Back when we were making our travel plans for TripFlix, a friend of mine who works in tourism explained to me that state tourism commisions have money set aside for media that are traveling to promote tourism in their state. TripFlix is a coast-to-coast interactive travel DVD for kids, so our mission fit their criteria perfectly. Not every state was able to help us, but many of them were able to provide free or discounted hotel rooms, as well as assistance in securing locations for shooting. Some even had beauty-shot reels of their state, which saved us a ton of money on aerial footage. They are more than happy to provide this for you. It's what they're there for! (Artbeats was also a valuable source for quality stock footage. Their Road Rush collection is heavily used in TripFlix.)
Actually, there seemed to be an inversely proportional relationship between the popularity of the state and their willingness to throw money at us to visit. The more off the beaten path, the more excited they were to have us come to town.
Having the local and state tourism board help with your travel and planning is one of those things that seems obvious when you think about it, but it was news to us. Good news. It saved us thousands of dollars in hotel fees and countless hours, not having to track down locations and permits for our show. TripFlix is a very ambitious project, budget-wise, and every dollar saved on travel expenses meant we had a little more to spend on production, marketing and distribution.
Have any travel tips? Share 'em in the comments.
Monday, January 7, 2008
"Travel expenses payed for by the state of Montana"
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