Hawaii Ranks #5 in Top 10 Places to Shoot in the US

The "Lost" crew enjoys balmy ocean breezes and the lilting sway of trees while working

Industry trade pub P3/Production Update just put out its ranking of the Top 10 Places to Shoot in the U.S. (outside of California). After considering criteria such as financial incentives, growth, cost of living, 2005 revenues generated from film industry, level of difficulty for productions, crewbase, infrastructure, support services and desire to return, P3 put Hawaii at the #5 spot.

First place went to Louisiana, which attracted $550 million worth of total production value in 2005 (although apparently, only about 1/3 of this--about $183M--was actually spent in Louisiana). California wasn't even considered because its $34 billion film and TV industry in 2005 far outweighs the industry in every other location.

FYI, Hawaii's 2005 in-state film industry expenditures totaled about $100M (down from our record $164M in 2004). Also FYI, P3 makes a boo-boo in its article by saying that the state-owned and operated Hawaii Film Studio complex boasts its own "state-of-the-art camera, lighting and grip equipment"--the studio actually does not carry this stuff, but there are many local vendors that do (see our production directory for a list of them).

Here's the full Top 10 list:
10. Texas
9. Utah
8. Virginia
7. Georgia
6. North Carolina
5. Hawaii
4. New York
3. Florida
2. New Mexico
1. Louisiana

>> Top 10 Places to Shoot in the U.S. [P3, July 2006]
>> Film production trade magazine ranks Louisiana No. 1 [The Shreveport Times, 8/6/06]

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