Free tool

Shadow box generator

A shallow open box with its base plate stuck flat to the wall. An LED on a tube in the middle shines through the perforated walls and throws your silhouette onto the wall around the box. Upload a picture, set the box, and download files ready to print.

Drag to rotate, scroll to zoom. The preview uses a coarser grid than the final file.

How it looks on the wall

ShadowLight through the walls

Shadow size

330 × 410 mm

Silhouette not covered

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Loose pieces bridged

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Box footprint

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Weight (PLA)

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Material cost

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Your silhouette

Any picture works. We turn it into a black and white shape.

Showing a demo heart until you upload your own.

Fine-tune the black and white shape

Find the threshold automatically

Smooth edges1

Remove specks3

Invert (use the light part)Treat a transparent background as empty

Base drawing (optional)

It is printed as a separate piece. Leave empty for a plain base.

Silhouette position and size

Box position, left to right0%

Box position, up and down0%

Silhouette size90%

Percentage of the largest shadow the box can make.

Shadow width330 mm

Shadow height410 mm

A bigger shadow needs a higher LED and taller walls.

Flip left to right

Box

Shape

Format

Width110 mm

Height140 mm

Base thickness2.5 mm

Wall thickness1.6 mm

Maximum wall height60 mm

LED height above the base plate50 mm

Bridge thickness1.2 mm

Print precision

Assembly and power

How the walls fix to the base

Power

Get your STL

What to build

Position

File format

Printer plate

Filament

Printing and assembly tips

Print in black or dark PLA or PETG so the walls really block the light.
Print each wall flat, stencil face up. Press-fit walls slot into the grooves in the base.
Use a 5 mm warm-white LED in the top of the tube, with the wires running down through the base.
For battery power you need a USB-C charging board (TP4056), a small LiPo cell, a switch and a 56 ohm resistor for the LED.
A base drawing prints in black. Glue it onto a light-coloured base so it stands out.
Thin bridges hold loose parts of the stencil in place. They show as faint lines in the shadow.

Quick settings

First lamp, any silhouette	Keep the defaults: rectangle, 110 × 140 mm, Fine 0.15 mm.
Small desk or gift lamp	Choose the Mini format. It makes a shadow about 20 to 25 cm wide.
No glue and no cable	Press-fit walls with the USB-C battery.
A quick test print	Fast 0.3 mm precision and a smaller width.

Getting a sharp shadow

Silhouette

The shadow forms on the wall around the box, so the middle of your picture sits behind the base plate and is lost. Use the position sliders to move the box over a part of the picture you can afford to lose. Silhouette size is a percentage of the largest shadow the box can make (40 to 110%).

Box shape and format

Standard starts at 110 × 140 mm. Mini starts at 55 × 70 mm. Width can go from 40 to 200 mm and height from 40 to 220 mm. A higher LED and taller walls make a bigger shadow. The base plate is stuck to the wall and the box opens toward the room.

Assembly and power

The groove in the base is 5 mm deep. Press-fit leaves 0.1 mm clearance per side, tight 0.05 mm, loose 0.2 mm. The battery well is cut into the base, so battery mode makes the base thicker. A 5 mm LED with a 56 ohm resistor draws 12 to 15 mA.

Photos instead of an SVG

Any picture is converted to black and white. Use automatic threshold first, then raise the smoothing if edges look rough and the speck remover if there are stray dots. Logos and bold shapes work best.

Base drawing and download

The drawing can be 40 to 100% of the base and 0.8 to 3 mm thick. If your parts do not fit the plate, export them as separate parts and print them one by one.