CASE STUDY
Building the Ultimate Lightsaber Studio for KR Sabers
Richard Payne
Published : 22th September 2026
The Origin Story
What begins as a teenager tinkering in a bedroom occasionally spirals into an international enterprise. For Khal, Director of KR Sabers, it started at age 19 as a pure hobby building lightsabers and sharing the projects online.
Over time, the demand for these wonderfully accurate recreations of film history eclipsed the hours in a standard working week. Khal quit his day job to focus entirely on KR Sabers. Today, the company operates its own dedicated technical centre, manufactures highly complex hilts and components, and has cultivated a fiercely loyal community of over 100,000 followers.
As the business matured, so did the audience's appetite for behind-the-scenes content. Khal realised the need to regularly showcase product development, manufacturing, assembly, and new launches. However, assembling a temporary camera rig every time a new lightsaber needed demonstrating was becoming a severe bottleneck. Furthermore, capturing the product accurately presented a unique set of optical headaches.
He approached ProAV to design a permanent, multi-camera studio that could handle the unique demands of a Star Wars-themed technical workspace.
The Challenge: A Cinematographer's Worst Nightmare
Filming a high-end lightsaber replica is objectively difficult. You are essentially asking a camera to simultaneously capture an intensely bright, self-illuminating column of light alongside intricately machined, highly polished, reflective metal surfaces. Often this includes an illuminated internal chassis, all within the same frame.
Beyond the dynamic range challenge, the operational brief was strict: Khal is a manufacturer first and a content creator second.
"The main goal was to produce higher-quality content for our customer base," Khal explains. "We have a lot happening at our technical centre, so having a permanent multi-camera setup gives us a much more professional and efficient way of sharing that with our audience. That’s insanely valuable when video production is only a small part of what I tend to do."
The setup needed to be "always on" and entirely seamless, allowing Khal to sit down, hit record, and instantly capture isolated angles without touching a light stand.
The Solution: Compact Optics and Seamless Control
ProAV recognized that a Blackmagic Design ecosystem would perfectly serve Khal's need for high image quality, remote control, and effortless post-production.
The Camera Payload
The visual core of the studio relies on three Blackmagic Micro Studio Camera 4K G2 units, paired with Panasonic 12-35mm lenses.
These were chosen for two highly specific reasons:
1. Form Factor: The incredibly compact size of the Micro Studio cameras eliminated the need for heavy, intrusive grip equipment. They could be easily rigged for the crucial overhead "workbench" shots alongside wider presenter angles, and easily repositioned for creative b-roll.
2. Dynamic Range: The sensors are uniquely adept at handling the extreme contrast of the lightsabers, retaining detail in the glowing blades without plunging the presenter into total darkness.
The Nerve Centre
To tie the room together, ProAV specified the ATEM SDI Extreme ISO. By running SDI cabling in and out of the Micro Studio Cameras, the ATEM provides Khal with seamless, centralized control over camera exposure, colour settings, and recording. Crucially, the "ISO" capability means every individual camera feed is recorded simultaneously to affordable media. Khal can simply capture a session and drop the neatly organized, synchronized files right into his editing timeline.
Illuminating the Dark Side
To control the reflections on the polished metal hilts, ProAV supplied a couple of iFootage Anglerfish PL1 80BN panel and an iFootage Angelfish 60DN backlight. This combination washes the presenter and the desk in a diffused, soft front light while providing an optional hair-light or background fill to separate Khal from the set, allowing the sabers to pop visually without blowing out the shot.
The Impact: Workflow, Streamlined
The new studio has transformed how KR Sabers produces content, removing the friction between building a product and sharing it with the world.
"For me, one of the biggest advantages is how much it streamlines the entire workflow," notes Khal. "Rather than having to set everything up from scratch each time I want to film something, I can essentially sit down, hit record and know that everything is already organised and working together nicely. When I’m ready to edit, all of the footage is there for me."
More importantly, the investment on the Micro Studio Cameras paid off beautifully against the harsh lighting demands of the sabers.
"The image quality has genuinely exceeded my expectations," Khal says. "I’ve been really impressed with how well the cameras handle everything. I’m already thinking about adding a few more!"
While the studio is currently used for pristine pre-recorded YouTube content, the ATEM SDI Extreme ISO ensures KR Sabers is entirely future-proofed for live broadcasting when the time comes to launch their next flagship hilt to a global audience.
To see the studio setup in action and explore the sabers, visit: KR Sabers on YouTube