We can’t stop consuming TV!
At least that is what it seems, judging by how much television and new media platforms have grown in the past few years. From Amazon Prime to Hulu and including the almighty Netflix, blockbusters seem to come one after the other, toping charts and breaking box office records.
The VFX industry
However, there is a subsector that is sneakily benefiting massively from all this media madness: the VFX industry. Almost all productions nowadays require top-notch visual effects and their increasing demand has generated the need for this companies to start scaling up and keeping costs in check, and that’s why they’re looking for alternatives to reduce them.
Ticket sales in the U.S. and Canada earned $11.8 billion in 2019 and the global box office the following year was $42 billion, according to research firm comScore. This data is particularly relevant now that we are witnessing the rise of the streaming titans.
Netflix has gone from 150 million subscribers in 2019 to 195 million in 2021. The simultaneous success of the big and small screen suggests that there is enough market for both; our media consuming appetite seems insatiable. However, as with great power that comes with great responsibility, such high demand of work is increasing costs in the industry.
Visual effects companies
Visual Effects companies currently have more projects than they can actually work on. This is a very nice problem to have, but still a problem.
As put by Mike Chambers, Visual Effects Producer and Chair at Visual Effects Society, ‘Maintaining business at a small independent house is very tough. The pressure to grow is intense’.
The VFX industry needs to start looking for alternatives on how to reduce costs while still serving such a high demand in work. A very viable solution is looking for a place that understands the challenges VFX companies are facing and is willing to help.
The Canary Islands film industry
The Canary Islands in Spain have very extensive experience with the film industry. Movies like Bourne, Fast & Furious 6 or Solo: A Star Wars Story were filmed in the Spanish archipelago. Companies like El Ranchito have already worked with all these giants. They made the visual effects for the most expensive production in Spanish in history, Hernán, about the life of the Spanish conquistador, for Amazon Prime Video, Lost In Space for Netflix and a series that you’ve maybe heard of: HBO’s Game of Thrones.
Fun fact? They have already open offices in the Canary Islands to benefit from the industry specific tax incentives the regional government has put in place, the talent of the local workforce and the advantage to attract international talent to a place that ranks consistently in the top spots in quality of life indexes.
Oh, and one more thing: the Canary Islands boasts the lowest corporate tax rate in the EU with a staggering 4%, apart from the Audiovisual industry tax incentives. If companies like El Ranchito are already in the archipelago, don’t you think you should reach out and understand how can your growing VFX company benefit from having operations there too?