Want To Get a Little Something More Out of YOUR Home??

Pasadena Magazine (July, 2011) featured an article showcasing Home Shoot Home and what we do best-connecting location managers and scouts with a location that suits their filming needs! While we encourage you to check the magazine article out yourself, we want to give you a little preview!

This article focuses on the expenses that are poured into maintaining a beautiful home, but then also highlights how homeowners can utilize the beauty of their home to make it create revenue for them. Russ Fega (The CEO of Home Shoot Home) first realized the need for location scouts to partner with a location company that had a unique knowledge and understanding of the available homes in a specific area in 2003. Home Shoot Home is set apart from other location companies because each home before being listed is evaluated for its character, location and accessibility to parking to ensure that it will work well for film crews. Most of Home Shoot Home’s available properties are in the San Gabriel Valley. [Pasadena] “can look like Anywhere USA. It can look like back east and it can look like California” says Fega.

The project that Home Shoot Home is most proud of won’t be at the box office anytime soon. The Altadena Community Chest is a non-profit organization that was started by Russ Fega. Traditionally, before a film production crew can start filming in a city, there are permits that must be acquired. The money from these permits goes directly to the city for development; it essentially is to compensate for the inconvenience that the people of the city experience. Because Altadena is an unincorporated community, it does not directly receive these funds. The Altadena Community Chest was created as a way for studios to give back to Altadena. These donations are distributed to organizations that directly benefit the people who reside in Altadena. If you would like to make a donation, or would like more information about the Altadena Community Chest, please visit http://altadenacommunitychest.org/.

How Hollywood Came Into Existence…

Hollywood was not always considered to be the film capital of the United States. The first film company to ever film in Hollywood was the Biograph Company which was established in 1895. The Biograph Company has a rich history and is credited with giving notable stars such as Mary Pickford, Mack Sennett, Lionel Barrymore and Lillian Gish their start in the industry. In 1910, a man named Griffith from the Biograph Company came west and started filming in Los Angeles. While filming, Griffith’s crew decided to explore other areas for potential filming and came across a village called Hollywood.

Griffith and his crew were captivated with many things that Hollywood had to offer them. Not only did Hollywood have beautiful and reliable weather, it had room for expansion and the people of the town were friendly and exuberant about filming. While in Hollywood, Biograph filmed “In Old California” which is a “historical dramatization of a Spanish woman during the reign of Spanish and Mexican owned California in the early 19th century” (IMD, 2011). Griffith and his crew remained in Hollywood for several months and continued to shoot many films before returning to New York.

When the Biography Company did decided to return to New York. “In Old California” was such a huge success that other film producers and companies soon followed their path to Hollywood. Many film makers and producers went to Hollywood to escape the fee’s that Thomas Edison had put in place due to the fact that he owned patents for the process of filming. Thus Hollywood started changing from a sleepy village and slowly over the years turned into an icon that the world would forever recognize.

Other Links:

1.)    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinema_of_the_United_States

2.)    http://www.biographcompany.com/history_home.html

Hollywood History

As with any family or culture, heritage is important. The same is true for the filmmakers of Southern California. At Home Shoot Home we thought it would be interesting for our readers if we punctuated our blogs with a bit of the history that made Hollywood and the Southern California Film Industry what it is today. Cinema in the United States can ultimately be broken into four very distinct periods: the Silent Film Era, Classical Hollywood Cinema, New Hollywood and what is referred to as the Contemporary Period.

As the name implies, silent films are silent “with no synchronized recorded sound” (3). The dialogue and story line were communicated through gestures and title cards. The highest grossing silent film of all time was the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse in 1921. The first non silent film to hit the cinema was the Jazz Singer in 1927.

As technology progressed, so did the ways in which films were edited. Thus, the term Classical Hollywood Cinema was developed which primarily referrers to the way films were produced between 1910 and in the 1960’s. The principle of this type of editing rested on the premise that the camera and recorded sound should not distract from the actual film where both had in previous times (5).

The term New Hollywood was coined in the mid 1960’s (Think Bonnie and Clyde and the Graduate) and lasted until the early 1980’s. The Graduate and Bonnie and Clyde were  important turning points in Hollywood history, both appealed to the youth of Southern California and ultimately tapped into an entirely new market (1). In a nutshell, the New Hollywood era of film is defined by the new ideas and new approaches to filmmaking by many film makers in America.

The Contemporary Period of Hollywood started in the 1980’s and Hollywood is still defined by the Contemporary Period. The Contemporary Period is ultimately defined by special effects, blockbusters, marketing and digital video (2).

Resources:
1.) http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/historyonline/hollywood_1960s.cfm
2.) http://sparkcharts.sparknotes.com/film/film/section8.php
3.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_film
4.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Hollywood
5.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_Hollywood_cinema

A Bit More About Who We Are And the Services We Offer…

At Home Shoot Home, we pride ourselves on being a neighborhood based company. To us, this means building long and lasting relationships and connections with our clients. Home Shoot Home offers a unique portfolio of homes as well as industrial and commercial spaces that are available for filming in the Altadena, Pasadena, South Pasadena area of the San Gabriel Valley. What our homes offer is a wide array of filming options that range from quaint Early American, to Spanish, Colonial, Modern etc. Essentially, we believe that if you have a need for residential filming in San Gabriel Valley, we have a location to suit your needs.

In addition to our residential homes that are available, we also offer a very diverse set of commercial and industrial properties. These properties range from stables, to ballrooms, auto repair shops, churches, boxing rings etc.  Our website will allow you to tour each property as they have been extensively photographed. At Home Shoot Home we know that certain projects require specific functional layouts. Which is why on our site, features can be selected such as: kitchen window that faces driveway, kitchen that opens to other rooms, kitchen that has a view of backyard. These search specifications allow you to narrow down your options and quickly find a property that will suit your needs as well as the specifications of your filming project.

Once you find a property, simply contact us with the property information and we will contact the owner so you don’t have to worry about any negotiations! Our goal is to make finding a location as simple and pain free as possible!

You Won’t Want to Fast Forward Through These Commercials!

For many of us, commercials are just something that allows us to take a break while watching our favorite TV show to go get a snack or a drink. Very few if any commercials ever catch our eye or attention. However, Walmart has created a new set of commercials that are not only clever, but entertaining to watch and will leave you wanting to see more.

What is special about these commercials is not only their wit, humor and cleverness, but that they were shot right here in Altadena, California. Brian Aldrich, who is a well known and successful commercial director, has partnered with Home Shoot Home for his Walmart commercials. Aldrich stated that “The ads have been shot on a single block in Altadena, California, that has a “quintessential middle-America feel”.

The concept and basis for these commercials is that every shopping cart and the items within it tell a story. With comic effect, Walmart commercials depict items being purchased on a conveyer belt-however these items are not related to each other in any way but are tied together in full humor throughout the commercial. This approach to depicting products in humorous fashion allows Walmart to highlight overall savings on products and creates a feeling being warm, friendly and comfortable. Greg Warren who is Walmart’s Vice President of Creative Marketing stated “Value brands do well with humor”.

Hot On The Line…

At Home Shoot Home we are proud to be a part of a new film that is being shot this summer starring Keira Knightley, Steve Carell and Adam Brody. The film is called “Seeking a Friend for the End of the World” and was picked up by Focus Features. This film was written and is being directed by Lorene Scafaria who is perhaps most widely known for her film based off of Rachel Cohn and David Levithan’s book “Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist”. “Seeking a Friend for the End of the World” will be utilizing two of Home Shoot Home’s houses in the Southern California area in June of 2011.

“Seeking a Friend for the End of the World” takes place in the not so distant future. In this film, Scafaria explores the inherent human instincts and brings to life what individuals are capable of when they fear their life’s end is near. This romantic comedy unfolds as a woman in a fit of panic leaves her husband. The man (Carell) suddenly finds himself alone amidst the worlds greatest tragedy and sets out to find his high school sweetheart. His neighbor (Knightley) decides to set out with him on his journey to find his true love.

"This story has been many years in the making and I couldn't ask for a better team of people to help bring it to life," said Scafaria. Focus Features CEO James Schamus stated, "Lorene has created a very funny story about the human condition, and about how love is the only thing that can save us all. We're excited to be partnering with Indian Paintbrush and Mandate, and working with Lorene on her directorial debut - she's an extraordinary talent who is particularly adept at drawing interesting and dynamic characters and their worlds." “Seeking a Friend for the End of the World” is set to release in 2011.

Links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorene_Scafaria

http://movies.about.com/b/2011/05/10/focus-acquires-seeking-a-friend-for-the-end-of-the-world-with-steve-carell.htm

It is where our heart is....

At Home Shoot Home it is incredibly important to us to use our resources to help others in need. Here we will talk about an organization that was founded by Russ Fega, the owner of Home Shoot Home. As you can well imagine, this project is near and dear to our hearts. This organization is known as the Altadena Community Chest.

Throughout the years, Altadena California has served as the filming site for film projects. From a director and scouts perspective, Altadena is an excellent location for filming due to the diversity it offers. Essentially, Altadena offers film producers a wide array of options in which to choose from, these options range from various architectural styles of homes and commercial building to the beautiful landscapes that it is surrounded by. However, unlike most cities, Altadena, because it is an unincorporated community, does not directly benefit from the filming that takes place. Aside from the home or business owners who directly rent out their property to the studio, the community has no financial gain.

In attempt to off set this problem, Russ Fega started the Altadena Community Chest in hopes of being able to give something back to the community that has been a host to so many filming projects. The Altadena Community Chest supports organizations such as Altadena Elementary School, Arroyos & Foothills Conservancy, Five Acres, Friends of the Library, Young & Healthy, Altadena Heritage, and the Altadena Library Foundation.

If you would like more information of the Altadena Community Chest, please visit their website at http://altadenacommunitychest.org/.