In examle below are two ways I think better than built in complication.
First is using font with 8 shade images, that can have rotation applied.
The other, I have seen somewhere interesting method for continuous shade developement, but can not find the source, nor whether it was here or on GWD forum. So I had to recreate it from scratch
It uses 2 squares one circle and one half circle cutout mask.
The formula for shade progression is linear, but maybe could be improved with some sine implementation.