Digital Hunt For Hollywood Hotspots
The software company is plugging into a concept that even tech-buffs like Stephen Spielberg and George Lucas have paid little attention to: applying the wonders of digital technology to the industry's mundane affairs.
Ampersand has developed a `Location Permitting System' (LPS) for Entertainment Industry Development Corporation (EIDC) of Los Angeles, which coordinates the issue of on-location film permits throughout the city and county of Los Angeles.
EIDC has put Ampersand's system in the final parallel testing phase. It expects the system to be put into operation next month.
Costing $300,000, the LPS is a leading-edge technology product with interfaces to Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and the WorldWide Web (WWW). The system allows the entertainment industry to submit permit applications online using the WWW.
According to EIDC, the absence of such a system has cost Hollywood unlimited amount of time and money in the past. A case in point is "Speed," the recent Hollywood blockbuster. To film the now immortalised stunt scene of a hijacked bus leaping over an unfinished bridge, the production crew had to hunt all over the US for three months before they settled for one near Los Angeles.
With LPS in place, directors can now sit before a computer monitor and digitally hunt for any location across the US and book it months in advance. They can also obtain permits from EIDC through an online network.
The EIDC board has all the big names in Hollywood including senior vice-presidents from all the leading studios like Walt Disney Pictures, Warner Brothers, Paramount, MGM, Sony Pictures Entertainment/Universal Studios and 20th Century Fox.
"With this system, we hope to get a lot of direct exposure with top-brass from these southern Californian studios," says Ampersand president Narasimhan Mandyam.
More than 50 per cent of all location "shoots" in the US take place in Los Angeles area and movies and location shoots are a mainstay of the southern California economic landscape. Last year, the EIDC issued over 24,000 permits for location "shoots." With the introduction of the new system, EIDC expects to issue more than 35,000 permits this year.
Film shooting outside Hollywood's approved studios requires permits from EIDC since most outdoor shooting in the US involves complex and dangerous action sequences under the watchful eyes of the local police, fire department and other governmental agencies.