Xara Photo & Graphic Designer+ is a Windows application for editing photographs, drawing vector illustrations and combining images with text in graphic designs. Its tools cover both the contents of a picture and the objects arranged around it, so a retouched photograph can become part of a flyer, card, poster or social media graphic in the same project. The Plus edition is subscription software with access to the Xara Elements content catalog.
Retouching photographs
The Photo Tool provides automatic enhancement alongside manual brightness, shadow and highlight adjustments. Cropping, rotation, scaling and red-eye removal handle changes to framing and appearance. Xara Photo & Graphic Designer+ uses non-destructive photo editing, allowing adjustments without repeatedly overwriting the original image data.
Selections narrow an edit to the part of the photograph that needs attention. Color Select targets areas by their color, allowing a change to a flower or sky without applying the same adjustment across the whole picture.
Photo Healing and Magic Erase deal with unwanted details; with Magic Erase, the selected area is replaced using the background. Background removal instead isolates a subject for placement over another image or export without its former background.
Intelligent Scaling changes a photograph’s aspect ratio using content-aware resizing. It is intended to protect important picture content when changing the frame’s proportions, rather than stretching every part equally.
Vector shapes
Drawing tools create freehand lines and shapes, while path editing lets you reshape their geometry. A straight segment can be pulled into a curve, and live path editing displays the changed shape during the drag. At angled joins, the corner controls apply a chosen corner style and radius. Selecting several points lets you adjust their corners together instead of matching each one separately.
The bitmap tracer gives imported artwork another route into this editing process. It converts a bitmap, such as line art or a logo, into vector shapes whose contours can then be adjusted. This changes the working material from a grid of pixels to editable outlines.
Object effects
Xara Photo & Graphic Designer+ applies styling directly to objects. Drag controls adjust gradient fills, transparency, shadows and bevels on the page. Graduated transparency can fade a photograph or drawing into the background, while feathering softens its edges for a composite.
Blending generates intermediate forms between objects, which can be used to build patterns or transitions in an illustration. The extrusion tool gives a two-dimensional outline depth with shading and reflections.
Templates, tables and font replacement
Templates supply editable arrangements for print materials and social posts. The content catalog also contains stock photographs, illustrations, photo grids, text panels, overlays and filters. A design can therefore begin with an existing layout, then use different images, text and drawn elements rather than retaining the template’s original content.
The Table Tool creates a table with chosen rows and columns. Its controls adjust cell spacing and padding, row heights, column widths, borders and alignment; cells can also be merged or split. These controls suit structured content within a design, such as a menu or a small comparison table.
Font changes can be managed across the project. Find & Replace Font locates text using a particular typeface, replaces an individual occurrence or changes every use. Replace All also updates the font in text style definitions, so the change reaches styles as well as existing text objects.
QR codes
The built-in QR editor turns text or a URL into a vector code that can be placed in the layout and recolored. Its error-correction setting controls the tradeoff between a denser code and its ability to remain readable when part of it is obscured or damaged.
A selected shape can replace the usual square data pixels for a customized code. Complex shapes or shapes with holes can reduce scanner readability, so that choice affects function as well as appearance. An existing code can be reopened in the editor to change its contents.
Supported file formats
Supported file types include bitmap formats such as JPEG, PNG, WebP and TIFF, alongside vector formats including SVG, PDF and AI/EPS. Photoshop PSD import and export include layer support, allowing layered artwork to move between applications.
Xara editions compared
Xara Photo & Graphic Designer+ concentrates on photo editing and illustration. Designer Pro+ adds a full PDF editor, desktop publishing and web design capabilities. The separate one-time-purchase Photo & Graphic Designer edition is an older product with a different purchase model and feature set from the Plus subscription.
