 Development of the film began with the cancellation of Spider @-@ Man 4 in 2010 , ending director Sam Raimi 's Spider @-@ Man film series that had starred Tobey Maguire as the titular superhero . Columbia Pictures opted to reboot the franchise with the same production team along with James Vanderbilt to stay on with writing the next Spider @-@ Man film while Alvin Sargent and Steve Kloves helped with the script as well . During pre @-@ production , the main characters were cast in 2010 . New designs were introduced from the comics , such as artificial web @-@ shooters . Using Red Digital Cinema Camera Company 's RED Epic camera , principal photography started in December 2010 in Los Angeles before moving to New York City . The film entered post @-@ production in April 2011 . 3ality Technica provided 3D image processing , and Sony Pictures Imageworks handled CGI . This was also the final American film to be scored by James Horner and released during his lifetime , before his death in 2015 from an aircraft accident . 
