Questions

FAQ

How aiScreeningRoom works, what the report includes, how accuracy is measured, what happens to your footage, and how distributors use the instrument.

01

The basics

What is aiScreeningRoom?

aiScreeningRoom predicts how real-world audiences will receive an unreleased film by watching the actual footage - the entire cut - with no human test audience in the room. You upload your film, declare how you are positioning it, and get a test-screening-style report: predicted audience reaction, craft assessment, where the film holds or loses people minute by minute, comparable titles, and (for feature narratives) an IMDb landing-zone projection.

It is built by the team behind iScreeningRoom (called "a revolutionary online test screening platform" by Forbes), using more than ten years of taste-matched online panel testing to tune the instrument.

How is this different from a traditional in-theater test screening?

A traditional in-theater test puts your cut in front of a recruited audience - one audience, one night, one theater - and creates a leak surface every time. aiScreeningRoom never shows your film to a human test audience. Footage no audience watches cannot leak through one.

Because there is no recruitment or venue, you can test at any stage of post - rough assembly through picture lock - and re-test after editorial changes. Testing becomes part of cutting, not a single event after the fact.

How is this different from iScreeningRoom?

iScreeningRoom is an online human audience test screening platform: nationwide audiences selected for interest in the film's genre, premise, and comparable titles, typically targeting about 300 completed surveys per film.

aiScreeningRoom is the AI instrument built on that panel data. It predicts the kind of reception those panels measure - without putting the cut in front of people. Human panel testing continues in parallel; new panels keep growing the calibration corpus.

Who is it for?
  • Studios and independent filmmakers and producers who need a reception read before release.
  • Distributors, sales agents, and buyers who want a comparable, evidence-backed prediction before acquisition or positioning decisions.
  • Editors refining the cut.
02

How it works

What does the system actually watch?

Your uploaded video file - not a synopsis alone, not a trailer, not a script. The system watches the full runtime in multiple independent viewing passes, then aggregates those reads into one report. Narrative synthesis and comparable-title research use additional language models and public film databases; the reception grades come from the footage evaluation.

Why do I have to enter genre and synopsis?

After scoring, the report includes a positioning section that compares what you declared against what the footage actually plays as - advice on the sell, not a rewritten score for a different pitch.

What do I get in the report?

For a feature-length narrative film, the full product:

  • Predicted audience reaction on a 1–5 panel scale, with a range across viewing passes
  • Craft score out of 100 (reported separately from audience prediction)
  • Minute-by-minute engagement timeline (where it holds or loses people), with cited moments
  • Findings and synthesis grounded in timestamped evidence
  • Positioning alignment (sold-as vs plays-as)
  • Optional poster/key-art read if you uploaded art
  • Comparable films with verified public scores and domestic grosses
  • An IMDb landing-zone projection (center estimate with a range, not a single guaranteed number)
  • Chat with Felix to dig into the results

For shorts, trailers, non-narrative, or other non-feature footage, you get a qualitative critique - synthesis, findings, and timeline - without calibrated audience, craft, or IMDb scores. Classification happens after the system watches; it is not something you pick from a menu to unlock grades.

How long does analysis take?

Typically about 20–90 minutes after upload, depending on runtime. Longer features sit toward the high end.

Can I test multiple cuts?

Yes. Each screening evaluates the file you upload. Re-upload a new cut as a new screening when you want a fresh read after editorial changes. That is one of the main advantages over a one-night human test.

What about Felix?

Felix is aiScreeningRoom's interactive cinephile analyst on your completed report. You can ask what is working, what is broken, pacing and performance questions, and how to think about fixes.

03

Accuracy and trust

Does this actually work?

The claim rests on two independently checked links. Neither peeks at the answer it is graded on.

1. Do taste-matched human panels predict public IMDb?
For corpus films that later earned an honest organic IMDb rating (screened for organized voting, verified title identity, adequate panel size), panels and public ratings usually moved together. Across 36 qualifying films, graded out-of-sample: when panels ranked films high, organic IMDb usually did too; average miss about half an IMDb point; 32 of 36 (89%) within 1.0 IMDb point; 75% within three-quarters; 64% within half a point.

2. Does the AI predict those panel results?
On 8 sealed holdout films - locked away from training and tuning - the AI was off by about a quarter of a star on average on the panel's 1–5 scale, with strong rank agreement with real panels.

A separate cheat-check asks the model what it knows about films from memory, with no footage. On 44 films it cannot recall, panel-prediction accuracy matched films it can. That is a contamination check, not a second accuracy claim: the sealed holdout remains the AI-to-panel accuracy figure.

Full methodology, figures, and limitations: Validation summary

Why not just predict IMDb directly?

Unreleased films do not have public ratings - that is why you need a prediction. Public ratings also never enter the calibration that trains the instrument. The panel mean is the sole calibration target; IMDb is validation and reporting (the landing zone), not something the AI is fit to.

What are the known limitations?

Stated plainly because a trust story that hides weaknesses is not trustworthy:

  • The AI-to-panel record is still early (sealed holdout of 8 films). The beta exists in part to grow a prospective ledger: predictions logged before outcomes exist, scored only when panels or public ratings arrive later. If accuracy moves against us as n grows, claims will be repositioned accordingly.
  • Films audiences love can be under-called. Top-band compression is a known failure mode.
  • On weaker films, predictions can skew high. Bottom-band overprediction is holdout-confirmed.
  • Public ratings for small or polarizing films are noisy ground truth. Paid vote-lifting and brigading exist; we screen and weight for visible cases. The projection assumes an organically rated release. Films marketed beyond their natural audience tend to land below the projected center.
  • Faith dramas and documentaries: public IMDb is often distorted by culture-war voting or too thin to use. We report the panel-scale prediction and say why, rather than manufacture a false-precision IMDb forecast.
  • Some films succeed or fail on taste a craft-and-engagement read underweights. Those perception inversions define part of the uncertainty band; reports disclose uncertainty rather than promising an oracle of taste.
Is this a guarantee of box office or streaming performance?

No. Reports are predictions and craft assessments with measured accuracy and stated limitations - not guarantees of commercial outcome. Comparable titles with verified scores and grosses help you reason about commercial context; they do not forecast your P&L.

04

Security and your footage

Will my film be shown to a human audience?

No. Analysis is automated. Your footage is not put in front of a human test panel through this product.

How long do you keep my film?

After analysis completes successfully, the source upload is deleted from our storage. If an immediate delete fails, a seven-day maximum backstop applies.

When footage chat is enabled for your account, a downscaled eval copy may be kept up to seven days for that feature only - never as a browser playback or download URL. When footage chat is off, no eval copy is retained after analysis. Evaluation uploads to Gemini are deleted when processing finishes; temporary chat caches are short-lived.

Reports and chat transcripts remain so you can return to your results; they do not include a downloadable video file.

Is this studio-grade secure?

For the self-serve product: we minimize copies and dwell time, use private storage and paid APIs with no-training terms, and delete source after success. That is a strong practical posture for unreleased indies. Please reach out to discuss studio walled-garden deployment.

Do walled garden options exist for studios?

Yes. Self-serve aiScreeningRoom is the indie path. For major and mini-major security requirements, studio deployment is a separate product on the same instrument - dedicated tenancy in the studio's environment, not customer API keys pasted into the shared app.

  • Near term - private cloud (Vertex AI): the evaluation runs in the studio's own Google Cloud organization and Vertex AI project, under zero-retention / no-training guarantees and the TPN-style frameworks studios already use for dailies and VFX. Footage stays in their walled garden.
  • Roadmap - on-premises: true on-prem as open-weight video models mature to feature-length evaluation quality.

Studio pricing is not the self-serve beta or catalog rate.

Call for pricing

Do you sell my film or data?

No.

05

Formats, uploads, and practical details

What file should I upload?

MP4, MOV, or AVI - H.264 delivery files preferred. Maximum 15 GB. Minimum about 2 minutes runtime (junk/empty upload floor). ProRes and camera masters are usually too large; export a compressed delivery screener.

Optional key art up to 1 MB.

What stage of the cut works?

Any stage of post where the picture is watchable as a film - rough assembly through locked picture. Incomplete assemblies will be judged as incomplete assemblies; the instrument reads what is on the timeline.

What if I upload a short or a trailer?

You still get a serious qualitative critique. You do not get the calibrated audience prediction, craft score, or IMDb landing zone. Those grades are for feature-length narrative classification.

Why does faith-market matter?

If your film targets the faith-based market, say so at intake. That segment has different public-rating dynamics (especially on IMDb). We report segment context honestly rather than applying a hidden numeric fudge to the score.

Can I share the report?

Yes - completed reports support share links for people you choose. Felix chat stays with the project owner (not on share links).

Can I upload my own audience survey later?

Yes. There is an optional path to upload real audience survey CSVs. When paired with a video-eval report, a convergence map highlights where the AI evaluation and your live panel point the same way - plus single-source and tension items. It is a corroboration map, not an accuracy scorecard that rewrites the AI grades.

06

Access

How much does it cost?

During private beta, screenings are complimentary for invited filmmakers.

Who can join the beta?

Working filmmakers with feature films at any stage of post, by invitation / allowlist during private beta. Apply at aiscreeningroom.com. Beta participants help grow the prospective accuracy record (predictions logged before outcomes) and receive priority access when the commercial platform launches.

What if analysis fails?

Contact support. If the failure is a platform error, that is a support case. Prediction accuracy itself is not a refund matter - the product is an instrument with a published record, not a guarantee.

07

For distributors and buyers

How would a distributor use this?

As a decision input before acquisition, ask-setting, or positioning: predicted reception with uncertainty, craft-vs-reception gap, comps with verified scores and grosses, and an IMDb landing zone you can line up against known titles. It is faster and more iterable than a one-night recruited screening, and it does not require putting the seller's cut in front of strangers.

It does not replace taste, negotiation, or legal diligence. It replaces "we have no measured reception signal until we screen it."

How does this compare to incumbent test houses?

Incumbents assert authority and typically publish no auditable accuracy record against real-world outcomes. aiScreeningRoom publishes its methodology, figures, and limitations. Measured accuracy versus asserted authority is the comparison we invite.

Traditional tests also measure a different construct when they use paid convenience samples in a single venue. Our calibration target is taste-matched panel reception of the kind iScreeningRoom runs - closer to natural audience than "whoever showed up that night."

Will my seller's cut leak?

Not through a human test audience - there isn't one. Processing still involves cloud storage and paid AI APIs under the retention rules above. For acquisition diligence at indie scale, that is usually the right tradeoff versus recruiting viewers. For major-studio security requirements, ask about the private-tenancy path rather than assuming self-serve meets that bar.

Still have questions?

Read the record, or apply for beta.

Validation detail: Validation summary

Privacy and retention: Privacy Policy

Apply or contact: aiscreeningroom.com