At least once a week someone finds us and the first thing they say is some version of: “You’re in Houston, right? We’re in [not Houston]. Is that a problem?”
We Fly to You
We Fly to You
Tell ’em what you’re gonna tell ’em: We film anywhere in the country, and outside it. Everywhere else is just a flight.
We film anywhere in the country, and outside it. Houston is home. Everywhere else is just a flight.
At least once a week someone finds us and the first thing they say is some version of: “You’re in Houston, right? We’re in [not Houston]. Is that a problem?”
No. It is not a problem. And thank you for not making the Houston we have a problem joke.
We are in Houston. Well, Tomball. The former sleepy little farm town that is now straight-up suburbia. But, Houston is home and we love it and we’re not leaving. We love the heat. We love the humidity. We love the mosquitoes. OK, those are all lies, but dammit, they’re our mosquitoes. Heritage Films is a Houston company. We are a Texas company. Proud of that, too. More so. But Heritage Films is not a Texas company in the way that Buc-cees is a Texas company. We go where the story is.
Four countries and counting. 40 states and counting. States I’d never been to before I showed up with a camera.
Here’s something people get wrong about what we do.
They think location is backdrop. That you could put the subject in any comfortable chair in any well-lit room and get the same film.
You cannot. I mean you can, but it’s not as good.
Location is content.
When a man sits in the workshop where he’s spent forty years building things and talks about his father teaching him how to use a plane, the workshop is in the story. You can see it in his hands. You can see it in the way he reaches for something and stops himself because he’s in the middle of a sentence.
When a woman sits at the kitchen table where her family gathered every Sunday for fifty years and talks about her mother’s recipes, the table is in the story. The light through that specific window is in the story. Surrounded by memories and photo albums and other things that make them forget the cameras are even there.
You can’t fake that in a neutral room. The camera knows the difference and so does everyone watching.
So we don’t try to fake it. When it is remotely possible, we come to them.
The follow-up question is usually about cost.
I’ll be straight about it: travel adds something. What it adds is usually less than people expect. What it avoids is a film that feels like it was made in a conference room. We stay in a Hilton Garden Inn or the like. We gotta get there. We gotta get home. Yada yada.
The other thing I’ll say is this: the call we get most often is not “how much does it cost to film out of state.” The call we get most often is “I waited too long and now I’m trying to figure out what to do.”
Travel is a logistics question. We solve logistics questions. That one is harder.
If you’ve been sitting on this because you figured the geography was an obstacle, call us. It probably isn’t. And if it is, we’ll tell you straight.
Tell ’em what ya told ’em: We’re based in Houston (well, Tomball), but we’ve filmed in 40 states and four countries. Location isn’t backdrop. It’s content. The workshop, the kitchen table, the back porch, those places are part of the story and you can’t fake them in a neutral room. If geography is the only thing stopping you, it probably isn’t.