# Trail renderer: missing shadow

**URL:** https://discussions.unity.com/t/trail-renderer-missing-shadow/950979
**Category:** Lighting & Global Illumination
**Tags:** Question
**Created:** [June 23, 2024, 4:13pm UTC](https://discussions.unity.com/t/trail-renderer-missing-shadow/950979 "2024-06-23T16:13:32Z")
**Posts on this page:** 3
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![claudedaddy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c37758/32.png) [@claudedaddy](https://discussions.unity.com/u/claudedaddy)
#### Post date: [June 23, 2024, 4:13pm UTC](https://discussions.unity.com/t/trail-renderer-missing-shadow/950979/1 "2024-06-23T16:13:32Z")

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I added a trail renderer to an object. It generates a trail but does not generate a shadow for the trail. I am using a default renderer (unity 2022.3.3).with default line material and cast shadows is enabled (see pic). Any suggestions for what I am doing wrong?

 ![9904875--1431027--upload_2024-6-23_11-12-0.png](https://europe1.discourse-cdn.com/unity/original/4X/6/e/3/6e39487e25d9eac34fca34e7baa35b33a8c77829.png)

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### Author: ![Kurt-Dekker](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/unity/user_avatar/discussions.unity.com/kurt-dekker/32/101578_2.png) [@Kurt-Dekker](https://discussions.unity.com/u/Kurt-Dekker)
#### Post date: [June 23, 2024, 4:24pm UTC](https://discussions.unity.com/t/trail-renderer-missing-shadow/950979/2 "2024-06-23T16:24:17Z")

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Lines and Trails are kinda squirrelly shadow-wise because they are by default billboarded to the camera.

This means the “shadow view” they cast can be extremely narrow.

Not only that but the default-line material simply does not make shadows (at least on my setup).

I did these things and got a shadow to cast off of a Line / Trail:

- switch Alignment to Transform Z
- switch to another material that DOES cast a shadow (test on a cube if in doubt)

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<div class="post-metadata">

### Author: ![claudedaddy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c37758/32.png) [@claudedaddy](https://discussions.unity.com/u/claudedaddy)
#### Post date: [June 23, 2024, 4:50pm UTC](https://discussions.unity.com/t/trail-renderer-missing-shadow/950979/3 "2024-06-23T16:50:21Z")

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Thanks. I checked my material and I had set it to transparent. Changing it to opaque now casts a trail shadow. I tried Alignment with transformZ but the trail becomes intermittent. Also, even with View alignment and a material casting a shadow, the trail shadow is intermittent and sometimes disappears for a while. Yeah, trail rendering seems a bit flakey as you said.

BTW: Is there some way to get trail fade using a material to set the color? It seems that fade only works with a builtin color.