Hi. I want to adjust the sharpness and softness of the shadow by the source angle value of the directional light. But no matter what value I put in, the shadow never changes.
May I know why and how to solve the problem?
Thank you.
Hey @Linparkart!
Can you bring us some screenshots? Show us what you’re working with, what you’re doing, and what is happening? Changing the source angle of the light should change the shape and direction of the shadows, not the sharpness. Directional lights tend to create some pretty harsh shadows. Maybe try adding a post-process volume or atmosphere to scatter the light?
Hi Mind-Brain, I actually have the same problem.
I follow a tutorial and the “source angle value” of directional light adjusts how the shadow gets softer, the “longer” it is. It is very easy in the video, but has no effect when I do it… I work with UE4.27, iMac, 8GB RAM.
Hey @kunstaffin!
You will want to try increasing the scalability settings on your editor. Unfortunately I don’t have 4.27 installed and it’s in a different spot than 5.x so I can’t grab a quick screenshot. But it’s above your viewport on the main window, one of those big buttons gives a dropdown. You’re looking for several settings ranging from “Low” to “Epic”.
You may also have issues based on your RAM if you turn it up too high, just a word of caution!
If you continue to have issues, I suggest a new post!
Hi @kunstaffin, I’ve also faced with such issue in unreal engine 5. In my project with “Generate Mesh Distance Fields” enabled, my point, spot and rect lights can cast “soft” shadows but directional cannot.
In my case root of the problem was “cascaded shadow maps” which overrides (?) “distance field shadows” in directional light properties. “cascaded shadow maps” cannot cast shadows with soft edges and “distance field shadows” can. So after setting “Dynamic Shadow Distance MovableLight” to 0.0 “Source Angle” can change cast shadow softness.
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Hi there @Linparkart,
This topic has been moved from International to Rendering.
When posting, please review the categories to ensure your topic is posted in the most relevant space.
Thanks and happy developing!
I was having this same issue in 5.4.4, what tanshihaj said fixed it for me.
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Hey @Linparkart!
Did what @tanshihaj said work for you? Let us know and we’ll mark it down as solved for future answer seekers!