matte/shadow on a background object

[Marcel]

I think you should explain yourself a bit more, because right now you aren't making sense to me :)

What do you want to achieve and were do you get stuck?

[snot_nose]

well, I have a background image with trees and a forest.
i want to cast the shadows from the trees in the background, into the scene itself. so i used cylinder objects with a matte / shadow material on them.
the problem is that since the camera of the scene is animated the background doesn't look good as an environment map. so i used a sphere with flipped normals as the background.

my question is: can i use the matte/shadow objects on the sphere background, like i did with the environment map.
i want to see the image on the sphere through the cylinders, but that they will still cast shadows.

[Marcel]

If I am following you correctly you won't need the Shadow Matte material anymore.

You could use a standard material for the sphere (the texturemap with the trees/background).

For the cylinders that cast the shadows you can use normal objects without even a material applied. Go to the object properties and set 'Visible to camera' off. That way the cylinders won't show up in the scene, but will cast shadows.

I hope this helps :)

[snot_nose]

that's exactlly what i was looking for

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