[Plugin] Shadow Slice - Accurate Interior Shadow Analysis & Sun Study Tool

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Hi SketchUp Community,

I’m Nam from Febhouse (and the creator of ArchiDiagram). Today, I am incredibly excited to share a brand new, 100% free plugin with you all: Shadow Slice.

If you’ve ever tried to do an interior sun study in SketchUp, you know the struggle. Standard Section Planes do not block sunlight. When you cut through a roof or a wall to see inside, the sun shines straight in as if the building were open, ruining the accuracy of your solar analysis.

Shadow Slice is designed specifically to solve this core pain point!

Shadow Slice: Interior Shadow Analysis & Sun Study Tool for SketchUp

TUT copy
TUT copy1920×1024 345 KB

How it Transforms Your Workflow:

  1. Interior Natural Light Analysis

Shadow Slice makes the ceiling transparent but keeps the shadows solid. This allows you to look inside and analyze natural light distribution throughout the entire house without changing the actual lighting conditions.

  1. Smart Section Compensation

This tool reconstructs the parts of the building removed by the Section Plane. The compensated portion is transparent to the eye but still blocks sunlight (except for glass), ensuring that your interior lighting analysis remains physically accurate.

QC2
QC21920×1024 301 KB

  1. Section-Based Shadow Study

Specially designed to analyze interior shadow behavior directly within a section view. It is the perfect solution for documenting how sunlight penetrates a space for professional design reports.

QC3
QC31920×1024 282 KB

  1. Perspective Cutaway Visualization

Create perspective sections that help viewers easily visualize the entire architectural mass. It provides a perfect balance between maintaining the building context and revealing the interior space.

QC4-1024
QC4-10241024×546 63.9 KB

Why Choose Shadow Slice?

  • The Problem: SketchUp’s Default Sections

In standard SketchUp, Section Planes do not block sunlight. When you cut through a roof, the sun shines directly into the interior as if the roof no longer exists. This makes it impossible to perform an accurate solar study because the shadows from the “cut” parts of the building are missing.

  • The Solution: How Shadow Slice Works

Feb Shadow Slice automates the complex manual workflow required to fix this by creating an intelligent “Ghost Slice” copy of your model.

  1. Accurate Shadow Casting: Reconstructs the geometry removed by the Section Plane to ensure it continues to cast shadows accurately while remaining invisible to the camera.
  2. Non-Destructive Workflow: Your original model remains untouched; all processing is done on a separate Ghost copy that is automatically moved to a dedicated Tag.
  3. Intelligent Entity Processing: Automatically handles materials and back-materials for nested groups and components to ensure consistent transparency without losing structural data.

SIMPLE 2-STEP PROCESS:

  1. Step 1: Select a Target (a Group or Component that already contains an Active Section Plane).
  2. Step 2: Click “Create Slice” on the toolbar. The extension instantly generates the transparent Ghost Slice for your analysis.

A GIFT TO THE COMMUNITY

  • We know how frustrating standard Section Planes can be for interior solar studies, so we wanted to share our solution with everyone. This version of Shadow Slice is completely free to use. We hope it saves you hours of manual work! If you have ideas or specific needs for more advanced tools down the road, drop a comment—we are always listening.

  • :laptop: Compatibility: Works smoothly with SketchUp’s standard workflow.

  • :wrapped_gift: Version 1.0.0 Standard: SketchUp Extension Warehouse

  • :backhand_index_pointing_right: Learn more, watch the quick start video: Shadow Slice: Interior Shadow Analysis & Sun Study Tool

I hope this tool helps streamline your workflow and makes your interior light analyses much easier. Please feel free to test it out and leave any feedback, questions, or bug reports in this thread.

Thanks for your time!

Cheers,

Nam Nguyen

Founder at Febhouse

Connect with me on Instagram | LinkedIn

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