider-Man's varied costumes in Toybiz's Spider-Man Classics line, but none have been definitive. As Spidey is my all-time favorite super hero, I hoped throughout the years for more accurate or posable versions. When I heard Hasbro was taking over the license and issuing Spider-Man Origins, I eagerly awaited their showing at SDCC last year. They didn't quite deliver enough for me, so I did what many customizers do—I decided to make my own. These were mostly repaints using the Parachute Spidey body—the perfect lean, athletic, well-proportioned Spidey base with no sculpted-on webs. I did mod them by insetting the "melon" shoulders so that they had a more natural look.

Scarlet Spider needed some chest and ankle sculpting, as well as a belt. I used sheet styrene for the belt and buckle. The front web cartridges are rolled ApoxieSculpt. The back cartridges are from the Face-Off Punisher's belt. I repurposed the old ToyBiz Scarlet Spider's wrist web shooters but glued their ends together so there was no gap. I printed out Testors custom water decals I drew on my computer and used them for the front and back spiders on his sculpted hoodie. I also used them to delineate the edges of his eyes and painted the red to their edges. The hoodie strings are also ApoxieSculpt (and fragile).

For Symbiote/Secret Wars Spider-Man, I painted the white areas white, drybrushed the musculature then applied decals that outlined the front and back spiders, the eyes, and the white trapezoids on his hands. Then I painted the rest of him in gloss black, for that shiny, creepy alien look.

The Ben Riley Spider-Man uses a Parachute Spidey base with sculpted-on wrist web shooters and hand-painted webbing. The eyes are decals. He was hard to find good reference for because the artists who drew him wouldn't draw his costume the same way within even the same issue, so I chose the one that was the most predominant. I stayed away from the Bagley style of the eyes taking up 90% of the mask face. I enlarged slightly the Scarlet Spider's eyes, but not Spider-Ben's. His are the "standard" size I would like on my traditional red & blue Spider-Man.

Spider-Man 2099 uses an XMC Archangel frame (same shoulder mod) because it's not Peter Parker (or a clone of his) underneath that costume. I cut off his ears and sculpted a mask over his face. His red parts were decals, but because of the way I did them (not printing them out with a blue background surrounding them), I had to repaint them anyway. So the decals ended up being just a guide. He has kid-unsafe elbow spikes sculpted from FixitSculpt, which no mass-market produced figure would be allowed to have "You'll put your eye out!"). After i sculpted them I drilled a little hole for each one in the elbow plastic and superglued them in. I used the Toybiz 2099's web cape because I thought it looked better then the Hasbro one, tacked on to his back with a couple of pins and super glue.

These customs would not have been completed without the following resources:
Testors ModelMaster Acryl paints
Testors custom decals and sealer
A really fine Golden Eagle 10/0 liner brush from Micromark.com
My Pasche VL airbrush
Spiderfan.org for the costume reference material

Please be sure to click "View All Images" below to see all the photos for this Marvelous Custom.

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Comments...

Last 10 comments - ( Read All Posts )

Pedrozd - 2009-02-11 @ 4:30 am

nice work!

Valenzze - 2007-03-16 @ 5:06 pm

Sorry folks, but I don't sell my figures or do commissions.

Ryno - 2007-03-14 @ 1:19 am

haha, ya put me down for one of all four! (dreaming...)

Ghosts of Razgriz - 2007-03-13 @ 12:53 am

Do you take commissions? I would love to have a Ben Reilly spider-man like that for myself

snowman81 - 2007-03-12 @ 4:26 pm

Very impressive stuff. :)

nagauthier - 2007-03-12 @ 3:49 pm

Definitely better than the crappy Hasbro on the Spidey 2099 and black costume. The others were nice improvements over the old TB versions too.

Marvel_Joe_Spider - 2007-03-12 @ 3:21 pm

That is some pretty sweet stuff

Blackheart - 2007-03-11 @ 4:11 pm

Great customs. I've been longing for an ML style Ben Reilly costume for ages. That and the Scarlet Spider customs are awesome. :)

iammingy - 2007-03-11 @ 3:56 am

I think the article states that I made them myself. I drew them all in Adobe Illustrator and printed them out on the special Testors decal paper. I am a Graphic Designer/Illustrator by trade.

Oops, I did it again... haha :D

No wonder the decals look so good on the figures!!! Good job!

Thanks. And yes, I was thinking of doing them as well. @Spidey@

Cool! I am looking forward to them! :)

pastwatch2001 - 2007-03-11 @ 2:49 am

I wonder where he got the decals... or he just made them himself? :)
I think the article states that I made them myself. I drew them all in Adobe Illustrator and printed them out on the special Testors decal paper. I am a Graphic Designer/Illustrator by trade.
All of them look perfect to me!
EDIT: Since this customizer is so good at making Spider-man custom....now I really wanna see him making Iron Spider-man and Armored Spider-man!!! :P
Thanks. And yes, I was thinking of doing them as well. @Spidey@

Awesome work! I just started getting into making my own customs and this only makes me want to try harder. Thanks for sharing your work with us. :)

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