ON1 Effects Free 10 is a collection of professional photo filters and effects which can be used stand-alone, and as Photoshop or Lightroom plugins.

Beginners can use the package much like other apps. Open an image, choose a preset – Cinematic, Color Grading, Haze Reduction, more – and just click a thumbnail to apply that effect.

When you need more power, there are ten configurable filters and effects to explore: Adjustable Gradient, Adjustment Brush, Black & White, Borders, Dynamic Contrast, Glow, HDR Look, Texturizer, Vignette and Vintage.

Each of these have plenty of options. Select Vignette, for instance, and you get thumbnails of 12 vignette types, along with tools to adjust brightness, size, roundness, feathering, opacity, effect strength and more.

You’re also able to save custom settings as a preset for easy recall later.

Click a preset to update your image immediately, or fine-tune it with a host of low-level tweaks and adjustments

Effects can be applied globally, to a masked area, or painted onto the photo as required.

The developer would like you to upgrade to the $39.99 commercial version, so unsurprisingly the free build has some restrictions to push you in that direction: no Sharpen tool, Blur, Noise Reduction and many other effects.

The Browse module is missing, too, so the only way to find and select your photo is with a standard Open dialog box.

ON1 Effects Free isn’t the best all-round photo optimizer, then, but the effects you do get deliver great results, and are very configurable, and if you just need to enhance a photo or two then it should work very well.

ON1 Effects Free 10 is free application for Windows 7 and later and Mac.