Written by on May 30, 2014. Posted in On Location

Sony Pictures Imageworks follows incentives and shifts HQ to Vancouver

The visual effects company behind big-budget features like The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and Edge of Tomorrow is to shift its head office from Culver City in California to Vancouver. Sony Pictures Imageworks is making the move partly because of British Columbia’s production incentives.

“We’re going to start referring to Vancouver as our headquarters as of now, even though we’re not in the new space yet,” Imageworks’ Steven Argula told the Vancouver Sun.

“We will maintain a small base in Culver City, which will basically deal with LA-based clients. We’re not sure how many [existing Imageworks employees] will make the move. It depends on who’s eligible and who wants to move and a lot of other factors.”

Argula cited filming incentives and Vancouver’s growing crew base of visual effects experts as the main reason for the change.

British Columbia offers a base 17.5% Digital Animation and Visual Effects Credit as part of its overall filming incentive programme. The province’s base 33% filming tax credit on local labour expenditure has helped turn Vancouver into one of Canada’s top filming hubs that routinely attracts US shoots.

We’re going to start referring to Vancouver as our headquarters as of now, even though we’re not in the new space yet.

Steven Argula, Sony Pictures Imageworks

Godzilla has been among the biggest productions of recent years to film in Vancouver and recreated San Francisco at Burnaby’s Canadian Motion Picture Park.

Montreal is one of Vancouver’s main competitors in Canada as the eastern province offers a superior 20% tax credit for visual effects work. The incentive has helped Montreal attract Cinesite and Technicolor just in the last six months and the city’s broader 25% filming incentive also drew new superhero sequel X-Men: Days of Future Past.