Adobe AfterEffects Tutorial: How to Create a Lightsaber Effect

Lightsabers are probably one of the coolest things movies have thought up of.  Even non Star Wars junkies would admit that lightsabers are cool.  With this tutorial, you will be able to edit your own footage and add a lightsaber effect.  Of course, as is with many things in computer art, there are a million ways to accomplish the same goal.  This guide is just one way to creating the lightsaber effect, I am in no way saying this is how the people at ILM did it for the Star Wars movies.  Another thing to note before diving into this tutorial is that knowing how to rotoscope is required.  Rotoscoping is, however, the way the people at ILM did the lightsabers for the original three Star Wars movies.

Step 1: Masking
This tutorial will assume that you have footage of someone with a prop stick acting as the lightsaber.  As mentioned earlier, you will need to know how to rotoscope, and that is the first step.  Rotoscope the movement of the prop stick that will eventually be the lightsaber.  For the sake of the tutorial, I will call the original footage comp "Original".

Step 2: Make a new Comp
After you have finished making your mask, create a new composition.  Name this comp "Lightsaber Effect".  Once that is done, add a solid white layer to this comp and copy and paste the mask from Original to the solid white layer.  This should mask out most of the viewable surface and leave  you with what would look like a white stick. The white will end up being the core of the lightsaber.

Once that is done, add two more solid layers.  The color of these layers should be the color of the lightsaber that you want.  For example, if you want a red lightsaber, make both layers red.  For this tutorial, that's the color I will be using. After you have created both red layers, copy and paste the mask from Original to both layers.

The reason for two layers of the same color is to add volume to the color.  You can try making the lightsaber with just one layer, but eventually, after the lightsaber effect as been added, it will look transparent.