The self shadow script creates vertex colours based on the angles of your mesh.

It has been quite a while since Campbell Barton wrote the original Self Shadow script (it was included in Blender 2.45). Around the same time I wrote the “Ma Baker” script that did something similar. We then cooperated in writing the “Ma Self” script which was an optimised version of a third method.

The new addon

Because I’m currently working on growing Entoforms with colours, I also wanted some shading and this method is perfect for it. I decided to rewrite the scripts as a Blender 2.5 addon.

After placing the script in your addons folder and enabling it through the user preferences (mesh/self shadow). You can find the function in the vertex paint mode under the paint menu.

I will probably do a rewrite with more refined options soon, but I thought I’d share this version already since it works rather well.

An added functionality is that it generates shadows in HSV colour mode. This means that even if you already painted your mesh… the original vertex colour data is retained… only the “lightness” is altered by the script.