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Just wondering from anyone here that lives in LA or the area... what's it like? I'm thinking about moving there. Currently live in Orlando, which I love, but I think I'm ready for something new. Anyway, I think LA would be a fantastic place to "grow" any porn business.
Any thoughts on LA and or the adult biz in LA. Quality of life, things to do, etc.
Thanks!
OMG NO do not do it, its like moving to a second world country compared to FL or TX, its cold, over priced, depressing, boring, and a bit socialist. Try going to Ft Lauderdale/Dallas, or just spend a month or 2 in LA/Hollywood/OC in one of those hotels that will let you pay by the month before you think about moving here full-time. :mental:
OK, it's time for my Los Angeles, Beverly Hills plug…LA is a great place for producing just about anything...from clothes hangers to aircraft, microwave ovens, movies to porn...you name it, it can be developed, packaged, advertised and plugged and directed from here. I moved here from my home in San Francisco 20 years ago because the possibilities are limitless and all very doable.Quote:
Originally Posted by NewBoyToyMatt
And if in the adult industry, there is no doubt that this IS the place to be. Not only is California one of the only LEGAL places to shoot adult content in the US but, we boast many of the top resources from directors to editors to replicators and videographers, printers, etc...and lots of talent too. And, with all of our 6+ area airports, you can fly them in just as easy!
We live and produce in a premium spot, Beverly Hills, and love it...and, we enjoy returning to our home after traveling to the fantastic and close by beach, mountain and desert resorts...
And, don't forget, Disneyland, the home of the Disney Theme Park Empire, is in close by Anaheim... you can check out some of my "real world" design work when walking down the Main Street of "Hollywood"- land in Disney's California Adventure!
Best of all, the weather is great…
i live in l.a. and i love it! we have plenty of live music of many different sorts as well as a very active gay community and lots of fun places to get drunk and dance, drink coffee and talk plus you name it. lots of parks here, including griffith park, which has an active equestrian community, a historic merry go round, and acres of trees.
there are SO many models here of all sorts, it's a mecca if you shoot content whether adult or non.
not to mention: great resturants, some interesting museums, beautiful drives like up pacific coast highway, fun and wonderful spots like marina del rey, beechwood canyon and some parts of silverlake.
and don't forget - plenty of your fellow webmasters if you would rather talk biz in person rather than on icq ;)
I live in San Diego, about 2 1/2 hours south of Los Angeles (4 or more hours if you are driving between 3pm and 7pm on the 405). I love it here. If you want to be successful in this indstry, LA is THE place to be. San Diego is alright and the weather is gorgeous, but I do not get up to Los Angeles to attend all of the events as often as I should. If I lived in LA, I would certainly be more successful because of all of the opportunities and seemingly endless supply of models.
My advice: do it... then come to San Diego and pick me up!
HAHA!
Rocky
OH and BTW:
You know you're a Californian if...
* Your coworker has 8 body piercings and none are visible.
* Your incone exceeds $300,000 and you still can't afford a house.
* You have a very strong opinion about where your coffee beans are grown, and you can taste the difference between Sumatran and Ethiopian.
* A really great parking space can totally move you to tears.
* Gas costs $1.00 per gallon more than anywhere else in the U.S.
* Unlike back home, the guy at 8:30 am at Starbucks wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses who looks like George Clooney really IS George Clooney.
* Your car insurance costs as much as your house payment.
* It's barely sprinkling rain and there's a report on every news station: "STORM WATCH."
* It's barely sprinkling rain outside, so you leave for work an hour early to avoid all the weather-related accidents.
* Both you AND your dog have therapists.
* The Terminator is your governor.
* If you drive illegally, they take your driver's license. If you're here illegally, they want to give you one.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NewBoyToyMatt
hi Matt, like many others have said, this is the place to do the adult biz... L.A. has so much going for it which have been covered well, so I'll mention some of the negatives: the ocean and the air are both polluted, it's very crowded and traffic is hell (work from home!), and home ownership is crazy expensive. that said, every time I move, I keep coming back, so I'm sure I'll be here for the rest of my life...
I do get a lot of shooting done here, but housing cost and size sucks, and there are surprizingly limited physical resources for shooting.
It is cold here. It is expensive. White people are in the minority. You should be able to read Spanish language words used in retail store windows. I live in the east end of West Hollywood, so most of the stores here are Russian language speaking.
If you go to McDonalds, the Grilled Chicken Sandwich here comes with BBQ sauce, in Minnesota it came with Mayo.
Sometimes I wish I lived in a Trailer House so I could better relate to the TV News here: a 1/10th inch of rain is a looming catastrophy, they will interrupt any news story to bring live video of Police car chases (last week it was a 14 yr old girl driving), pedestrians walk in front of moving cars then the surviving family cries about the bad cars and demanding JUSTICE, gang shootings, domestic disputes, and hostage taking situations.
I think the Award for Best LA News Story last year should have gone to the guy who at 2 in the morning fired 8 rounds into his neighbor's car because the car alarm had gone off and woke up the apt bldg.
...yeah, but for most of L.A.'s gay community, just going to McDonald's at all puts you in the minority :-)Quote:
Originally Posted by nickbaer
it's cold here? it's one of the warmest states during the winter.
housing sizes suck? my daughter just rented a 1600 sq foot 2 bedroom. the 4plex across the street from us offers 1600 sq foot ONE bedrooms. i grew up in a house that's still there - it's well over 4000 sq feet. i haven't noticed that housing sizes are any different here than anywhere else.
the east end of west hollywood? i don't have any problem with the languages in the windows, which, except for a few russian stores, are in english.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nickbaer
Thinking of moving to L.A., huh?
I moved here just about five years ago from Pennsylvania, and it was a MAJOR adjustment for me. At first I loved it, then after a while I hated it; now I have a healthy love/hate relationship with the city.
THE PROS:
* Mild weather/climate -- Don't let anybody tell you L.A. is cold. It's GREAT weather. It usually hits an average of between 70 and 78 during the summers, and in the winters the lowest it gets is about 45. To me, that's perfect, as I don't want to live anywhere where it's 80 degrees all year round. How boring would that be? Plus, you'd have no sense of the seasons or time passing if it stayed warm all year long. For the most part, L.A. is GREAT weather.
* Culture/Hollywood -- One of the greatest things about Los Angeles is that it is the entertainment capital of the world. There is no shortage of free movie screenings, free concerts and free tapings of TV shows here. I can't tell you how many awesome screenings I've attended where I got to meet folks like Jim Carey, Nicole Kidman, Kevin Bacon, and many others -- FOR FREE! If you are savvy enough and know which email lists to sign up to, you can go to advance screenings of many movies months/weeks/days before the public sees them. There are concerts every night. Lots of live theater too (the Mark Taper Forum is one of the most respected theaters in the country). On top of this, there are so many great restaurants to eat at. Everything from Thai and Peruvian to Ethiopian and Vietnamese. There is almost no way you can live in L.A. and not be cultured.
* Proximity to Sites -- Big Bear Lake, Joshua Tree State Park, Disneyland, Six Flags of California, Great American Adventure, Palm Springs, Venice Beach, Santa Monica Pier, San Deigo, San Francisco, the Grand Canyon... these are all things that are within a few hours' drive from Los Angeles. (San Fran is 5-6 hours; ditto the Grand Canyon.) There are just so many cool and fun things you can do and see here. Awesome places to hike/walk your dog (Runyon Canyon, Griffith Park), and a zoo. Recreational opportunities abound.
* The gay community -- From West Hollywood to Silver Lake, this city is FILLED with "the gays." Hell, they run this town. When I first moved here, I got so used to seeing them walking hand in hand down the streets that it came as a shock to me to see straight people again.
* The Porn Biz -- If you want to produce adult content, this is the place to do it. It's legal, there are tons of companies in the San Fernando Valley (aka Porn Valley) and the people all look like they are porn stars anyway, so there's no shortage of beautiful people to cast in your movies.
THE CONS:
* The smog -- If you don't have allergies or sinus problems, after living here for about four to five years, you will. The smog is AWFUL for your system.
* Rent/housing prices -- A modest one-bedroom apartment can run you $950 to $1200, though you can find nicer if you live in the Valley (10 degrees hotter than L.A. at any given time, and UNBEARABLY hot in the summers) or in certain places in the city, like Korea Town or Hollywood.
* The size -- L.A. is a HUGE city. It's not like New York or San Francisco, where you can just hop on the metro/Muni and get where you need to be in a relatively short (and stress-free) amount of time. Because the city is so spread out, it's a bit overwhelming, and everybody drives to avoid the failure of our wretched pubilc transit system. Which leads me to...
* The traffic/the parking -- OH. MY. GOD! It's AWFUL. Positively AWFUL! Driving just five blocks can take 20 minutes sometimes. Stay away from the 405 freeway at all costs if you want to get ANYWHERE! Because L.A. is so spread out, mostly everybody drives, so there tons of people on the streets and there is NEVER anywhere to park, especially in West Hollywood, the bane of my existence as a driver.
* The people!!!!!!! -- One of the biggest problems with L.A. is its residents. Because Hollywood is a town that is built upon the foundation of fantasy and falseness, that conceit spills out into the people who live here. I have never met so many people concerned with their bodies and with appearances than I have in L.A. They are self-involved, body-obsessed, emotionally vacuous freaks who have their heads in the clouds and rarely pay attention to anybody but themselves. It's all about the outside, never the inside. Muscles are more important than personality, and cell phones (especially in banks, restaurants, post offices and cars) are the preferred method of human interaction.
The problem with Hollywood is that people move here from other states to remake themselves into this ridiculously phony image of what they think they want to be. They think, "Oooh, Hollywood. I can go there and be somebody." They forget they already were somebody. Consequently, they move here to lose themselves in a sea of shallow opportunists who are all looking to get famous for nothing. Everyone here thinks they are a star of some kind, even though they've done nothing all that sensational to warrant attention, and the name-dropping that goes on is out of control. It's all generalizing, of course, but a lot of people out here are out of touch with reality, and it makes this city very sad, lonely and alienating at times.
After being here for 5 years, I've gotten used to the people. They don't bother me as much as they used to. I just don't relate to them. I have a very small circle of friends, and once you find that, you're pretty much good to go. If you've got friends, you can pretty much live anywhere.
That said, L.A. is NOT the city I would pick to live in, if I had my druthers. I'm only here because my career (entertainment journalism) dictates that I'll have more opportunity here than New York. If you move here, it's IMPERATIVE that you get out of the city for an extended weekend at least twice (if not three times) a year so that you can get your head out of the vacuum of falsity (not to mention out of your own ass). I have to escape L.A. as often as possible in order to clear my head and remember what's really important to me.
My ultimate dream is to have a house in Pennsylvania, an apartment in New York City, and an apartment in Hollywood so I can enjoy the best of all the "worlds" I have come to call home. But in many ways, L.A. is home to me, and I'm really glad that I live here.
Hope that helps.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nickbaer
I know that I am new here, but I do live and work in the Beverly Hills/West Hollywood area. It is expensive to live here. But there is a ton of physical resources for shooting here. Its not hard to find. Thats why almost every gay and straight company works out of here in some way or another. As for being "cold". Cold compared to what "Minnesota". Doesn't it snow there? Whens the last time it snowed in West Hollywood? And the raciest thing just gets me mad. We all have to live together in this world. LA is a melting pot. It always has been. Thats one of the reason the it is a great city.
Sorry for the rant. But that just:angry: pushed all of my buttons.
Cam
Agreed. As much as it's a chore to try and get understandable directions out of the Latinos and Arabs who work in the 7-Elevens around this city (you L.A. people know what I mean; LOL!), it's great to get out of the "white zone" and realize that there are lots of other ethnicities that make up the world.Quote:
Originally Posted by CamCruise
Don't ever hang out in "Little Italy" NYC or Philly, although Italians, like Jews can be considered "white" - we too come in many flavors!Quote:
Originally Posted by nickbaer
Perhaps, Orange County will suit your purposes better...
Oh yeah. God. What Ken said. There's sooo many people who are just nuts, and even worse, so many others who put up with it and think it's cool. People, one screenplay banged out at the coffee shop doesn't mean you have a "development deal!" (heh)Quote:
Originally Posted by XXXWriterDude
And I won't even get started about actors-- most of them make musicians look secure and sane ;-) (kidding!! ...well sort of!)
The trick to making relationships here is to find the other sane ones and hang out with them.
Actually, the trick is to befriend the townies! LOL! Seriously, the people who grew up in L.A. aren't all that impressed with it. It's just their hometown to them. They're pretty down-to-earth, and most of them don't even work in the industry.Quote:
Originally Posted by skot
The problem with L.A. is that it's a career town. No one moves here to settle down and raise a family. Relationships (if you can cultivate them) emerge as a by-product of your business relationships and the networking you do as part of your career. It's a very me-Me-ME town, so everyone is always trying to get one step closer to their dream. That makes it a VERY difficult place to make real friends in. (That and the fact that so many people fail at it, and end up moving back home. It's a very transient city, so just as you're getting to know someone, they're gone.)
I often say that L.A. is the true make-or-break town. So many people come out here and realize, "Shit, I'm not cut out for this. I can't compete with all these people." This city forces you to be industrial and make your own way, or it makes you crumble and wither in self-defeat. That's one of the reasons I like it. It's a survival of the fittest city. You either shit or you get off the pot. Fuck New York. If you can make it in L.A., then you really CAN make it anywhere else! LOL! ;)
Make sure you see the picture that one BEST PICTURE - CRASH...suggested viewing for sure!Quote:
Originally Posted by NewBoyToyMatt
It's cold? No it isn't. I moved here from Toronto. THAT was cold. LA is a little chilly on occasion in the first bit of the year.Quote:
Originally Posted by nickbaer
Yes, it's expensive. That's to keep the riff raff out.
As far as the rest goes, it's kinda borderline racist and I don't even wanna deal with it, but I don't speak Spanish and I don't have a problem with shopping in retail stores.
Oh, and LA isn't for everyone, but I LOVE it here. It's big and crazy and I can ride my motorcycle into the mountains in the morning and still be home for lunch.
It's warm and sunny but not humid. it's close to San Diego, Palm Springs, Vegas, San Francisco, the beach, the mountains and the Kern Canyon roads.
Ooh -- or watch L.A. Story-- a terrific movie not only before you move here, but try watching it about six months after arriving and you'll realize that it's all completely true.Quote:
Originally Posted by A_DeAngelo
LA Rocks!
I moved here from the UK and had travelled pretty much everywhere beforehand.
Out of 34 countries and countless cities, Los Angeles has exactly what I need at the moment.
Make your home here, make your cash here, vacation whereever your heart desires!
Just my 2c
:vanish:
Personally, I prefer The Player. ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by skot
Thanks for all of the great feedback. I visited last year and am coming back in late June. After that trip, I'll decide. But from what I'm hearing...
- You either love it or hate it (or go back and forth!)
- You have to be here for content shooting (surplus of models, crew, locations).
Matt