for Capture One — free beta until 31 January 2027
How it works. Hit the Lens Plugin is a separate Windows application, launched from Capture One's Image > Open With menu. It looks at the photos in your session and writes standard XMP sidecar files, which Capture One reads back with Image > Load Metadata. It is not built with the Capture One SDK, does not install anything inside Capture One, and does not appear in Capture One's Plugin manager. It is not affiliated with, sponsored, authorised or endorsed by Capture One A/S.
Where it fits
Capture One 16.8 introduced Assisted Review, which automatically flags closed or out-of-focus eyes and exposure problems (Capture One's own help article, “Assisted Review (Beta)”; it only flags images, it does not remove or hide any, and it does not look at where anyone is looking). Hit the Lens Plugin picks up from there: it looks at the whole session and finds the shots where your subject is actually looking into the lens.
It gives you a pre-selection to check, not a final verdict — colour tags you review and correct in Capture One as normal. It is most useful on photocalls: red carpets, press lines, panels — anywhere you come home with hundreds of near-identical frames of the same face and need to find the ones looking at the camera fast.
Requirements
- Windows 10 or 11, 64-bit.
- Capture One, sessions only in this beta (catalogs are not supported yet).
- Automatic loading of the result back into Capture One has been live-measured on Capture One 16.7.7 with its interface set to Italian. The English menu names are not yet confirmed live (they come from a system resource file, not a real measurement). With Capture One in English or another language/version, the full analysis still runs and the XMP files are still written; if the automatic step doesn't apply, a short on-screen instruction shows the one manual command (Image > Load Metadata) to see the result.
Free during the beta
Hit the Lens Plugin is free to use until 31 January 2027. No licence key, no account, no card required to try it.
Installing it: about the Windows security warning
The beta installer is not yet digitally signed, so Windows may show a warning the first time you run it. This is expected and normal for a new, small, independently published app — here is what to do:
- Download the installer and run it. Windows SmartScreen may show a blue screen titled “Windows protected your PC”.
- Click “More info”.
- Click “Run anyway”.
- Follow the setup wizard; it installs for your Windows user only, no administrator rights needed.
Download
Download Hit the Lens Plugin (free beta)
Trouble with the button above? Direct download from the fallback form on this site.
Version 0.9.0-beta, 18 September 2026 — Windows installer, 64.0 MB.
Installer SHA-256: e127494415a1bab3c8a3f4d7dbb4d8667857c6dc0c93d7b9a0a00094d8dd2db3
What comes next
Hit the Lens Plugin stays free through the beta. After that, it becomes a paid licence at EUR 39, with a EUR 29 launch price. Anyone who tried the beta and opted in to promotional emails gets a EUR 19 discount code by email before the free period ends. Without that tick box no promotional email is sent: only the service messages about the download.
Legal
Hit the Lens Plugin is an independent product of DIGITAL INDEX di Fabrizio de Gennaro (Modena, Italy). It is not affiliated with, sponsored, authorised or endorsed by Capture One A/S or Adobe. Capture One is a registered trademark of Capture One A/S in the European Union and/or other countries. Adobe and Lightroom are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Adobe in the United States and/or other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners and are used only to identify the software with which this product is designed to work.