 The Vancouver branch of Sony Pictures Imageworks was responsible for the digital touch @-@ up . The group improved the sewer and high school battle scene with many of Spider @-@ Man 's poses and environments that were used in the film . The comic book was cited as a basic source for Spider @-@ Man 's poses . The visual designers helped bring the Lizard to life by first building a digital version of a production design maquette . Many of the staff were involved with the process . They also started by thinking about lizard biology and how his muscles would work . A large man referred to as " Big John " stood in as the character during shooting , performing much of the interaction with other characters . The computer @-@ generated Lizard replaced him in post @-@ production . The creators would then fuse the design of the Lizard with the actor Rhys Ifans . Ifans then used motion capture for the Lizard 's speaking parts , which Webb found challenging to incorporate into the character 's final version . 
