# \[Cycles\] shadow catcher visible behind semi-transparent material with HDRI environment

**URL:** <https://blenderartists.org/t/cycles-shadow-catcher-visible-behind-semi-transparent-material-with-hdri-environment/1650343>\
**Category:** Materials and Textures\
**Tags:** shading\
**Created:** [August 14, 2026, 10:58am UTC](https://blenderartists.org/t/cycles-shadow-catcher-visible-behind-semi-transparent-material-with-hdri-environment/1650343 "2026-08-14T10:58:01Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 7\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![dirkolbrich](https://blenderartists.org/user_avatar/blenderartists.org/dirkolbrich/32/1144157_2.png) [@dirkolbrich](https://blenderartists.org/u/dirkolbrich)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2026, 10:58am UTC](https://blenderartists.org/t/cycles-shadow-catcher-visible-behind-semi-transparent-material-with-hdri-environment/1650343/1 "2026-08-14T10:58:01Z")

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First post, so please be gentle.

I have a problem of a visible shadow catcher behind a semi transparent material in a HDRI environment. Is there any best practice or shader setting to make the shadow catcher disappear?

I am using Blender 5.2 LTS with Cycles rendering.

The materials / environment are usually used as assets for easy drop-in. So any solution should avoid linking the HDRI environment into the shadow catcher or the semi-transparent material as I have seen in other tutorials → [[Cycles] Ground for HDRi Environment (aka Shadow / Light Catcher)](https://blenderartists.org/t/cycles-ground-for-hdri-environment-aka-shadow-light-catcher/636320)

Thank you for your help.

[260813\_shadow catcher with semi transparent object.blend](https://blenderartists.org/uploads/short-url/fPiwCjubmhLmfv0y9mYYWbr7REk.blend) (193.5 KB)

 ![260813_shadow catcher with semi transparent object](https://blenderartists.org/uploads/default/original/4X/7/3/f/73fbf579c865fa42b1770014332bc4826fb3348b.png)

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**Author:** ![dirkolbrich](https://blenderartists.org/user_avatar/blenderartists.org/dirkolbrich/32/1144157_2.png) [@dirkolbrich](https://blenderartists.org/u/dirkolbrich)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2026, 11:08am UTC](https://blenderartists.org/t/cycles-shadow-catcher-visible-behind-semi-transparent-material-with-hdri-environment/1650343/3 "2026-08-14T11:08:29Z")

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This makes the shadows disappear. Not the intended use case of a shadow catcher 😉

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**Author:** ![Khamurai](https://blenderartists.org/user_avatar/blenderartists.org/khamurai/32/1490280_2.png) [@Khamurai](https://blenderartists.org/u/Khamurai)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2026, 11:09am UTC](https://blenderartists.org/t/cycles-shadow-catcher-visible-behind-semi-transparent-material-with-hdri-environment/1650343/4 "2026-08-14T11:09:13Z")

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Yep my bad 😅 A little quick on the trigger

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**Author:** ![dirkolbrich](https://blenderartists.org/user_avatar/blenderartists.org/dirkolbrich/32/1144157_2.png) [@dirkolbrich](https://blenderartists.org/u/dirkolbrich)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2026, 11:09am UTC](https://blenderartists.org/t/cycles-shadow-catcher-visible-behind-semi-transparent-material-with-hdri-environment/1650343/5 "2026-08-14T11:09:32Z")

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Faster than your shadow 😉

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**Author:** ![Khamurai](https://blenderartists.org/user_avatar/blenderartists.org/khamurai/32/1490280_2.png) [@Khamurai](https://blenderartists.org/u/Khamurai)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2026, 11:50am UTC](https://blenderartists.org/t/cycles-shadow-catcher-visible-behind-semi-transparent-material-with-hdri-environment/1650343/6 "2026-08-14T11:50:49Z")

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Well, I found _a_ solution, not sure how well it fits your project though

Duplicate the scene

 ![image](https://blenderartists.org/uploads/default/original/4X/5/a/b/5abc3c41f1b3e6881e6fc4aaa4efa5889ab3cf53.png)

In one of the scenes, disable the ray visibility for the camera of the shadow-casting objects

 ![image](https://blenderartists.org/uploads/default/original/4X/3/4/6/34636bdad24e8d1d2a81e323dff31f87035cb6f2.png)

And in the other scene do the same for the shadow catcher

 ![image](https://blenderartists.org/uploads/default/original/4X/7/e/1/7e16db0ba35465517710059e97ae0d771017aa0a.png)

Then mix the two scenes together in the compositor

 ![image](https://blenderartists.org/uploads/default/original/4X/0/9/b/09b63e7759019f57ba574872de2a2ffe59bc59fc.png)

Blender file for reference  
[shadow\_transparent.blend](https://blenderartists.org/uploads/short-url/tSvl0K2YWizUqXqmgBPnBL4ys4a.blend) (110.5 KB)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dirkolbrich](https://blenderartists.org/user_avatar/blenderartists.org/dirkolbrich/32/1144157_2.png) [@dirkolbrich](https://blenderartists.org/u/dirkolbrich)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2026, 2:58pm UTC](https://blenderartists.org/t/cycles-shadow-catcher-visible-behind-semi-transparent-material-with-hdri-environment/1650343/7 "2026-08-14T14:58:48Z")

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Thank, that seems to be one solution.

Yet I find creating 2 scenes and excluding shadow casting object a bit too excessive. Can become a lot of work if I have a scene with a lot of objects.

Will try if I can play with a single scene and use just the shadow catcher pass in the Compositor.

Maybe I am asking the wrong question. I think the first step is to understand WHY the shadow catcher blocks the environment behind a semi-transparent object. This seems such a basic functionality, I can’t believe Blender hasn’t solved that yet.

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**Author:** ![dirkolbrich](https://blenderartists.org/user_avatar/blenderartists.org/dirkolbrich/32/1144157_2.png) [@dirkolbrich](https://blenderartists.org/u/dirkolbrich)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2026, 8:30pm UTC](https://blenderartists.org/t/cycles-shadow-catcher-visible-behind-semi-transparent-material-with-hdri-environment/1650343/8 "2026-08-14T20:30:46Z")

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Seems to be a known bug.

[shadows catcher geometry visible through transmission #114839](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/issues/114839)