After nearly a year of development, I've finally reached the finish line. Filmari is uploaded to App Store Connect and waiting for review. It's a massive milestone. Exciting and a little nerve-wracking at the same time. Before moving forward, I want to take a moment and look back at how it all started.
20 Years Behind the Camera
I've been into filmmaking and cameras for a good 20 years now. Started out as a wide-eyed enthusiast shooting wildlife stuff just for myself. Then came music videos and short art films for friends from film school. Somehow I ended up in TV production, where I picked up real-world experience. Great times — chasing stories, sleepless nights in the editing suite. I look back on those days fondly.
In recent years I shifted more towards live streaming and its technical side. Lots of gear, lots of computers, and above all — lots of calculations. I've always had this thing where I need to simplify processes and make my life easier. That's how my first tool came to be: Time to Seconds. I needed to log video durations in seconds when uploading to FTP. For a while I did it manually in a regular calculator like a good soldier, but something in my head immediately flagged it: this is not sustainable.
Filmari Is Born
One tool led to another, and it hit me that it would be great to have them all under one roof. So last year I started building Filmari. It went through a lot of changes — complete wipes, clean rebuilds, endless tweaking. Anyone who's been through development knows exactly what I mean. But gradually it started to look functional, and dare I say, actually useful.
I pulled together the tools I use most often into one package. I know the internet is full of this stuff, but having everything in one native app beats juggling a million browser tabs where every tool lives on a different website.
From Tools to Projects
As the app grew, a Projects section was added. Some tools work great as standalone utilities, but others only really make sense when tied to a specific film. Inside a project, you can write a script, build a shot list, put together your gear inventory, and — most importantly — create a budget.
The Budget Planner is one of my favourite parts. I see it all the time in forums: filmmakers, especially younger ones, struggle with pricing their work. They pull numbers out of thin air, feel uncomfortable charging a fair rate, or simply forget to account for half the costs involved. The budget system in Filmari helps bring some clarity to those numbers.
No More Freestyle Shooting
The other common struggle is going on set with zero plan and just winging it. I was the same — grab the camera and see what happens. But good results start with preparation. I used to be old school about it: pen, paper, quick scene rundown. Without that, in the chaos of a shoot you'll forget half the shots you needed.
That's why I built the Shooting section. It's essentially a technical script where you map out your scenes and shots. On top of that, there's an On-Set Mode where you can log takes for each shot. Export that, bring it into the edit suite, and you immediately know what was a bad take and where that hero moment is hiding.
No Subscriptions. No Data Mining.
Filmari isn't trying to be some global corporation. It's a pure indie app. That said, to cover development costs, I needed a paid component. A lot of people advised me to go with a subscription model.
But honestly — as filmmakers, we're all pretty tired of every tiny plugin demanding a monthly fee. I decided to go against the grain, DaVinci Resolve-style: one-time payment.
- The app is fully functional and free.
- If you're a hobbyist filmmaker, you can use it without restrictions for years.
- The only limitation is one active project and one inventory list.
- If you're juggling more, unlock the full version with a single one-time fee. No hidden charges. Ever.
One more thing — privacy. It annoys me how aggressively modern apps harvest your data. Filmari has no servers of mine, no accounts. Everything stays on your device (or your iCloud if you want sync across devices). The app works completely offline — which matters when you're shooting somewhere out in the middle of nowhere with no signal.
That's all from me for now. I'll be posting updates and news here on the site as things move forward. Stay tuned! :)