Well, even though I DO use styles as a jumping off point for my shadows, I do TONS of tweaking, and my shadows take me almost as long to do as the rest of the layout. I have Jenn's and Peppermint's shadow styles, and I apply those as I create the layout, just to give me a basic feel for how I want things to be. Once the layout is finished, I go back and do my tweaking, and pretty much every single paper and element gets tweaked in some way. I also apply a very slight shadow in the opposite direction of my main shadows (this results in lots and lots of layers). My shadow work takes tons of time, but I love the way it makes the layout look so real! I really think it's worth playing with and learning how to do what you want. But, it does take time to find a method that you really love.
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