Radiant Photo £129/$129

This new software promises to transform photos with a single click-and it actually does

- Rod Lawton

Windows Requires: Intel Core i5 or better, Windows 10 or Windows 11 (64-bit editions), 8 GB RAM or more (minimum), 16+ GB RAM (recommended), 1 GB free space; SSD for best performance, 1280 x 800 display (minimum) 1920 x 1080 (recommended)

macOS Requires: Apple ARM processor (M1/ M2), Intel Core i5 or better, macOS 10.9 or later (64-bit), 8 GB RAM or more (min), 16+ GB RAM (rec), 1 GB free space; SSD for best performance, 1280 x 800 display (minimum), 1920 x 1080 (recommended)

Let's not mention any names, but there are already programs out there L that promise to leverage the power of Al to transform your images into masterpieces but with the emphasis firmly on 'reality enhancement' rather than image quality.

Radiant Photo is rather different. It doesn't attempt to change what you're looking at but instead optimises the colours and tones on a pixel-by-pixel basis to recreate scenes as our eyes see them.

Human vision isn't like a camera. Our eyes and brains use their own HDR, sharpening, and colour corrections, which cameras don't have. It might be going too far to say Radiant Photo tries to recreate what our eyes 'see', but it's not far off.

It doesn't seek to replace your existing photo editing software but works alongside it. It comes in a standalone version, as a Lightroom Classic and Photoshop plug-in version, and as a bundle which includes both. You could use it as a finishing adjustment once you've carried out other work or, as Radiant Photo would suggest, as a starting point before you do anything else.

For example, you might use it with Lightroom as a plug-in or Capture One (say) as an external editor for optimising images after you've carried out basic raw processing and before any further edits.