The Templates Page This page contains useful templates that when opened in Xara either have guidelines for creating certain tasks and/or have had adjustments made in certain areas to accommodate the specific task. The templates open as regular Xara XAR files and all the settings have been done for you. Refer to Xara’s Help files for information on creating your own templates.

BILL TAYLOR’S SHIELD SHAPES

From Bill Taylor (Soquili) - A collection of 10 shield shapes that you can copy and paste from Xara Xtreme into Xara 3D-6.

Click here to download a zipped XAR document with all 10 shapes.

Bill Taylor’s (Soquili) RGB Color Wheel (©2007 Bill Taylor) is about the best color wheel I have ever seen (and I did write a book on Color a few years ago. It is simple, easy to use and brilliantly thought out. Open the Layer Gallery and select the color model you wish to work with (in the example above, Analogous Colors--colors that are in the same section of the color wheel). Unlock the layer (check the second check box) then double click to enable rotate/skew mode, and you can rotate the opening to see all the various Analogous color schemes. Use the Color Picker (the eyedropper) in the Color Editor to sample colors.

You should only work with one layer at a time, and lock the other layers as you use this color wheel. Click here to download the Zipped XAR file (32K).

Gary Bouton’s Lens Flare. Not really a template but an actual vector image created by Gary Bouton and available to you to use. Click here to download a ZIPPED file.

Judi Assony has created a card envelope template for creating a custom printed envelope for enclosing a greeting card or photograph.

Print, trim, glue and post. It’s fun. It’s easy.

You can use Judi’s pattern, or select one of her patterns from the Fills and Brushes page, or create a pattern of your own.

Click here to download the template. (50K)

Minimiro’s CMYK Color Model Template

The Problem: If you plan to export your graphics to other graphics applications and work in CMYK color space, you must change color model of your template. In the Color Gallery (F9), you have to manually predefine the CMYK color model, because by default—never mind what Color Model you select in the Page Options menu, the colors in color gallery are displayed in the HSV model.

The Solution: The CMYK Color Model Template is configured to work in CMYK color space and will display colors using the CMYK Color Model.

Download the zipped file. Open it, and save it as template! (File > Save As Template...). Save it in the Xara Templates folder so that it will be available when you go to File > New... (to display the template files). Unless you plan to make this your default template, do not check the Use As Default Template check box. Click here to download the template (3K).

NOTE: You may need to set your Color Units (Utilities > Options > Units) to Percent (%). Xara uses your current color units setting. Also, you may need to change Edit Local Colors in: (View tabbed section) to CMYK as Xara uses your current settings for this too.

Xara to Flash Same Size Export Template - You asked for it and Egg Bramhill responded. Here is a simple template that will let you export your Xara drawings to Flash SWF so the images will be the same size in Flash. Just unzip the file, open the Xara file and then save it as a Template. (File > Save Template...). Save the template in the same directory as the other Xara templates and do not check Use as Default Template. Give it a name like Flash Export Template.

To use the template, select File > New... and then select the template from the flyout menu. Thanks Eric. You’re a good egg!

Click here to download the zipped file (5K).

FREE PowerPoint Finance Printable Template created in Xara and made available by Steve Knight of Power2Present.com, a Web site offering PowerPoint templates. The Finance Printable Template is from Volume 4. Each £30 volume contains a set of 4 templates in presentation and printable form. Click Here to download the Finance PowerPoint Template (285K).

James Kasyan has created a label template for Memorex CD labels and inserts. Click Here to download the Zipped template (3K)

NEW CD Templates from Michael Schaefer. “I have created 3 templates for Xara 2. CD-DVD Label.xar is for the Avery(R) brand CD/DVD Labels (# 5931) sheet. Jewel-Case-Front.xar and Jewel-Case- Back.xar are for use with the Neato(R) brand Jewel Case Inserts.”

In addition to the Guides layer, there are two foreground layers called 'Insert Your Graphics Here' and 'Don't Print This Layer'. The layers entitled 'Don't Print This Layer' and 'Guides' are set to non-editable by default, and all three layers are visible. The 'Don't Print This Layer' layer contains some basic instructions and shading to better indicate where the label parts are. There is also an arrow to indicate the feed direction for most printers. If the 'Don't Print This Layer' is visible check box is unchecked prior to printing, you'll save toner or ink by not printing the gray background. CLICK HERE to download the three Zipped Xara Template files (11K).

Joel Schilling has responded to numerous requests for a template to print CD labels and Cassette labels. The CD labels worth with Neato’s CD labels. The instructions for the audio cassette labels are included in the template file. Both templates are Xara files. The total file size is about 28K. Click Here to download both templates.

Joel Schilling has designed a series of templates useful for printing business cards and for setting Xara to print in portrait mode.

• 1) Ten business cards to a page for use with perforated card stock from Avery and other manufactures.
• 2) Three 6x4 postcards to a page of card stock.
• 3)  Nine 2 1\2 inch round stickers to a page of Avery Sticker Paper.
• 4) A template that sets up the page in portrait mode for working and printing the page.

CLICK HERE To download the Xara Printing  Templates

CLICK HERE for an HTML tutorial for using these templates (110K)

NEW FILE (5-3-00) Wide Format Arch E 48” x 36” Xara Template from John Clements

John writes: “This attached file can be used as an "configuration" template. On a non-printable layer I listed pertinent Xara Printer Options, Xara Page Options, and Printer Driver settings. Since I don't output to large formats everyday this template serves as a quick reminder/setup procedure. It can also help prevent wasting a lot of plotter paper.”

“This template has Arch E format parameters but can easily be adapted for any other "large" page format.”

“I use this all the time for our HPDesign Jet plotters. I hope this is helpful. Feel free to else/distrubute it (or its content) anyway you want.”

CLICK HERE to download the template (5K).

John Clements has designed a simple Xara Template file that can be used to create PowerPoint presentations.

The page's units of measure are in inches. The color palette default is RGB which is the same as PowerPoint. The page size is 10" wide x 7.5" high which corresponds to PowerPoint's "On-Screen Show" page size. The guidelines correspond to the borders of the title and bullet-list boxes located in PowerPoint per the "bullet list" slide-style  for the default "blank slide". The title text (44 pt Roman) is on a non-printable layer and serves as a visual key only.

This template gives you a visual key as to the proportions of a PowerPoint "On-Screen Show" page. What ever is drawn and exported as a GIF file and subsequently imported into PowerPoint will be same "size" and scale as it was in Xara. You should not have to do any re-sizing of the bitmap in PowerPoint. This should maximize the quality of the bitmaps created in Xara and imported into PowerPoint.

CLICK HERE To download the Xara PowerPoint Template

Pastel and Deep Color palettes created by Gary Priester. These two palettes when opened as a Xara XAR file add either 32 deep tones or 32 subtle pastel tones to the existing Xara palette.

CLICK HERE to download the ZIPped file.

If you have created a useful template, and would like to share it,
CLICK HERE to let me know about it.

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