As user-generated video online grows in popularity and sophistication, small studios have cropped up in Los Angeles that give creators access to spaces out of their own reach. YouTube's own space is the largest at nearly 41,000 square feet. Outside the building is a helicopter once built in the facility that Google converted into the sound-stage space. The company bought the chopper on eBay.
YouTube beauty guru Michelle Phan and her Ipsy launched an open studio in May. The company received 1,000 applications in the first two hours, she said.
Ipsy Open Studios' largest space in the 3,000-square-foot facility has the re-creation of a vlogger's bedroom in one corner, while another corner has a lofted seating area above a section dedicated to editing.
The gear room at YouTube Space LA is staffed by pros who pull the equipment a creator specifically requests and ready it on dollies to roll to the sound stage.
Collab's open-door studio not only hosts creators who need a place to record or hang, but the company also takes advantage of the space to shoot press images for their top talent.
At the center of Collab's studio is a green screen stage, which makes "time travel, space exploration or a relaxing Hawaiian vacation are just a stock-image search away," the company says.
In additions to letting Collab creators build sets like this one for a series about rapping Shakespearean verse, Head of Talent Will McFadden welcomes talent into his loft apartment to shoot.
