Film Crew Hire in Cornwall

You pay each crew member’s day rate, which goes to them in full, plus our 10% booking fee and 2% insurance on everything we book, kit included. A DOP and a sound recordist for the day comes to £1,568 + VAT. Cornwall adds its own lines to the quote: Cornwall Council’s location fee if you’re filming on its land, from £180 a day for online content to £1,500 for a commercial, VAT included; parking dispensations at £20 a vehicle a day; and travel and hotels for any crew who come down from Bristol, Devon or London, all checked October 2026. If we’re the producer of record, it’s quoted as a production instead: everything at cost, plus a 15% production fee and 5% for insurance and contingency, and every production starts at £9,500.

Who’s the producer of record. With crew hire, you or your producer run the shoot and carry the production: we find, book, brief and pay the crew, and book kit or travel if you want it, for 10% plus 2% insurance. With a full production, we take it on: our producer plans and runs it, and we book and pay for the crew, kit, locations, the Cornwall Council and landowner permissions, travel and crew hotels in our name, on one contract. That’s quoted as a production: everything at cost, plus 15% and 5% for insurance and contingency.

We’re a crew agency with 2,800+ freelance crew on our books across the UK, 30+ of them in Cornwall, so we can scale a crew from one camera operator on a beach to a full unit on a clifftop. Some roles are thin on the ground down here: sound, lighting and grip, DIT, hair and make-up, costume and Steadicam. For those we bring crew from Bristol, Devon or London, with the travel and hotels on the quote before anything is booked. On the Lizard for Cohere, the 1st AC, the 2nd AC and the tracking vehicle team travelled in, and the crew stayed in Helston. We started in Cornwall: our founders work from our Newquay office, on Mount Wise, and our headquarters is at 124 City Road in London.

Our team reads every brief within 2 working hours and comes back with names and the full price. What usually sets the date is permission, not crew. Cornwall Council asks for ten working days’ notice, or five for a crew under five with a handheld camera, and 12 weeks for any traffic management or road closure (checked October 2026). A parking dispensation takes five working days, a body of persons approval for children on set at least 21 days, and a drone near St Michael’s Mount two weeks; on a Site of Special Scientific Interest, Natural England’s consent can take up to four months. In summer, book the crew hotels early: Screen Cornwall warns that accommodation is limited.

On council land, yes. Filming on Cornwall Council land, its beaches, woods, parks, gardens and old mining sites among them, needs a permit through FilmApp. Screen Cornwall’s Film Office gives advice, locations and introductions to landowners, but doesn’t issue the permits. Cornwall Council’s 2026–27 location fee for a commercial is £1,500 a full day, £660 for documentary and daytime TV and £180 for online content, with drone permission £216 a full day on top and a £10 admin fee on every application, all paid upfront (checked October 2026). Cornwall Council asks for £5m public liability and a location-specific risk assessment with every application. Much of the coast has other owners, the National Trust, the Duchy of Cornwall and private estates among them, and car parks and access roads often belong to someone else again, so one sequence can need several permissions: our Cohere shoot on the Lizard needed three. On a full production we apply for all of it; on a crew hire it’s yours, and we’ll tell you who to ask.

Yes, with the owner’s permission. Council beaches go through FilmApp, with no vehicles on the sand without the council’s specific permission. The Duchy of Cornwall holds over 160 miles of Cornish foreshore, and Screen Cornwall points out that filming on the foreshore at low tide needs its own permission. RNLI lifeguards patrol 20 Cornish beaches in the 2026 season, Fistral, Perranporth, Porthmeor and Sennen every day of the season, and the lifeguards should be told before you film on a patrolled beach (checked October 2026). Harbours have their own rules: Cornwall Council’s harbour masters look after Newquay, Truro, Penzance and St Ives among others, and Falmouth and Padstow have harbour commissioners. On the water, tell the coastguard when and where you’re filming.

Yes, with the right permissions. Cornwall Council’s drone permission is £216 a full day on top of the location fee, with a flight path document and a CAA-qualified pilot; the National Trust and English Heritage don’t allow drones without permission, and St Michael’s Mount is a flight restricted zone (checked October 2026). Flying near the Mount needs written consent from Penzance Heliport, St Aubyn Estates and the National Trust at least two weeks ahead, and Cornwall Wildlife Trust asks for no drones on its reserves without permission, because many are breeding sites. Since 1 January 2026 the pilot needs a Flyer ID from 100g and an Operator ID from 250g, or 100g with a camera.

They set the schedule. Tides decide when a beach can be filmed, and ADMIRALTY EasyTide gives free predictions six days ahead. Visit Cornwall warns that sat-navs send drivers down narrow lanes, so follow the road signs, and that the A30 is busy in peak season, school holidays and at weekends. Culdrose, on the Lizard, averages about 151 days a year with a millimetre of rain or more, and a mean wind of 12 knots (Met Office 1991–2020 averages). On the Lizard for Cohere, a fortnight of good forecasts turned to fog the night before, and the call moved up to 07:00 to catch the mist.

Many own theirs, from camera packages to lighting kits, and it goes on the quote as its own line so you can compare. Otherwise we hire it in, from The Cornish Camera Co. in West Cornwall or Falmouth University’s film school stores, which hire to outside productions on 24 hours’ notice: a Sony FX6 kit there is £200 a day plus VAT (checked October 2026). On the Lizard for Cohere, a lens came from The Cornish Camera Co. Bigger kit comes down from Bristol or London, and kit we hire in goes on at the same 10% + 2%.

Yes, on the same quote as the crew. Screen Cornwall says Cornwall has no film studios, and the nearest stages are The Bottle Yard in Bristol. Falmouth University hires out its film school studios: Studio 1 is 154 square metres, at £750 a day plus VAT (checked October 2026). Converted farm buildings and empty industrial units make pop-up studios too. We check what’s free for your dates, and on a crew hire the studio goes on at the same 10% + 2% as everything else we book.

Not in the payroll sense: most UK film crew are freelance. Instead, your contract is with us, a UK company. We contract and pay the UK crew, hold £10m employers’ liability, and send one invoice, so you don’t need a UK company to shoot in Cornwall. Your own travelling team stays on your payroll, and can fly into Cornwall Airport Newquay from London Stansted or Manchester, or take the Night Riviera sleeper from Paddington. If you’d rather we ran it as your production service company, we’re the producer of record and our policy covers the shoot, £10m public liability included.

Two things. Employers’ liability for every crew member we book, up to £10m, and insurance on the kit we hire in for you. That’s what the 2% pays for. A large kit rental may need extra insurance, as its own line on the quote. The 2% doesn’t insure the rest of the shoot: public liability, the location, your own kit and anything you book yourself stay with you, because you’re the producer of record. If you’d rather we were, it’s quoted as a full production, and our insurance covers the whole shoot, public liability included. In Cornwall, the council asks for £5m public liability with every FilmApp application (checked October 2026), and on a crew hire the certificate it wants is yours.