The feature width broadening and height increasing of the Cr nanostructure have been experimentally observed in the gradual atom flux distribution divergent area on one sample along the standing wave direction in laser-focused atomic deposition. By applying an optimized ballistic deposition surface growth model to simulate this situation, it is demonstrated that the shadow effect of the forming nanostructure influences the deposition sites of the subsequent incident atoms, which leads to feature broadening and contrast decreasing of the nanostructures. The shadow effect theory provides a new understanding for the explanation of the discrepancy between the calculated results and the experimental observations. (C) 2012 Elsevier B. V. All rights reserved.