Shadow Photography: Making Shadows the Subject

Shadow photography treats the cast shadow as the subject rather than a side effect of the light. A shadow is pure shape, and it reads well only when three things line up: a light that looks small, an angle that stretches or bends the shape, and a clean surface to land on. Get those right, expose for the lit ground, and let the shadow fall to black.

This page is about the shadow an object throws onto something else. When the object itself is the dark shape against a bright background, that is a silhouette, metered differently. What the light’s angle does to a subject is covered in direction of light; here the shadows are the picture.

What makes a shadow worth photographing

Most shadows go unnoticed because they are soft, short, or falling on a busy surface. A shadow becomes a subject when:

• The light is hard, so the edges are crisp and the outline is readable.
• The angle is right, so the shadow is long enough, or distorted enough, to be interesting.
• The surface is clean: pavement, sand, snow, a plain wall, a lawn. A shadow falling across gravel or leaf litter disappears into it.

Shadows work as subjects because they strip away color, texture and identity, leaving an outline the viewer has to read. A shadow of a person is anyone. A shadow of a bicycle is every bicycle. That is why shadow photographs feel graphic and a little mysterious, close kin to minimalist and abstract work.

Hard sources make hard shadows

How sharp a shadow’s edge is depends on one thing: how big the light source looks from the object casting the shadow. A source that looks small lights the object from almost a single direction, so the edge is crisp. A source that looks large, like an overcast sky or a big window close by, lights it from many directions at once, and the shadow blurs or disappears. The full explanation is in hard light vs soft light.

The sun is enormous, but so far away that it covers only about half a degree of sky (0.53 degrees, roughly a pencil’s width at arm’s length). Small in angle is what counts, not small in size. Nor does hard mean bright: a bare candle is dim and hard, a sunlit white sail is bright and soft.

The soft fringe, and why it grows

Even sun shadows are not perfectly sharp. Light from opposite edges of the sun’s disc passes the object’s edge at slightly different angles, so every shadow has a core where the whole sun is blocked (the umbra) and a soft fringe where only part of it is (the penumbra). Because the sun is 0.53 degrees wide, the fringe grows by about 0.93 centimeters for every meter of light path between the object’s edge and the surface.

You can see this on any sunny day:

• The shadow of your foot on the pavement is razor sharp, because the edge is touching the ground.
• The shadow of your head is not. With the sun 30 degrees up, light travels about 3.4 meters from the top of a 1.7 meter head to the ground, giving a fringe about 3 centimeters across the beam, which the slanting light spreads to about 6 centimeters on the ground. At 10 degrees the path is nearly 10 meters, the fringe about 9 centimeters across the beam, and the light lands so shallowly that on the ground the head’s outline blurs over about half a meter.
• The shadow of a treetop 30 meters up has a fringe of about 30 centimeters even with the sun overhead, and much more when it is low, which is why tree shadows look soft at their tips and crisp at their trunks.

So for the crispest shapes, look for objects close to the surface they shadow: railings over a sidewalk, a chair against a wall, leaves against a fence. Your aperture and focus cannot help: f/11 sharpens the picture of the shadow, not the edge the light made. Haze and high cloud spread the sun over more sky and soften every edge; on a fully overcast day there are no cast shadows to photograph at all.

The pinhole suns under a tree

Look at the bright spots on the ground under a tree on a sunny day. Each is not the shape of a gap in the leaves but an image of the sun, projected through a small gap acting as a pinhole. That is why the spots are round however ragged the gaps are. Their size follows the same 0.93 centimeters per meter rule: a gap 10 meters up makes a spot about 9 centimeters across when the sun is high. Low sun stretches the spots into ellipses, and during a partial solar eclipse every one becomes a crescent. Once you see them they are a subject in their own right; dappled light photography covers working with that light.

Artificial light follows the same rule. A bare bulb, a street light or a small flash gives hard shadows; the same light through a lampshade or softbox looks bigger and gives soft ones.

Want to check you can tell hard light from soft at a glance? The natural light quiz asks exactly that, with an explanation for every answer.

When shadows are longest: sun angle, time, season and latitude

Shadow length is simple geometry. On level ground, a shadow’s length equals the object’s height divided by the tangent of the sun’s elevation angle:

Below about 20 degrees, shadow length grows very quickly, which is why the hours near sunrise and sunset are the classic time for shadows and summer midday shadows are short blobs under people’s feet. Clock times do not travel well, so think in sun heights. At 45 degrees latitude, in summer or at the equinoxes, the sun spends roughly the first and last two hours of the day below 20 degrees, and climbs past 30 degrees about three hours after sunrise.

The sun’s height depends on three things you can plan around:

• Time of day. Lowest near sunrise and sunset, highest at solar noon, which is often not 12 o’clock.
• Season. At 45 degrees latitude the noon sun reaches about 68 degrees at the summer solstice but only about 22 degrees at the winter solstice, so a winter noon gives shadows as long as a summer evening.
• Latitude. The farther you are from the equator, the lower the sun stays. At 60 degrees latitude the winter noon sun is below 7 degrees, which means long shadows all day. Near the equator the noon sun can be almost straight overhead, and shadows nearly vanish at midday.

The same low sun is the warm light of golden hour, so long shadows and warm color tend to arrive together. In winter you can get long shadows all day, and snow to put them on.

Want to know when the sun will be low enough where you are today? The golden hour calculator works out the sun’s low-angle hours for any place and date.

Which way the shadow runs

Direction matters as much as length. Shoot toward the sun, as in the runners photograph at the top of this page, and shadows run toward you, stretching down the frame and filling the foreground. Shoot with the sun to one side and shadows run across the frame, which is best for showing their full profile. Shoot with the sun behind you and the shadows fall away from you, with your own shadow joining them. Because the sun is so far away, its shadows run parallel; a row of posts makes a row of parallel stripes. Night lights change that.

The same low, raking light makes shadows at a much smaller scale too: every grain of sand, brick edge and bark ridge throws its own tiny shadow, and together they are what we see as texture. Try picking out the side-lit version in this pair.

Which photo shows the surface texture more strongly?

A B

Exposing for shadow shapes

The key exposure decision is to expose for the lit surface and let the shadows go dark. You are not trying to see into the shadow. You want it as a solid shape, and the sunlit ground around it gives the shape its edge. A shadow that records as near black is not an underexposure to fix; it is the picture.

On a clear day, ground in open shade typically sits about three stops below the same ground in direct sun, and a deep shadow under a car or in a doorway can be more. If you expose so the shadow shows detail, the lit ground blows out and the shape loses its edge. Methods that work:

1. Spot meter the lit ground, then correct for its tone. A spot meter places whatever you point it at near middle grey. Sunlit grass is close to that, so take the reading as it is. Dark asphalt is darker than middle grey, so take away about a stop. Pale concrete and sand need about one stop more, and sunlit snow one and a half to two stops more, so they stay bright instead of grey.
2. Use exposure compensation. When a big dark shadow fills much of the frame, an average or evaluative meter tries to brighten it and overexposes the lit areas. Dial in one to two stops of negative exposure compensation and check the result.
3. Start from sunny 16. In clear, direct sun, f/16 at a shutter speed of about 1/ISO exposes sunlit surfaces well. The sunny 16 rule gives you a baseline that ignores the dark shadow completely.
4. Check the histogram. You want the lit areas high on the right without clipping, and a large mass on the left for the shadows.

A lower ISO does not deepen a shadow. ISO, aperture and shutter speed move the whole frame up or down together; the gap between lit ground and shadow is set by the light.

Why shadows go blue, and why some stay light

A shadow is not empty of light. It is lit mainly by the open sky, plus whatever bounces in from the ground and nearby walls. On a clear day the sky is blue, so detail left in a shadow turns cool: usually a feature, a cool shape on a warm ground. For neutral shadows, use a local white balance adjustment or convert to black and white.

Bounced light also decides how dark a shadow gets. A shadow beside a white wall or on snow is filled by reflected light and stays lighter; beside red brick it turns warm. For the deepest shadows, look for dark or distant surroundings: a lone post on a wide lawn, not one beside a whitewashed building. It is the same fill a reflector or fill light adds on purpose.

Not sure what your meter will do with a frame that is half black? Metering modes shows how each mode reads the same scene, and where each one goes wrong.

Composing with shadows

Show the shadow alone, or with its owner

The first choice is whether the object that casts the shadow appears in the frame. Shadow alone makes a puzzle: the viewer rebuilds the object from its outline. Shadow and owner together make a relationship: the shadow can echo the object, as the chair does above, exaggerate it, or seem to act on its own. Both work, but decide deliberately. A frame that includes half the object and half the shadow usually reads as indecisive.

Decide how much of the frame is shadow

The split between lit and shaded area is a choice in its own right. Half and half feels balanced and graphic. As shadow takes over, the picture gets simpler and darker in mood, until only a small lit shape remains, the territory of chiaroscuro. The dark mass works like negative space, giving the lit shape room. Step left or right and watch the balance change before you settle.

Use distortion

Whether a shadow keeps its object’s proportions depends on the surface it lands on, not on how high the sun is. A flat sign throws a true-shaped shadow onto a wall that faces the same way as the sign, at any sun angle. Tilt the surface away from that and the shadow distorts: low sun on level ground stretches a standing figure into a giant, steps break a shadow into a zigzag, a curved wall bends it, and a shadow that climbs from the ground onto a wall folds at the corner. Look for surfaces that reshape them: stairs, corrugated metal, sand ripples, the corner where pavement meets wall.

Look for repetition

Railings, fence posts, columns, benches, window grilles and rows of trees all cast repeating shadows, and a repeated shadow is often stronger than the repeated objects, because it is simpler and higher in contrast.

Shadows and their surface can make two patterns at once, as stripes and boards do on the deck. A single break in the rhythm, a person walking through a railing’s shadow, gives the pattern a focal point. More on a pattern with one variation in pattern and repetition, and the outlines themselves in shape.

Use your own shadow, or keep it out

With the sun behind you, your shadow falls into the frame, pointing toward your subject. By accident it is a distraction; on purpose it is a self-portrait, and one of the few ways to put yourself in a photograph without turning the camera around. When you include it, make it clear and whole, not a head cut off at the bottom edge. When you do not want it, step so the sun is off to one side, or aim a little higher so the frame starts beyond the tip of your shadow.

Go overhead

Looking straight down changes everything. From above, people become the round tops of heads and objects lose their recognizable profile, but their shadows keep the full side view. In overhead views the shadow often carries more information than the object. You do not need a drone: a balcony, a bridge, a parking structure or a staircase gives you a high enough view of a sidewalk, a plaza or a beach. Elevated perspectives covers more places to find that viewpoint.

Snow and pale sand are ideal shadow surfaces: bright, smooth and nearly featureless, so even thin lines of shadow read at full strength.

Is the dark shape you want the object itself, against a bright sky? Then you are making a silhouette, and you meter for the background instead of the ground.

Projected shadows: windows, blinds and leaves

Turn things around and the shadow becomes a pattern laid over something else. A window throws a bright shape with its bars cut out; blinds lay stripes across a face or a wall; leaves scatter soft spots. A cut-out placed in front of a light is called a gobo, and every window, fence and tree is one you did not have to make.

The fringe rule decides how crisp the pattern is: the closer the surface is to the window or blind, the sharper the pattern. A person standing right at the blinds wears crisp stripes; a few steps back into the room the stripes blur. With people, keep the eyes either fully lit or fully in shadow, not cut by a stripe. Window light covers the rest of what that light can do.

Shadows after dark: street lights and other small sources

Night gives you a different kind of shadow. Street lights, shop signs, headlights and lamps are small, hard sources, and they sit a few meters from the scene instead of 150 million kilometers away. That changes the geometry:

• Shadows radiate outward from the light instead of running parallel as sun shadows do.
• Shadow length changes as a person moves. Under a street light their shadow is a pool at their feet; as they walk away it stretches far down the sidewalk. Wait for the length you want.
• Multiple lights make multiple shadows. A person between two street lights casts two shadows in opposite directions, often of different lengths and colors if the lamps differ.
• Closer to the light means bigger and softer. A shadow on a wall is enlarged by the distance from light to wall divided by the distance from light to object. With a lamp 3 meters from a wall, a person standing 1 meter from the lamp throws a shadow three times their size; at 2 meters from the lamp, one and a half times. The fringe follows the same proportions: from a lamp 10 centimeters across, about 20 centimeters of blur in the first case and 5 in the second.

Expose for the pool of light and let the rest go black, as in daylight. Light from a nearby lamp falls off fast, following the inverse square law, so the pool fades quickly to dark and frames the shadow for you. Expect a higher ISO and a wide aperture to keep a handheld shutter speed.

Heading out after dark to look for these? Night street photography covers settings, safety and where the light pools are.

Shadows in black and white

Shadow photographs are already mostly tone, a bright surface and a dark shape, so color often adds little. Converting to black and white removes the blue cast and the warm and cool clash and leaves the graphic core. Push the lit surface bright and the shadow deep. If the surface is one color, such as brick or grass, brighten that color in the conversion; and since sunlit shadows are blue, darkening blue deepens them. A crisp shadow on even ground is one of the rare scenes where very high contrast almost always helps.

Common mistakes and misconceptions

• Exposing for the shadow. The lit ground blows out and the shape loses its edge. Fix: expose for the sunlit surface and let the shadow go dark.
• Shooting shadows on busy surfaces. Gravel, patterned tiles and leaf litter break up the shape. Fix: look for plain pavement, sand, snow, walls and lawns.
• Going out at midday in summer. Shadows are short blobs under objects. Fix: go when the sun is below about 20 degrees, or in winter.
• Stopping down to sharpen a soft shadow. Aperture and focus cannot sharpen an edge the light made soft. Fix: choose objects close to their surface, a clearer sky, or a smaller source.
• Moving the subject toward the lamp for a crisper shadow. It makes the shadow bigger and softer. Fix: move the subject toward the wall.
• Expecting a lower ISO to deepen shadows. It darkens everything equally. Fix: expose the lit area correctly and look for dark surroundings that bounce less light into the shade.
• An accidental self-portrait. Your own shadow creeps into the bottom of the frame. Fix: change your angle to the sun, or include your shadow whole and on purpose.

Try this: prove the shadow rules on a table in 10 minutes

You need a phone with a flashlight, a fork, and a plain wall or a sheet of white paper taped upright. Darken the room.

1. Stand the phone on its edge on a table about a meter from the wall, propped against a mug, with the flashlight on and facing the wall. Hold the fork upright 2 centimeters from the wall. Photograph the shadow: the tines are crisp and the fork is shown at its real size.
2. Keeping the phone where it is, move the fork back to 30 centimeters from the wall and photograph again. The shadow is about 1.4 times the fork’s size (100 centimeters from light to wall, divided by 70 from light to fork) and the tines a little softer.
3. Keep the fork 30 centimeters from the wall and slide the phone toward it until the flashlight is 10 centimeters from the fork. The shadow grows to about four times the fork’s size (40 centimeters from light to wall, divided by 10 from light to fork) and goes much softer.
4. Put the phone back a meter from the wall and lay a single sheet of paper over the flashlight, which makes the source bigger. With the fork 30 centimeters from the wall the tines melt into one soft shape. Move the fork in to touch the wall and they snap back.
5. Tip the paper backdrop away from the fork and watch the tines stretch, then fold it into a corner and watch the shadow bend.

Judge it by putting the frames side by side. If the fork at the wall is the sharpest, the fork near the flashlight is the biggest, and the covered flashlight gives the softest edges, you have seen every rule on this page with your own eyes. On the next clear day, find the same effects outside: a railing’s shadow sharp at its foot and soft at its top, and the round pinhole suns under the nearest tree.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best time of day for shadow photography?

Whenever the sun is below about 20 degrees, which makes every shadow at least 2.7 times the height of its object. At mid latitudes in summer that is roughly the first and last two hours of sun; in winter, and farther from the equator, the sun stays low enough for long shadows much of the day.

Why are my shadows blue?

On a clear day, shaded areas are lit mainly by the blue sky rather than the sun, so they record with a cool cast. Keep it as contrast, correct it locally, or convert to black and white.

Can I photograph shadows on a cloudy day?

Not cast shadows. An overcast sky is a huge, soft light source, so objects cast almost no shadow. Broken cloud works: wait for a gap when the sun comes through clearly, and the shadows snap back in seconds.

Will a smaller aperture make the shadow edges sharper?

No. A smaller aperture gives more depth of field, so the picture of the shadow is sharp front to back, but the edge itself is only as crisp as the light made it. That depends on how big the source looks and how far the object is from the surface.

What is the difference between a shadow photo and a silhouette?

A silhouette is the object itself, dark against a bright background, usually shot toward the light. A shadow photo shows the dark shape the object throws onto a surface, and is metered for that lit surface. The two often meet when the object and its shadow are both in the frame.