1989 Batman and his ride

wayouteast

Sr Member
As a celebration of the fact that the very best of all the Batmen (prove me wrong! ;)) may be returning to the cape and the cowl in the near future, I finally dug my AMT 1989 Batmobile out of the model stash and built it. Definitely the best Batmobile!

Sorry there's no 'build log' and in progress photos for this one... I just kind of went at it over a few days. This is the later version of the kit that has the resin Batman figure with it... and I thought I should hint at at least one of his classic foes as well! :D

There seems to be still some debate about the exact colour of the '89 Batmobile, and in fact it did get a repaint in a glossy all-over black between the first movie and Batman Returns. I read somewhere that the first iteration of it was painted in multiple coats of pearl laquer to resemble 'a beetle's wing' with red, blue and green iridescence. There's little sign of that on screen, but I really liked the idea, and I prefer the duller, more matt finish to the very glossy car in the second movie, so I opted to add very VERY subtle red, green and blue pearl over a matt black basecoat, red on the 'edges' and green and blue for the top and sides. It's barely noticeable, literally a single pass of the airbrush at a very light pressure, and the car appears a slightly satin black to the casual glance, but in certain lights the colours appear very subtly. I like the effect. From the first movie car I also kept the bronze turbo 'nose', intake scoop detail and wheel hubs, and the steel side panels, to give a bit more variety.

The car's headlights and rear lights are lit, as well as the rear exhaust and the cockpit. The cockpit has a total of 25 red, amber, green and white LED indicator lights in the dashboard and rear panels. The dials are all drilled out and backlit with UV LEDs and there's a flickering blue LED behind the monitor screen on the right of the dash to give the effect of images playing on the screen.

I managed to find a 3D file of a 'Gotham City' manhole cover (actually intended as a drinks coaster!) which, re-sized and printed, gave me a nice detail for the base's road surface. Add a penguin for Batman to glare at balefully (see what I did there?) and small rubber duck as a homage to the huge one in the second movie... and the model was complete.

All in all I think it turned out really nicely, and if nothing else it gave me an excuse to watch the movies again! :)

Batmobile-front.jpg Batmobile-side.jpg Batmobile-cockpit.jpg Batmobile-cockpit-2.jpg Batmobile-rear.jpg Batmobile-street-furniture.jpg
 
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