Set decorator Roger Christian found the handles for the Graflex Flash Gun in a photography shop in Great Marlborough Street, in London's West End.

Adding a few "greebles" (surface details), Christian managed to hand-make the first prototype of a lightsaber prop for Luke Skywalker before production began.

Once Lucas felt the handle was up to his standards, it went to John Stears to create the wooden dowel rod with front-projection paint so that the animators would have a glow of light to enhance later on in post production.

Due to lack of preparation time, Christian's prototype and a second spare were used for the shooting in Tunisia, where filming on Star Wars began.

Lucasfilm showed Shin the finished product, having followed his suggestions to use an X-Acto knife to give the lightsaber a very sharp look, and to have sound accompany the weapon's movements.

Additionally, in several spin-off series such as The Clone Wars and Rebels, special variants of the lightsaber have been depicted - such as the lightsaber-blaster wielded by Ezra Bridger.

The Star Wars expanded universe adds several lightsaber types, including short[24] and dual-phase (adjustable length) weapons.

[25][26] In Star Wars Rebels, Ezra Bridger's original lightsaber is a hybrid that features a fully functional blaster pistol built into the handle.

Kylo Ren, introduced in The Force Awakens, uses a lightsaber that features two crosshilt blades, giving it the appearance of a greatsword.

Mace Windu's purple-bladed lightsaber, as first seen in Attack of the Clones, was requested by the actor Samuel L. Jackson, who believed the color, which is his personal favorite, would make his character be easily recognized among other Jedi.

In the book Star Wars: Ahsoka and the comic series Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Sith, it is shown that dark side users remove the crystal from a defeated Jedi's lightsaber and concentrate Force energy on it to break its connection to the light side, a process known as "bleeding" to create a red crystal.

It subsequently appears briefly in the hands of Moff Gideon in the season one finale of The Mandalorian, to whom Kryze had previously surrendered the weapon.

The technical lightsaber choreography for the original Star Wars trilogy was developed by Hollywood sword-master Bob Anderson.

Anderson's role in the trilogy was highlighted in the film Reclaiming the Blade where he shared his experiences as a fencer developing the lightsaber techniques for the three original movies.

The lightsaber duels in the Star Wars prequel trilogy were specifically choreographed by stunt-coordinator Nick Gillard to be miniature "stories".

"[citation needed] In writing the prequel trilogy, George Lucas said he wanted the lightsaber combat to be "reminiscent of what had been done in the previous films but also something that was more energized.

So with Obi-Wan Kenobi, for instance, he's got a very business-like style—when he was younger he could border on the flashy and might twirl his lightsaber a bit, because he was taught by Qui-Gon.

Melding them together is the difficult part—to move from a Kendo style to, say, rapier requires a complete change in body and feet movement, and this must look effortless.

The show is present at the Rebels stage next to Star Tours – The Adventures Continue attraction at Disney's Hollywood Studios and at the Tomorrowland Terrace at Disneyland.

Additionally, Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser has incorporated lightsaber training for each guest aboard the spacecraft during their stay.

The training is led by the Saja cast members and teaches the fourth form of lightsaber combat, Ataru, to the guests.

[47] The virtual reality rhythm game Beat Saber involves the player using two lightsabers in order to slash a series of oncoming cubes.

In Jim Butcher's Dresden Files novel series, medical examiner and Star Wars fan Waldo Butters wields one of the three holy Swords of the Cross, which re-fashions itself into a lightsaber upon accepting him as its owner.

In Yuya Sato's Danganronpa: Togami light novel trilogy, main antagonist Orvin Elevator / Kazuya Togami wields a lightsaber built into their prosthetic arm, to which they are berated for copyright infringement by Genocider Syo / Genocide Jack; in the anime Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope's Peak High School, this same lightsaber is instead depicted as a flaming mechanical katana wielded by Kyosuke Munakata.

Prior to the seventh generation, there were also a few earlier Star Wars games that used gesture-based control to simulate lightsaber combat, such as the two bonus levels of the arcade game Star Wars Trilogy, where the player controls Luke Skywalker as he wields his lightsaber against Boba Fett and Darth Vader in Return of the Jedi by pushing a joystick in one of eight directions to follow on-screen offensive and defensive cues,[49] and a TV game released around the time Revenge of the Sith came to theaters, titled Star Wars: Saga Edition – Lightsaber Battle Game, in which the player swings a lightsaber-shaped controller to deflect blaster bolts from infantry (such as battle droids and clone troopers) and duel against characters from across the saga.

By the time Disney purchased Lucasfilm, new technological advances made augmented reality possible, leading to the creation of some more notable motion-controlled lightsaber video games that took advantage of that feature.

One of them came in the form of a special activity mode in the official Star Wars fan app on iOS and Android in which players use their smartphone's motion sensors to practice and master blaster deflection with a training droid (which appears on the phone's rear camera), similar to the deflection training exercises featured aboard the Millennium Falcon in A New Hope, while progressing through the ranks of the Jedi or Sith order.

Another is in Star Wars: Jedi Challenges, which works with a Lenovo Mirage AR headset, a tracking sensor and a dedicated lightsaber controller that launched in December 2017.

One of the multiple game modes available in Challenges, which was jointly developed by Disney and Lenovo, enables players to confront Star Wars villains in lightsaber duels, such as Darth Maul and Kylo Ren.