Described herein are apparatus, systems and methods for shadow assisted object recognition and tracking. The methods performed by the apparatus and system include identifying a blob within a video image, the video image having at least one object and at least one shadow of the at least one object, the at least one shadow of the at least one object cast by at least one light source. Identifying the blob includes identifying an object projection corresponding to the at least one object and a shadow projection corresponding to the at least one shadow. A location of an object portion of the at least one object is determined based on the shadow projection.