Mobile filmmaking app Filmic Pro has hit a roadblock. Bending Spoons, the company that acquired Filmic in September 2021, has reportedly laid off Filmic’s entire staff, leaving the future of the popular video app uncertain.

According to PetaPixel, Filmic no longer has any dedicated employees following the layoffs, which included founder and CEO Neill Barham. The move came as a shock to many in the mobile video world. Filmic has enjoyed immense popularity among independent filmmakers and videographers for years. Its professional-grade tools for iOS and Android devices made it a standout for shooting films and music videos on phones and tablets.

Some of Filmic’s key creative staff have acknowledged their departure on LinkedIn. Christopher Cohen, Former Chief Technical Officer at Filmic, posted on November 3rd about no longer being with the company. When asked about the situation, former COO Kevin Buonagurio said “pushing the envelope” of mobile filmmaking was what “made the Filmic journey so fulfilling.”

The layoffs throw the future of Filmic Pro into question. Only a year after acquiring Filmic, Bending Spoons cleaned the house and left the app without a dedicated team. And recent history from a similar Bending Spoons acquisition paints a potentially gloomy picture.

Earlier this year, after buying the popular note-taking app Evernote in 2021, Bending Spoons laid off much of Evernote’s staff over the summer. They moved the app in-house, changed the pricing model to subscriptions, and effectively transformed the spirit of the beloved product. A similar fate may await Filmic.

Bending Spoons does have video editing expertise in-house already with Splice, the GoPro video editor it took over in 2018. Filmic may now follow suit as primarily a Bending Spoons property. But the loss of Filmic’s innovative founders and filmmaking leads means the app is unlikely to have the same filmmaker-focused identity that made it so popular for cinematic mobile video.

Filmic even announced FilmicFest 2023 recently, its annual mobile filmmaking festival with a $25,000 grand prize. But with no staff left at Filmic and the competition signup page now defunct, the festival’s cancellation appears imminent. It’s a sobering sign of the challenges now facing the Filmic app.

While Bending Spoons may keep Filmic Pro available in some form, its development is likely to diverge under new leadership focused more on commercial potential than catering to the independent filmmaking community. For many mobile cinematographers, that creative soul of Filmic Pro has already met its final cut.