Netflix has now reached the White Cliffs of Dover and has introduced a streaming-only service in the UK. It is trying to attract customers with a one month free trial and competitive monthly price plan for £ 5.99 for unlimited streaming. While LoveFilm has announced its 2 millionth subscriber this month, is its supremacy strong enough to withhold the arrival of its American cousin?

In time for the UK launch, Netflix has made the smart move to tie up with social networking service Facebook to catch up on subscriber numbers with contender LoveFilm. This means, users wanting to subscribe to Netflix can sign up using their Facebook account. Once your Facebook account is linked up with Netflix, you and your friends’ Netflix activity are automatically shared. Users have already complained about sharing their Facebook details with Netflix, even though users can opt-out at any time. The company, however, confirms that it is not compulsory to use Facebook and there is also a less than obvious sign-up option available using only email and password.

Once signed up, the user is presented with a strenuous, long-drawn questionnaire that helps Netflix to identify the user’s movie preferences. Netflix has developed a sophisticated prediction algorithm: a personal video recommendation system based on the user’s preferences for specific genre types, moods, qualities, movie ratings and overall popularity. This algorithm has been deployed for customers in the US and is infamous for its hit ‘n’ miss accuracy. This process requires some manual input by the newly registered user for the initial setup. By ranking how often the user would watch movies in genres like Horror, Inspiring or ‘Cerebral’, Netflix can match movie recommendations, which will be displayed on your personalized Netflix homepage.

In comparison to LoveFilm, Netflix’s user interface relies heavily on imagery and the user’s taste preferences. This combination makes the homepage look clumsy and dull: Netflix’s predicted genres are arranged in vertical order, with movie covers listing on average 10 selected library titles per genre. Hotlists like ‘New Releases’ only appear at the bottom of the page with a poor selection of outdated movies. Frustratingly, there is no option to browse the complete movie catalogue and other Hotlists like ‘Recently Added’ or ‘Top Rated’ movie lists. Furthermore, movies can’t be queued or bookmarked to watch them at a later point.

Understandably due to its recent launch, the content available for streaming is limited and mostly based on library titles. This becomes even more obvious when carrying out a brief test: When searching for movies with actor Ben Stiller, Netflix presents the user with a list of merely 5 movies, while LoveFilm returns 243 matches in Film & TV and News & Features. Equally disappointing is the result for movie title ‘The Terminator’; while Netflix returns a list of 8 movies, LoveFilm offers a selection of over 30 titles. Being a subsidiary of Amazon.com, LoveFilm definitely benefits from its stock of international movies, back catalogue and existing contractual deals with studios.

Netflix clearly hits the mark with its anytime & anywhere availability by providing its service across a range of digital devices. It offers its streaming services via Internet Browser on PC, games consoles such as Xbox or Playstation 3 or any other Smart device such as BluRay Players, SmartTVs or Smartphones. Netflix is also available as an App on Smartphones, which enables subscribers to stream movies or TV shows instantly on the go via 3G or Wi-Fi connection. A convenient Pause ‘n’ Play feature enables users to start watching movies on the phone and then continue watching them on home TV by simply pausing the stream.

LoveFilm has a variety of packages and price plans, giving subscribers a choice suitable for their needs. Currently, the LoveFilm packages range from £ 4.99 for unlimited streaming to £ 14.99, also including DVD and game rental. Netflix, on the other hand, has decided to offer only a one-package deal to subscribers in the UK, providing unlimited streaming of TV shows and movies for a slightly higher monthly fee of £ 5.99. At the moment, there are no plans for Netflix to extend its service with an additional DVD rental service.

At the moment, LoveFilm is still UK’s favourite over Netflix. Netflix is a nice affordable streaming-only service with good potential, but it has not yet become a worthy competitor for LoveFilm in terms of user experience and movie content attraction. While LoveFilm’s future seems safe being a subsidiary of Amazon.com, Netflix’s tie with Facebook can offer unlimited possibilities. With its DVD rental service, LoveFilm is clearly in the lead for now, as broadband speeds are not up to the demands of digital home entertainment just yet. However, as Netflix rightly predicts, physical copies are on decline and digital streaming is growing rapidly. In the next decade an aggressive battle for subscribers is on the horizon – it might be between Netflix and LoveFilm.

© Ondemand Management Ltd, 2011

30′ Promo for Vorstadetkrokodile 2
Created: 2011
Country: Germany

Used tools: Avid Media Composer, Photoshop & Pro Tools for Audio recording

TheSelfbuilder.com at Grand Designs Live 2008 © Media10 Ltd.
Created: September 2008
Country: United Kingdom

Used tools: Adobe Photoshop & Adobe After Effects

Books-on-stage presents a new way to decorate your home: Books-on-stage provides the customer with a framework to place the favourite book on a wall instead of hiding them away in a shelf.
This was a collaboration project with Markus Seisenbacher, where it was my task to implement the order form and the administrator backend of the site. This has been implemented using PHP & MySQL, as well as JQuery.

The order form changes its price values depending on country and order amount momentarily. Via the backend the owner can view and manage all orders as well as administer prices changes and enter shipping fees.

Bluewater Christmas Fair and Market © Media10 Ltd.
Created: January 2008
Country: United Kingdom

Used Tools: Final Cut Pro, Adobe After Effects & Adobe Illustrator

Grand Designs Awards 2008 © Media10 Ltd.
Created: April 2008
Country: United Kingdom

Used Tools: Final Cut Pro, Adobe After Effects

World Property Investor

Tights 4 you

Caravan Quoter

British Insurance

The idea for this story considers the basic question of life: where is it all going? Can we actually decide on ourselves or are we abandoned to our fate and every decision we make will lead to it?
Life is like a mystery and a roller coaster ride and at certain moments in life we cannot help but wonder and ask ourselves what would have happened if I had made different decisions? Would we be happier or would things be the same? Did a series of reactions lead me to that point of life or was it fate anyhow? While going through this process we rely on the saying that it “was supposed to happen” and if the outcome was good or bad either, we still have learned from it and accept the unchangeable result.
In the film I am going to produce, the protagonists will get the chance to relive crucial moments in their lives in form of flashbacks. They will get the chance to relive the situation and go another way they used to which maybe affects the final outcome. In the end though, the protagonists see that no matter how they decide, it will only affect the current situation but in a bigger picture the outcome stays the same.

De songe et verite – Trailer
genre: Experimental French New Wave
created: Summer of 2007
country: United Kingdom

Used tools: Editing & Effects in Final Cut Pro

DVD includes full feature movie, scene selection, animated menu and trailer.
DVD has been produced using DVD Studio Pro and Final Cut Pro.

DVD cover Design