Looking for a FilmGrab alternative?
First, credit where it's due: FilmGrab is a labor of love and its galleries are beautifully picked. The one thing it can't do is search. FrameThrower is a cinematography search engine covering 5,000+ films — type what you're picturing, or drop in a reference image, and get matching frames in seconds. Free with an account.
When you've outgrown browsing galleries
- —Search instead of scroll. FilmGrab means paging through galleries hoping the frame you remember is there. FrameThrower finds it: every frame carries AI-extracted metadata — lighting key and quality, lens character, shot size and framing, color, mood, film stock look, time of day.
- —Still curated, not scraped. Sets are hand-picked and reviewed with working cinematographers and filmmakers — our test users — then indexed by AI. The judgment of a curated library, with the depth of full metadata search.
- —More frames per film. Gallery sites carry ~50–70 stills per title. FrameThrower typically indexes hundreds per film, so the exact beat you need is far more likely to exist.
- —Visual similarity. Drop in any image and find frames matching its light, color and composition — something no gallery site can offer.
- —Moodboards & lookbooks built in. Save frames to canvas moodboards, shot boards and exportable lookbooks without leaving the app.
- —See it free before you commit. A free account includes full search across 5,000+ films. Paid plans add exports and higher limits. No card required.
Frequently asked questions
- What is the best FilmGrab alternative for searching stills?
- FilmGrab is browse-only — beautiful curated galleries, but no way to search by what is in the frame. FrameThrower indexes every frame by lighting, lens character, shot size, framing, color and mood, so you can type "silhouette against a window, low-key" and get matching frames across 5,000+ films. Search is free with an account.
- Is FrameThrower free like FilmGrab?
- Seeing it is free: a free account includes plain-language search across the full library. Paid plans add exports and higher usage limits. No card required to start.
- Does FrameThrower have the same films as FilmGrab?
- The catalogs overlap heavily on the canon — features, documentaries and animation across 5,000+ titles — and FrameThrower typically carries more frames per film, indexed with per-frame craft metadata instead of a gallery page.
- Can I make moodboards from the stills?
- Yes — frames save straight into canvas moodboards, shot boards and exportable lookbooks inside the app, so the reference and the deliverable live in one place.
Search 5,000+ films by light, lens and mood
Every frame indexed by lighting, lens character, framing, color and mood — searchable in plain language, free to see before you commit.
Sign up for free