koobas.hobune.stream
Any way to add shadows to a scene without adding additional lights?
A bit of an odd request, but we want stylized shadows that don't necessarily reflect the lighting of the scene. Basically, we want the scene to be realistically lit with baked lighting, but we also want clearly defined shadows of the characters on the walls.
My first thought was to add a light source pointing directly at the character, but I can't find a way to not have it contribute to their lighting (which would make them look washed out). I also saw people talking about projectors, but I'm worried setting them up may be tricky for a live character, and they may not be performant (we're targeting mobile).
So I'm wondering, is this something that's possible to do? FWIW We're on Unity 2021 with the Built In Render Pipeline.
Shadow is an absence of light, usually. I assume you are trying to create some subtractive object that resembles a shadow. A mockup ( a drawing) of your desired result would certainly help. There are a lot of unanswered questions though. Are those shadows just a projection on a wall, or do the objects cast shadows on themselves and each other? You could perhaps recreate a similar technique that's used for shadows in unity, but render it in a subtractive way.
I remember one project, before unity had shadow support for mobile devices, where I faked shadows by having a camera that only rendered the shadow casters, from the same perspective as light would illuminate it, then had a projector that projected the rendered texture on the ground (the shadow receiver), with a shader that only darkened it. It was tailored to the scene and definitely not some "works anywhere" solution, but it served the purpose well. So maybe based on your specific scene / case, you can create something similar that fits the exact situation you're in.
