Blending between two objects is very easy and very quick in Xara Xtreme.

To create a blend simply select the blend tool and then click over the first object and drag to the second.

On releasing, the intermediate steps are generated (very quickly, due to Xara's unique rendering technology). Note that if your object has a shadow or bevel, then this is blended as well.

You can continue the blend to another object in the same way - simply click and drag from the end object in one blend to a the new object. Note that you can reposition and resize the end objects in the blend by CTRL-clicking over the end object and dragging it to the new position. The blend is instantly regenerated.

The number of steps can be changed by entering the number required into the blendtool infobar. Press Return and it will change instantaneously.

You can also alter the way the colors fade from one to another in the blend. 'Fade' generates a smooth transition from one to another, but you can also select Rainbow or Alternate Rainbow from the Color Blend Effect drop down menu on the blend infobar. An Alternate Rainbow gives a very colorful result (it fades along the longest path around the HSV Color Circle to be precise).

Blends have profile dialog boxes, so you can fine-tune your blend to achieve a non-linear rate of change in either the position of the steps or the other attributes such as color.

You can select pre-set profiles from the drop down menu or experiment with the sliders to achieve just the result you're looking for. So for example you can use the Position Profile to have more change at the start of the blend...

...or at the end.

The attribute profile works in the same way. For example you can have a faster rate of change in the attributes (in this case the color) at the end of the blend.

The AA button allows you to turn off the anti-aliasing in the steps of a blend. You might want to do that if you have a large number of steps, as it speeds up the redraw.

A new feature in Xara Xtreme is the ability to fit a blend to a curve. Here's a simple example using a curve drawn with the Freehand Tool:

Now if you return to the Blend Tool and select both objects (click the first, shift-click the second) and then click on the Blend on a Curve icon, the blend instantly fits to the curve.The other Curve icon rotates the blend steps around the curve.

Note that the 'curve' could in fact be any shape, not just a line. You could for example fit the blend to a QuickShape circle.

In all the examples above I have blended from one object to another separate object in order to make the tutorial clear, but equally you can of course blend one object into another underlying object like this: