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Ten different painters have told me ten different answers. Concerning specifically the Vega nose,
(bumper and brackets removed) where the header panel and grill meet the headlight buckets on either side, these are all tight joints, no gap. If these are painted before assembly, the paint is sure to scratch during the assembly. If the paint goes on after assembly, the tight seam is certain to fill in with paint and clear. I'm a novice at autobody repair and painting which is a trade in itself. Half of the painters I have spoken with have dogged out the Nason brand which is what we are using and so far has produced acceptable results.

I'm not sure if this will work for your application but years ago I had some insurance damage on the front of my Monza (Urethane nose, quad light car). What the body shop did to prevent paint bridging the seam where the fender meets the urethane nose is install the nose and then just slacken the fasteners off just enough to stick a small wood spacer to keep the two part spaced apart and then after paint they just pulled the wood spacer out and tightened the fasteners back up.

~ Remembering the "GT" stripe around the wheel wells and along the rocker panel, since this is going to be a Brilliant crystal pearl black- an '08 Mopar color, the doors will have to be mounted to get the reverse paint mask properly aligned. Body pieces will be 2020 Soul red crystal, a Mazda color, clear coat bumped with a little extra ruby flake before final pure clearcoat.
~ What is gonna suck is that the bumpers and trim, new carpet, seats, interior, and glass have to go in after paint without damaging it....after having it towed to my home shop...again.

I have used Nason, no complaints, nice results and has held up well.

cjbiagi wrote:I have used Nason, no complaints, nice results and has held up well.

Nason is an okay quality durable paint but their single stage urethane is a bear to buff out. Also their hardener is stupidly high priced, and the paint is getting that way, too, for what it is, which is a lower end paint.

I always paint the parts like you mentioned separately on the cars I do. I take great care in reassembling them so don't have any issues with scratching. If I do have a situation where a part might get scratched on reassembly I put a layer or two of green 3M masking tape on it where I think it might get scratched and make sure I can pull it all off after assembly (not put it somewhere where it gets sandwiched between two panels).

This is what works for me, but I've been doing it for a long time now.