Shadow Catcher - Matte Shadow

Development Rendering
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1

Hi,
I need help to create a shadow catcher in the Unreal Engine 4. How can I set up a plane which only shows the shadows on it? Is this possible? I have to use it for the integration of 3D objects in video footage.

Best regards, Andreas

2

I would also like to know the answer to this question :slight_smile: Maybe you could render against white and just screen overlay the shadow. And the rest you composite using alpha?

3

Has anyone found a solution to this?

4

Ditto. Would be very interested to see how this is done in Ureal.

5

Looking for a solution to this too to be used in AR. This is fairly easy to accomplish in Unity using a simple shader but we want to move our AR production to UE4.

6

Bump! Thats seems to be a long time ago question without any answer yet: Shadow catcher material for Image Based Lighting setups - Rendering - Unreal Engine Forums

https://forums.unrealengine.com/development-discussion/architectural-and-design-visualization/55466-shadow-catcher-setup?83999-Shadow-catcher-setup=

In the new UE4 4.17 version they added the Composure-Plugin. In the Tutorial is the ShadowCatcher Effect visible: Real-Time Compositing with Composure | Unreal Engine Documentation

Maybe some Part of the Sourcecode can help to come to a solution, but then again there will be some EULA issues…
https://github.com/EpicGames/UnrealEngine/tree/release/Engine/Plugins/Compositing/Composure/Source

7

Did you checked the ShadowPlane from the AugmentedUnreality Plugin? It kind of works, but i got the problem, that the plane is lit by the Directional Light to create the shadow. Because of that, the ShadowPlane is brighter or darker than my ImagePlate… Still looking for a solution for that…

8

Bump! Anyone got anything for this yet?

9

Bump Bump Bump!!!

10

I’m definitely interested in this too +1 Bump

11

Needing this right now!

12

I’m also really interested in a solution for that, used AugmentedUnreality Plugin but the shadow plane is let by the Light…which is not ideal.
Any news ?

13

This does not work for windows builds…

14

Well… I´m doing something where I have an unlit object with a texture and I need a shadow over that object…

15

the only different thing with respect the AR situation is thata I don´t have a camera feed as texture, but I assume that this has nothing to do with shadows

16

You have to use an unlit material on the shadow plane that has a properly UV mapped ARKit or ARCore camera nodes. Then enable cast modulated shadows on a stationary directional light. After that rebuild lighting and then switch to mobile preview so you can see the shadows in editor.

17

Are you doing augmented reality on Windows? Otherwise no, it won’t work on Windows.

18

Correct…

19

For a solution without the AugmentedUnreality Plugin take a look here:
https://forums.unrealengine.com/development-discussion/rendering/102794-shadow-catcher-possible-oo

20

Thanks for that, I´ll check it! :slight_smile:

But in any case, we should have this type of shader in UE4 already, it exists in Unity since the first time the HTC Vive were released with the first photogrammetry demos, and as of today, photogrammetry is pretty important in many situations, and we cannot use it correctly because the lack of this type of shader.

Cheers!