Volume Shadow Shading

Updated: 22 Sep 2025

Light particles using shadow volumes.

Method #

This node shades particles using a shadowing function from the point of view of a Light Node connected to the Light Node input. The shadow effect takes into account transparency of particles, so light will appear to be partially absorbed by particles rather than completely blocked by them.

The node works by splitting the volume into a 3D grid of cells, and particles within each cell are accumulated together. Setting a higher Sample Density will result in a higher density of cells in the grid, which in turn will mean less particles per cell, but will result in more realistic shadows.

This node is only effective if a Light is connected to the Light Node input. The light node must be a spot light.

Parameters

Attributes

These properties control the core behaviours of the node.

Parameter	Details
Particle Size	Edit the size of the particles once they are rendered.
Particle Alpha	Control the alpha value for each particle.
Particle Use Amount	Percentage of particles that can be used by the node.
Sample Density	The resolution of the grid that makes up the volume.

Inputs

Name	Description	Typical Input
Light Node	Control which light nodes affect the particle shading.	Light
Affected Emitters	Choose which particle emitters can be affected by the affector.	Primitive Emitter
Transform Modifiers	Apply the transforms of another node to this node.	Null
Target Node	Modifiy the rotations of the node to always direct the z axis towards the input.	Null
Local Transform Override	Apply the transforms of another node to this node, relative to its parent.	Null