The Development of Our Location Database
And the first projects for Samsung, 20th Century Fox and APT Tours
Progressive has outstanding experience in providing the necessary services for international productions’ shoots in Austria. Since we did not provide the director for the projects that we will introduce in this article, we would not like to simply present the final visual product; we would like to focus on the services that we provided. One of these high quality services that we offer and that is of unique standard in the market, is our location service.
When we decided after years of success in Hungary, to create an office in Austria as well and to start to offer Progressive’s services there, then one of our first ideas was to keep our Austrian location services to the high standards that our clients have become used to in Hungary. Therefore we had to build Austria’s independent location database, making location scouting an everyday routine and creating similarly high quality presentations of certain locations. This is by we had to prepare the opening of our brand for one year, consisting of countless proactive location scouts and negotiations with the owners of the locations creating the bases for location services.
The first scouts started in Vienna. It is worth adding that Budapest and Vienna are merely three hours away from each other by car, so the Austrian capital was easily accessed from our company’s headquarters. This was in 2014. Fortune was on our side; our Budapest office was contacted by the Australian film production company called Mr. Smith, to do with a commercial to be made advertising the APT River Cruise. The company organized trips all the way from Budapest to Germany, mainly for Australian pensioners and would have liked to promote this with the help of a TV commercial, that would also be screened in cinemas. This project required the biggest scout in Progressive’s history, during which we traveled thousands of kilometers in three countries, visiting Vienna as well. The preparatory scouts were very successful, our clients were completely satisfied and our database developed a lot as well. Later on, time by time we returned to Vienna, walking through its streets, squares, parks and museums, searching for special locations to broaden our database.
Next to Vienna, the most famous Austrian city is Salzburg, which brings Mozart and The Sound of Music into most people’s minds. Our first location scouts in Salzburg started because of the APT production, then after that, time by time we returned with pro-active scoutings in the city. Our efforts were proven worthwhile in 2015 by a brilliant and truly one of a kind production. Could we have been more lucky than to have been chosen to collaborate in carrying out the Austrian production of The Sound of Music’s 50th anniversary DVD bonus documentary with Julie Andrews? We were able to visit the film’s famous shooting locations with the actress, which are even today Salzburg’s most visited spots and provide ideal locations for countless other productions too. By the end of the shoot, our Location Library underwent a significant expansion, both with the city’s best locations and others in the surrounding region.
In Austria the astonishing nature and excellent infrastructure, which enables film and photo productions to easily access the most beautiful and wild natural locations, is truly unique. 40% of Austria’s area is covered by mountains; this is approximately the same ratio of natural and urban locations in our database. From the beginning we gave special attention to discover and get to know these locations. The mountain tops of the Alps, the vallies’ rivers and lakes, the forests at the bottom of the mountains can all become ideal locations. We also count rural areas and mountain roads in this category as well. Nature is an ideal scene for lots of types of sport, which is why during location scouting, we aimed to document these types of locations as well.
A good example is Europe’s best natural river section for slalom kayaking with top accessibility and is found in the Ötz valley. This is what brought UNIT9’s team from London to Austria, who were chosen for the creation of Samsung’s VR film, in preparation for the Olympia in Rio, for which we provided all production and location services. For shooting such productions, Austria does not only have brilliant natural resources, but is also rich in talents, who are professionals in many different sports. And kayak is only one of the many sports practised by a wide range of people in Austria. We could mention countless action sports, like wakeboarding, rafting, ski jumping, bungee jumping, skydiving, skiing, climbing, snowboarding, etc.
Developing a serious location database is a never ending project for a production company. A database like this shows how well we know an area and how many potential locations have we thought of for shooting. We are working on its expansion, while waiting for exciting projects, which can build upon our results.