A method for rendering a page, including: obtaining an electronic document (ED) identifying a main object and multiple shadow parameters; determining a main bounding box surrounding the main object on the page; creating a main brush including the main object; calculating a shadow bounding box based on the main bounding box and at least one of the multiple shadow parameters; creating a shadow brush by applying a shadow transformation matrix to the main brush, where the shadow transformation matrix maps the main object to a shadow defined by the multiple shadow parameters; inserting, into a main display list for the page, a set of instructions to: paint the shadow bounding box with the shadow brush; and paint the main bounding box with the main brush.