Poster-style frames: corner radius, drop shadow, vignette

This article shows you how to give a photo layer a polished poster look using the three frame-styling controls in the properties panel: rounded corners, a drop shadow, and a vignette. It also covers the built-in 13" × 19" poster canvas preset that pairs naturally with these controls.

Where to find the controls

Select a photo layer on the canvas. The properties panel on the right shows two relevant sections:

Frame — corner rounding (Corners) and the Drop shadow toggle with its sub-controls. The entire Frame section is hidden when the layer's fit mode is Top Fill with face placement active — see Consistent team faces: what face placement does & when to use it for why.
Image Adjustments — brightness, contrast, saturation, and at the bottom of this section, Vignette.

Photo layer properties panel with the Frame section expanded, showing Corners slider, Drop shadow checkbox and sub-controls

Rounded corners

The Corners slider sets a corner radius on the photo frame, from 0 (square) up to half the shorter side of the layer (a full pill or circle). The rounding is baked into the layer's clip shape, so it:

Rotates with the photo when you rotate the layer on the canvas — the rounded corners follow the photo's angle exactly.
Appears identically in the final render.

Select the photo layer.
In the Frame section of the properties panel, drag the Corners slider right to increase rounding. The canvas updates live.
Double-click the slider to reset it to 0.

The slider's maximum adjusts automatically if you resize the layer — it stays locked to half the shorter dimension, so you can always reach a fully rounded (pill-shaped) frame regardless of layer size.

Drop shadow

Check Drop shadow in the Frame section to add a shadow behind the photo. Five sub-controls appear:

Control	What it does
Color	The shadow color. Click the swatch to open a color picker. The alpha (opacity) of the existing color is preserved when you pick a new hue.
Blur	How soft or hard the shadow edge is. Higher values spread and soften the shadow (0–400 px).
Size	How far the shadow expands outward from the layer's edge before blurring. A larger size makes the shadow appear on all sides even when offset is 0 (0–200 px).
Offset X	Horizontal shift of the shadow. Positive moves it right, negative moves it left (−200 to +200 px).
Offset Y	Vertical shift of the shadow. Positive moves it down, negative moves it up (−200 to +200 px).

These numbers are canvas units that scale with the finished output, so on a poster-sized canvas the older, smaller maximums came to only about one percent of the design and read as almost no shadow at all — the ranges were widened so a shadow is actually visible at print size. The same wider ranges apply when you select several photo layers and edit their shadow together. Existing designs are unchanged: only the sliders' reach grew, not any value you have already saved.

All shadow controls update live on the canvas and carry through identically to the final render. Uncheck Drop shadow to remove the shadow without losing your settings — they're remembered if you re-enable it.

Vignette

Vignette darkens the edges of the photo in a smooth radial gradient, drawing the eye toward the center. It's a spatial effect applied after the photo is rendered, not a tonal curve.

Select the photo layer.
In the Image Adjustments section, drag the Vignette slider right to increase the effect (0–100%).
Double-click the slider to reset it to 0.

Vignette works in all fit modes, including face-placement mode, and renders exactly as shown in the editor.

The Poster 13" × 19" canvas preset

When creating a new template, the canvas-size picker includes a Poster 13" × 19" preset. This is a good starting point for large-format portrait posters where you want to combine a full-bleed photo with rounded corners, a dramatic shadow, and a vignette.

In the Templates tab, click New template.
In the canvas size field, choose Poster 13" × 19".
Set the DPI — choose 300 — Print for a print-ready file.
Name and save the template, then open it in the editor.

The resulting canvas is 936 × 1368 px at 72 DPI equivalents (or proportionally larger at higher DPI). Add a photo layer, apply rounded corners, a drop shadow, and a vignette to finish the look.

Face placement and the Frame section

When a photo layer uses Top Fill fit mode and face placement is active, the Frame section — corner radius and drop shadow — is hidden. This is intentional: face placement controls the photo's clip path to ensure consistent face alignment, and those two features share the same clip mechanism. If you need rounded corners or a shadow on a face-placement layer, switch the layer to Cover or Contain fit mode to access the Frame controls. The Vignette slider is always available regardless of fit mode.