In short: Book a studio when your shoot needs light that stays the same all day, quiet you control, power and rigging already in place, or effects a location would never allow. Choose a location when the real place, real daylight or real scale carries the story. Many productions do both, with dialogue in the studio and establishing shots outside.
A studio beats a location when the thing that decides your day is control, not scenery. If the shoot depends on light that matches from the first shot to the last, sound you can trust, a set you can build and change, or a schedule the weather cannot touch, book a studio. If it depends on a real place, real daylight or a scale you cannot build, go outside.
The mistake seen most often is choosing by habit. People who always shoot on location keep doing it when the job obviously wants a studio, and people who love a studio try to make it pass for a street. The test below takes five minutes and saves a day.
The five minute test
Answer each question for your own shoot. If most answers land in one column, you have your answer.
| Question | Points to a studio | Points to a location |
|---|---|---|
| Does the look depend on a real place? | No, a built set will do | Yes, the place is the story |
| Do you need real daylight or sky? | No | Yes |
| Will you shoot across several days or return later? | Yes, light must match | No, one visit |
| Is the sound critical? | Yes, dialogue or voiceover | No, ambient is welcome |
| Do you need effects or kit a location will not allow? | Yes, haze, rain, a car | No |
| Is the day fixed and the budget tight? | Yes, nothing can slip | Flexible, with cover days |
One honest note about our own barn: it has no windows, skylights or roof lights, so every bit of light comes off a lamp. That is why a shoot here looks the same at nine in the morning and at four in the afternoon. It also means that if you need real daylight, a location is the right answer. Why our studio has no windows covers the reasoning.
What a studio gives you
Light that does not move. Outside, the sun moves and the cloud arrives halfway through the reverse angle. In a studio, a lamp does what it did an hour ago. For anything that has to cut together, such as a presenter shot at eleven and again at four, that is the biggest single reason to be indoors.
Quiet you arrange. On location you inherit traffic, aircraft, a fridge that cycles on during the best take and a building's heating. A studio is not silent, because lamps and fans make noise too, but the noise is yours to switch off. If dialogue matters, that matters.
Power and rigging already there. On a location the first hour often goes on finding where the power is, what it can carry and where a stand can safely go. At our studio the White Space has an eight-bar lighting grid at 4.5 metres with 42 channels of dimming, and the hire includes the house lighting, C-stands, flags, bounce, apple boxes and a one metre turntable. Rigging, electrics and working at height are jobs for competent people, and this page is general guidance only. Whoever runs your shoot should assess the actual job.
A base for the whole unit. Clients need somewhere to sit and watch. Talent need somewhere to change. We have a client viewing area, a dressing room, fibre internet, fifteen parking spaces and ground-level load-in. On location, each of those is something you find, ask for or pay for.
Things a location will never allow. A full black-out, haze, a bespoke rain build and a car driven onto the set are studio jobs. The rain rig is quoted per build, from £750 +VAT. Effects like these need a competent person to plan them, so tell the studio what you are trying to shoot and ask for a quote.
What a location gives you
Texture you cannot build. A real kitchen, a real warehouse floor or a real hillside carries detail that a set decorator takes days to approximate. If the place is part of what you are saying, pay for it.
Daylight and sky. If the scene needs a dawn, a low sun or a wet pavement that is actually wet, you need to be outside.
Scale. A street, a field and a long hospital corridor are all hard to build and easy to find.
A subject at ease. A chief executive in their own office is often more relaxed than in a room they have never seen. Interview and documentary work often belongs where the subject lives and works.
The cost sums people skip
A studio day looks expensive next to a free location. It stops looking that way when you list what the free place does not include.
On location, count:
- the location fee or the cost of the favour
- lighting, grip and stands you would otherwise get with the room
- power, including a generator if the building cannot supply it
- parking, permissions and any notification the neighbours need
- travel, a unit base and somewhere to put the crew's coats
- a weather plan, which usually means a cover day
- a recce, which costs a day of someone's time
- release forms for the place and for anyone identifiable in shot
The location recce checklist and the location release cover the last two. In a studio, you replace most of that list with one booking.
A worked example with published figures. Take a one day brand film with a three person crew. At Granary's indicative crew day rates, a camera operator is from £450, a gaffer from £450 and a sound recordist from £495, all plus VAT. The White Space is £395 for a full day of ten hours, with the lighting and grip included. That comes to from £1,790 +VAT. The same crew on location needs the same £1,395 of day rates plus everything in the list above, and the lighting kit is on that list. Our studio hire cost guide explains how the blocks work.
Do the sum with your own numbers before you decide. Put the studio total beside the location total, with the cover day and the recce included, and look at the gap.
The answer is often both
The cleverest plan is frequently a split. Shoot dialogue, product shots and anything with effects in the studio, where light, sound and time are under control. Shoot establishing shots, exteriors and real texture on location, in an hour or two, with a small crew. The studio gives you the hours that must match, and the location gives you the shots that make it feel real.
A built set also lets you control the world outside the window. We built a cottage interior on the cove for a Channel 4 drama, with a practical window in it, so the weather on the other side was whatever the gaffer decided. The result is on the page about the cottage interior built for Channel 4. A set you build once can be shot over several days, with the light matching each time.
Mistakes that cost a day
- Booking a studio and expecting it to look like somewhere else. A cove is a clean surface. It becomes a kitchen or an office when somebody dresses it, and that costs time and money. Plan the set before the booking.
- Treating a free location as free. Add the items in the list above before you compare.
- Choosing a studio for a shot that needs real sky. If the sky is in the shot, go and find a sky.
- Skipping the recce. Visit at the time of day you will shoot, and listen as much as you look.
- Forgetting that a studio hires the room, not the people. Lamps do not light themselves. Crew are booked on top.
- Moving a shoot indoors to avoid the weather without checking what you lose. Rain on a window is easy to build. Rain on a street is not.
If you cannot decide, send the brief to the studio and ask what they would do. A good studio will tell you when your shoot belongs somewhere else.
Related guides
The picture at the top of this page is an illustration, not a photograph of a client or a real job.
Questions we get asked
Is it cheaper to film in a studio or on location?
Neither is always cheaper. A studio price usually includes lighting, grip and parking, so you hire fewer things. A location can be free to enter but adds permissions, kit hire, power, travel and a weather plan. Cost both with the same crew and the same day before you decide.
What can you do in a studio that you cannot do on location?
You can control the light for a full day, shoot at any hour, black the room out completely, build a set you can alter, use effects such as haze and rain, and drive a vehicle onto the set. A studio also gives you quiet you do not have to negotiate with the neighbours.
When should you shoot on location instead of in a studio?
Shoot on location when the real place is part of the story, when you need real daylight or sky, when the scale cannot be built, or when your subject is most natural in their own workplace. Documentary and interview work often falls into this group.
granary.digital · 01243 884993 · studio@granary.digital · The Old Grainstore, Adsdean, Chichester, West Sussex, PO18 9DN · Prices exclude VAT unless marked inc VAT