How Boxel Studio Used Beeble SwitchLight for AI-Powered Footage Relighting in Superman & Lois Season 4

By Hoon Kim | Beeble AI

At Boxel Studio, the fusion of technology and creativity is core to everything they do. As the film and television landscape rapidly evolved over the past two years, the team saw a clear opportunity: machine learning was no longer just a concept—it was becoming a key driver in transforming visual effects workflows.

Eager to stay ahead of the curve, Boxel invested heavily in research and development, exploring new tools that could elevate both quality and efficiency. One standout among these innovations was Beeble SwitchLight. From the first interaction, its potential was undeniable. The technology quickly became a powerful extension of Boxel’s compositing toolkit, redefining how they approached footage virtualization and advanced relighting across complex sequences.

We had the privilege of seating with Andres Reyes Botello and Freddy Chavez Olmos to talk more about this technology and its impacts at Boxel.

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Q: Can you introduce yourselves and your roles at Boxel Studio?
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Andrés Reyes Botello:
Founder/ Head of Studio

I oversee both the creative vision and production execution across our VFX and animation divisions. My role involves ensuring that we deliver high-quality work on time and on budget, while maintaining strong alignment with our clients throughout the process.

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Freddy Chavez Olmos:
Creative Director for Innovation & Artificial Intelligence

My focus is on researching, evaluating, and implementing new technologies that enhance our VFX and animation pipelines. I work closely with our artists and technical teams to make sure these tools are integrated in ways that are both creative and practical.

Q: What’s your history in the VFX industry?

Andrés:

Boxel has been part of the VFX industry for over 15 years. What makes our approach somewhat unique is reflected in our motto: “Storytellers by heart, image engineers by craft.” We’ve always viewed VFX as a digital manufacturing process, where creativity meets structure. Our mission is to support the story and amplify the director’s vision — but we’re also very conscious of production realities. We aim to build pipelines that are efficient, scalable, and financially responsible. This philosophy has helped us maintain long-standing relationships with clients like Netflix, Paramount, Apple+, Disney, Amazon, CBS, and Nickelodeon.

Freddy:

I’ve been in the VFX industry for over 15 years. I began my career as a VFX compositor and gradually moved into supervision roles, working on blockbuster films and high-end television series. What’s always driven me is the intersection between visual storytelling and emerging technology — finding ways to push the craft forward while staying grounded in narrative. That’s exactly what I focus on now at Boxel through our AI and Innovation division: identifying and implementing tools that meaningfully enhance our creative workflows.

Q: Can you give a brief explanation of your work on Superman & Lois?

Andrés:

On Superman & Lois, Boxel was brought on to handle a wide range of visual effects — from full CG environments, digital doubles, and creature animation to FX like energy blasts, destruction, environmental augmentation, and final compositing.
We had the privilege of working closely with the producers and showrunners, which allowed us to align creatively and contribute to what I believe is one of the most compelling portrayals of Superman on television in recent years.

Q: Have you used Beeble in any other projects?

Freddy:

Yes, we’ve been gradually integrating Beeble into several of our projects. Initially, we used it in more contained scenarios like green screen driving comps, where fast and flexible relighting made a noticeable difference. But Superman & Lois was the first time we fully implemented Beeble’s SwitchLight tool for more complex creative relighting — particularly in superhero FX sequences. It gave us a new level of flexibility in look development without the overhead of traditional render iterations.

// VFX CREATIVE WORKFLOW WITH BEEBLE SWITCHLIGHT

Q: What sparked the idea to use Beeble SwitchLight more creatively on Superman & Lois?

Freddy:

When we introduced the tool internally to our comp supervisor, Enrique Sandoval, we realized that SwitchLight was essentially performing what we call “footage virtualization.” It generates AOV-like passes — normals, albedo, specular, and roughness — directly from the live-action plate. That allowed our artists to relight scenes interactively inside Nuke without needing CG geo or digi-doubles. Once we saw how powerful and flexible that could be, we knew it had potential to completely change how we approached certain shots.

Original Plate

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Andrés:

Exactly! Understanding the amount of labor that typically goes into integrating 3D elements — from camera tracking to geo-tracking just to get interactive lighting FX — this kind of task would’ve made the added work almost prohibitive in both cost and time. But when that first SwitchLight test came through and we saw the quality and speed of execution, it was a no-brainer. It gave us a clear path to elevate the visual look of the show without impacting the schedule.

Q: How did the team react to this innovation?

Andrés:

When we showed the results to Matt Gore, the VFX Producer on Superman & Lois, he was happily surprised. He’s always looking for ways to boost the production value of the show while staying realistic about the financial constraints. What this meant was that we could now create truly intricate interactive lighting — like relighting the edges of Superman’s eyes for his laser vision, simulating subsurface glows, or making characters react to nearby explosions — all with more realism and without the need for complex 3D setups. It brought a new level of integration to our shots.
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Freddy:

And from the artists’ perspective, it was a game-changer. Suddenly our compositing team had direct creative control over lighting — without going back to rendering or requiring additional passes. It really helped tighten the feedback loop and empowered the team to iterate faster and more freely.

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Q: What challenges did this help solve?

Andrés:

One of the biggest challenges on Superman & Lois is speed of delivery. We’re often handling hundreds of shots that need to be finaled in under three weeks. SwitchLight’s ability to virtualize footage and generate lighting control AOVs almost instantly is second to none. It removed the need for rotomation or geo-tracking entirely — which saved a huge amount of time and labor. That let us keep the look sharp while moving quickly.

Freddy:

It also solved a creative constraint. Without the pressure of long render cycles or complicated 3D setups, our team could really explore lighting as a narrative tool — not just a technical task. And that made a big difference in the emotional tone and polish of many of the shots we delivered.

// BOXEL & BEEBLE SWITCHLIGHT

Q: How did you find out about Beeble?

Freddy:

At the beginning of 2023, I came across Beeble SwitchLight, which was originally designed as a relighting tool for single-image portraits, mostly targeting social media creators. But right away, I saw the potential it had for high-end VFX. I started running internal tests and reached out to Hoom Kim, Beeble’s co-founder, to discuss how the tool could evolve to serve the needs of visual effects professionals.


Andrés:

Freddy brought SwitchLight to our attention, and we immediately saw the promise. We reached out to Hoom, who was incredibly open and receptive. That led to deeper conversations about tailoring the tool for production-level VFX workflows. At SIGGRAPH 2023 in LA, we had the chance to meet Hoom in person, and that was really the start of a great relationship between Beeble and Boxel.

Q: When did you start using it and why?

Freddy:

Right after I joined Boxel Studio in 2023, SwitchLight became one of the first tools I helped integrate into our pipeline. We began beta testing new features and doing focused R&D to understand its broader applications. It quickly proved itself as a powerful way to give compositors more control, particularly when working with live-action plates that require footage object masking.

Andrés:

As Freddy mentioned, once we understood its potential, SwitchLight became one of the first machine learning–assisted tools we used in real production. Initially, it was incredibly effective for green screen driving comps. Since then, it’s become a go-to solution for a much broader range of compositing work thanks to its advanced footage virtualization capabilities.

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Q: What are the main uses of SwitchLight at Boxel?

Freddy:

A significant part of our work involves compositing characters shot on green screen into CG environments or matte-painted backgrounds. SwitchLight gives our artists the power to relight those characters directly in comp, eliminating the need to go back to 3D for minor lighting adjustments. It’s a game-changer in terms of efficiency and creative control.

Andrés:

As we’ve mentioned, SwitchLight has become a core part of our compositing toolkit. Today, we’re using it not just for green screen integration, but for tasks that involve complex footage manipulation, interactive lighting FX, and even subtle work that requires complex masking. It’s allowed us to solve creative challenges in ways that weren’t feasible before.

Q: Have you tried SwitchLight 2.0? If so, how did you find it?

Freddy:

Yes, we’ve been actively evaluating and integrating SwitchLight 2.0 into our pipeline. The improvements in AOV generation, UI responsiveness, and overall usability have made it even more artist-friendly.

Andrés:

And what’s been truly valuable is the openness of Hoom and the Beeble team. They’ve built a genuine collaboration with us. We’re constantly giving feedback, and they actually listen and implement. That level of responsiveness has not only made the tool better, but has made using it a great experience.

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Q: Are you using Beeble on future projects?

Freddy:

We’re excited to already be using Beeble across multiple upcoming TV, film, and animated projects currently in production.

Andrés:

It's part of our standard compositing workflow now. Whether we're working on a superhero show, a drama, or a hybrid stylized CG/live-action show, Beeble has become one of the tools our team relies on daily.

Get to know more about Beeble at www.beeble.ai

Superman & Lois Season 4 - All Episodes Streaming Now on HBO Max