Filmina vs ChatGPT
Uploading the PDF to the chat and asking it to explain works very well. Until there are sixty slides at eleven at night. How they differ, and why they compete less than it looks.
Almost everyone studying with AI today does the same thing: they drag the PDF into ChatGPT and type «explain this to me». And that's fine, because it works. No tool is going to clear up a specific doubt better than a chat that understands what you are asking.
The problem shows up when what has to be studied is not a specific doubt, but a whole file.
ChatGPT answers what you ask it. Filmina walks you through the whole document without you asking anything, in the order of the lecture and marking on the slide what it is talking about.
What ChatGPT does better, and isn't up for debate
- Asking anything. «I didn't get why the matrix is inverted in step 3» is something you can ask Mina, Filmina's chat, too, but Mina is built to answer briefly and from your material. For going round and round an open, hard topic, a general chat gives you more.
- Pushing. You ask for another example, for it to explain as if you were fifteen, for a comparison with something you already know.
- Testing you on anything. It builds questions on whatever you ask for and marks your answers.
- It has an app everywhere and a free version. Filmina runs in any browser and can be added to your home screen, but its apps are still on their way.
Filmina has Practice too, with questions of several kinds that adapt to how you are doing. But Mina, its chat, answers from your material first and doesn't search the web: if your problem is «there is a concept I don't understand» and the topic is open, a general chat is the right tool.
What happens with sixty slides
It summarises, because that is what a chat does
You ask «explain this PDF to me» and you get fifteen paragraphs about a sixty-slide document. It is a summary of a summary: the slides were already the summary of the lecture. What was left out it doesn't tell you, and the one who has to notice what is missing is you, who by definition doesn't know the subject yet.
Filmina goes slide by slide, in the order the lecture was given, and it covers every block on each page, charts and diagrams included. Coverage is verified in code: if a block was left unexplained, the model is asked again for that block only. It doesn't depend on it remembering.
Asking one at a time is work
The way to get a chat to explain slide 22 properly is to paste it slide 22 and ask it to explain it. Sixty times. Copy, paste, read, copy, paste. By slide twelve you are tired and you switch to asking for summaries ten at a time, which is exactly going back to the previous point.
In Filmina you upload the file once. While you listen to one slide, the next ones are already being prepared.
You have to read it, and reading is what you were avoiding
The chat's answer is text on the screen. If at eleven at night you didn't feel like reading forty slides, you won't feel like reading forty answers either. ChatGPT has a voice mode, but it is a conversation, not a walk through the document: there is no place where the PDF stays open with someone pointing at the part they are talking about.
That is literally the only thing Filmina does: the page on the left, the voice explaining, and a frame that surrounds the block being talked about and slides to the next one.
It makes things up, and on class notes you notice late
A chat fills gaps with what it knows about the world. Sometimes that's a gift, because it brings context the slide didn't have. Sometimes it is a definition your course gives differently, and you find out in the exam.
Filmina explains what is on the slide, block by block, without leaving your material. In its chat, every answer says where it comes from: «From your classes», «From your material», «From your notes», or «Beyond your material» when it comes from what the model knows. And if an explanation says something that isn't there, you flag it with «This is wrong» and it gets reviewed.
The file gets uploaded, in both
For the chat to read your PDF, the PDF travels to a server. The same goes for Filmina: the explanation is written and voiced in the cloud, and your slides stay in your account until you delete them. What is stored and where is in the privacy policy.
Filmina vs ChatGPT, point by point
| What matters | Filmina | ChatGPT |
|---|---|---|
| What you get | The whole document explained out loud, slide by slide | An answer to what you asked |
| Format | Audio with the page in front of you and a frame that points | Text on the screen, or a voice conversation |
| PDF coverage | Every block, verified in code | Whatever fits in the answer |
| Work on your side | Uploading the file once | Asking part by part, and deciding what to ask |
| Questions and doubts | Mina, a chat with your lectures that says which slides it comes from | It's what it does best |
| Practice | Questions on your lectures, of several kinds, that adapt to how you are doing | Builds questions if you ask for them, and marks your answers |
| Diagrams and images | Looks at them on the slide and explains them with the rest | It interprets them |
| Where it runs | In the cloud, from the browser, with an account | In the cloud, with an account |
| Pricing | Free to start, and Pro as a monthly subscription (see pricing) | Free with limits, or around US$ 20 a month |
The short way to decide
ChatGPT, when you have a doubt
You know what it is you don't understand and you want to ask it, argue about it, ask for another example or be tested on it.
Filmina, when you have a file
There are sixty slides, you don't even know where to start, and what you need is for someone to walk you through all of them while you look at them.
They go well together, and not out of diplomacy: you go through the PDF with Filmina, note the two or three things that stayed shaky and ask the chat about those. What doesn't work is the other way round, asking a chat to be a whole lecture.
And the same goes for Claude or Gemini
Everything on this page applies just the same to the other chats. The difference is not which model answers better: it is that a chat is a place where you ask and Filmina is a place where the document walks itself, with the page in front of you. They are two different things.
Frequently asked questions
Why not ask ChatGPT to read the PDF out loud to me?
You can, and it sounds good, but it is a conversation: there is no PDF left open with someone marking which block is being talked about, and what it reads you is what it summarised, not the whole document.
Is Filmina just a chat with a different face?
No. It uses language models in the cloud, like any chat, but there is other work around them: it looks at each slide with its charts, discards headers and footers, explains block by block and checks in code that none is missing. What you get is not an answer: it is the lecture walked through, with the page in front of you.
Can Filmina make things up?
It can get things wrong, like any model. What changes is that it works tied to your material: it explains what is on the slide, and in the chat every answer says whether it comes from your lectures, your material, your notes or from outside. If an explanation says something that isn't there, you flag it with «This is wrong» and it gets reviewed.
Can I ask Filmina questions?
Yes. Mina is a chat for each course that opens from any screen: it answers from your lectures, your notes and the material you add, and tells you which slides each answer comes from. The free plan comes with 30 questions a month, and Pro with 300.
What does Filmina cost against a chat subscription?
Starting is free: 60 minutes of explanation to begin with, then 20 a month, and 30 questions to Mina a month. Pro is a monthly subscription with 15 hours of explanation and 300 questions a month; a chat subscription runs around US$ 20 a month. The Pro price for your country is in the pricing section.
Keep comparing
- Filmina vs SpeechifyThe best known text-to-speech reader, against an explanation.
- Filmina vs NotebookLMGoogle's two-host podcast, against the explained slide.
- Why I made FilminaWhere it came from: an exam, a hundred slides and no tool that did the job.