At 9am on 21 June, the sun sits low in the northern sky, and every building and piece of infrastructure casts its longest winter shadow. That single morning shapes planning decisions across Australia. It’s the moment councils use to test whether a new development will steal a neighbour’s sunlight. Augmented reality shadow studies let people see that shadow for themselves, standing in the real place, rather than reading it off a drawing.
For residents, it answers the question they actually care about: what happens to my backyard? For developers and design teams, it turns a grey shape on a site plan into something they can stand in and fix early.
What Are Augmented Reality Shadow Studies?
Augmented reality shadow studies place a 3D model of a proposed building into its real-world location through a phone or tablet. The model casts shadows according to the sun’s position at a chosen time. Viewers can see exactly where those shadows will fall across neighbouring yards and buildings.
Traditional shadow diagrams show the same information from above, as flat shapes on a plan. AR shows it from eye level, at true scale, in the place where it will actually happen. For anyone who doesn’t read plans for a living, that change of viewpoint is usually the moment the impact clicks.
Why Do Shadow Studies Matter in Australian Planning?
Because sunlight is protected in most Australian planning schemes, and shadows are how councils measure it.
In New South Wales, shadow diagrams for development applications are commonly drawn for the morning, midday and afternoon of 21 June. That’s the winter solstice, when shadows are longest. The Apartment Design Guide sets minimum periods of direct sunlight in mid-winter. As guidance from the City of Sydney explains, communal open space should receive at least 2 hours of sun between 9am and 3pm.
Victoria uses a different reference date, the September equinox. Guidance from Monash City Council, for example, refers to 5 hours of sunlight on 22 September. That applies between 9am and 3pm to a neighbour’s recreational open space.
Each state and council sets its own thresholds. Either way, building shadow analysis can decide how tall a project can be and, sometimes, whether it goes ahead at all.
What’s Wrong with Traditional Shadow Diagrams?
Nothing, for the people who prepare and assess them. Shadow diagrams are precise and essential for approvals. The problem is everyone else.
Traditional building shadow analysis usually ends up as a bird’s-eye plan with three shaded shapes on it. Experienced planners can read it in seconds. A resident trying to work out whether their kitchen will lose its morning sun often can’t. They’re left to picture a three-dimensional shadow from a two-dimensional drawing, at a scale they’ve never seen.
Faced with a drawing they can’t read, residents often fill the gap with their own worst-case version. Objections and delays tend to grow out of that gap, and a more detailed drawing rarely closes it.
How Does GEAAR Bring Shadow Visualisation into the Real World?
GEAAR, short for Geospatial Everywhere Anywhere AR, is the augmented reality geospatial platform we built to place 3D models in their exact real-world location. It combines satellite positioning with visual positioning to pin models to the world with sub-centimetre accuracy. A proposed building appears precisely where it will stand.
That accuracy matters for shadow visualisation. A shadow is only useful if the building casting it is in the right place and at the right height. With the model locked to its true position, GEAAR can show shadows and the sun’s position by time of day. Viewers can then watch a shadow move across the site through the morning and afternoon in real time.
There’s one subtlety worth explaining to any audience. On the day of a site visit, the real sun will usually sit somewhere else in the sky. Real shadows and the virtual one won’t match. The AR shadow shows what the proposed building would cast at the chosen time, and that’s exactly the question a shadow study answers.
GEAAR runs on iPad pro for on-site viewing, and on a laptop for detailed review back in the office. We’ve used it to place multiple full wind farm models into their correct geographic locations.
Our first check on any project is the model itself. An impressive shadow cast by an inaccurate model does more harm than good, so accuracy comes before anything is shown to a community. This is why we use your CAD data as it provides maximum accuracy.
Where Does AR for Urban Planning Make the Biggest Difference?
AR for urban planning is most valuable where the people affected by a decision aren’t the people trained to read the drawings.
Community Consultation
Augmented reality shadow studies let residents stand in their own yard and see where a proposed building’s shadow will fall at the times that matter. For property developers, that turns a tense consultation into a conversation about real impacts. Sometimes it also shows the shadow is smaller than people feared.
Infrastructure and Transport Projects
Stations and bridges cast shadows too, often across public spaces. We’ve delivered more than $1 million of major infrastructure visualisation for Western Australia’s METRONET rail program since 2019. On projects like that, helping communities understand change before it happens is part of the job.
Wind Farms and Shadow Flicker
Spinning turbine blades can create a flickering shadow at certain times of day, a common concern for nearby residents. Energy companies overseas already use AR this way. German utility EnBW’s REVisAR app, for example, can display cast shadows and the sun’s position at chosen times. For Australian energy projects, the same approach lets residents check the times and places that worry them, standing where they live.
How Does Geospatial Augmented Reality Fit with Formal Shadow Reports?
Geospatial augmented reality complements formal shadow diagrams. It doesn’t replace them. Development applications still need technical diagrams prepared to the council’s requirements, and those remain the basis for approval.
AR earns its place around that formal process. Design teams can test options early, before committing to a drawing set. Community members and decision-makers can see what the official diagrams mean in context, rather than in the abstract.
AR also works well alongside other visual tools. Photorealistic 3D renders and flythroughs show a project at its best for presentations and marketing. On-site AR shows the same project where it will actually stand, which is the view most residents ask for.
Is an Augmented Reality Shadow Study Right for Your Project?
If your project will cast a shadow someone cares about, the answer is probably yes. Augmented reality shadow studies leave the planning rules exactly as they are. What they change is how well people understand what those rules protect.
Early clarity reduces surprises late in the approval process, and communities that feel informed tend to engage more constructively. We’ve seen how clear 3D visualisation can help shift public perception on contested projects. On-site AR brings that clarity right to people’s front doors.
Talk to our team about using GEAAR to show your next development in its real setting.
FAQ
No. Development applications still need formal shadow diagrams prepared to the council’s requirements. AR shadow studies work alongside them, helping design teams test options and helping communities understand what the official diagrams show.
As the simulation runs completely in real time and the sunposition is based off of scientifically sourced information, you can show exactly where shadows will fall at any time, on any day, on any year!
No. GEAAR runs on iPad Pro’s for on-site viewing, and on a laptop or desktop computer for review in an office or community session.
It depends on how precisely the model itself is. GEAAR combines satellite and visual positioning to place models with sub-centimetre accuracy, but the result is only as good as the building data behind it.