dropshadow.js

## dropshadow.js
// d3.js drop shadow example
// put together by http://charlbotha.com/

var items = [
    {x : 50, y : 10},
    {x : 100, y: 170},
    {x : 320, y: 70}
];

// we can increase this, everything will scale up with us
var w=960,h=500,
    svg=d3.select("#chart")
        .append("svg")
        .attr("width",w)
        .attr("height",h);

// filter chain comes from:
// https://github.com/wbzyl/d3-notes/blob/master/hello-drop-shadow.html
// cpbotha added explanatory comments
// read more about SVG filter effects here: http://www.w3.org/TR/SVG/filters.html

// filters go in defs element
var defs = svg.append("defs");

// create filter with id #drop-shadow
// height=130% so that the shadow is not clipped
var filter = defs.append("filter")
    .attr("id", "drop-shadow")
    .attr("height", "130%");

// SourceAlpha refers to opacity of graphic that this filter will be applied to
// convolve that with a Gaussian with standard deviation 3 and store result
// in blur
filter.append("feGaussianBlur")
    .attr("in", "SourceAlpha")
    .attr("stdDeviation", 5)
    .attr("result", "blur");

// translate output of Gaussian blur to the right and downwards with 2px
// store result in offsetBlur
filter.append("feOffset")
    .attr("in", "blur")
    .attr("dx", 5)
    .attr("dy", 5)
    .attr("result", "offsetBlur");

// overlay original SourceGraphic over translated blurred opacity by using
// feMerge filter. Order of specifying inputs is important!
var feMerge = filter.append("feMerge");

feMerge.append("feMergeNode")
    .attr("in", "offsetBlur")
feMerge.append("feMergeNode")
    .attr("in", "SourceGraphic");

// for each rendered node, apply #drop-shadow filter
var item = svg.selectAll("rect")
    .data(items)
  .enter().append("rect")
    .attr("width", 170)
    .attr("height", 100)
    .attr("fill", "steelblue")
    .attr("stroke-width", 2)
    .style("filter", "url(#drop-shadow)")
    .attr("transform", function(d) { return "translate(" + d.x + "," + d.y + ")"; });

## index.html
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

<head>
    <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8">
    <title>d3 drop shadow example</title>
</head>

<style>
body {
  font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;
  width: 960px;
  height: 500px;
  position: relative;
}
</style>

<body>
    <h4>Look ma, drop shadows!</h4>
    <p>Zoom in to see how pretty they are.</p>
<div id="chart">
</div>

<script src="http://d3js.org/d3.v3.min.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="dropshadow.js"></script>

</body>
</html>