When Bill Saxelby enrolled at the University of Texas at Austin in 2006 to pursue a career in steadycam operation, it was a peak time for Texas films. State incentives had helped launch hundreds of local productions, which in turn created thousands of jobs. Texas-born filmmakers like Richard Linklater, Wes Anderson and Robert Rodriguez were on the rise.
But by the time Saxelby graduated in 2010, the economic crisis had shaken the local industry. He says he was forced to roll up his diploma and leave for New York City if he wanted a shot at finding a job in his field.
At that time, "if you wanted to go make it, you had to go elsewhere, otherwise you'd be more in the smaller commercial market that was in Texas," Saxelby said. "But now, with the vast amount of infrastructure that they're building, those chances will be there for future students."
To Saxelby and other industry veterans, Texas is once again taking film production seriously.
In 2025, state legislators passed a massive film-incentives package meant to lure the industry back to the state. The Texas Moving Image Industry Incentive Program will offer $1.5 billion over the next decade to movies, TV shows, commercials, video games, animation and other "moving-image productions" if a certain amount of work is done in Texas.
The program will allocate $300 million to these productions every two years. For qualifying film projects, 35% of paid crew and cast members must be Texas residents, and 60% of production must be completed in Texas. They also must spend at least $250,000 in Texas.
Since going into effect last September, the program has received 100 applications for incentives to back their new productions.
While lobbying for the bill's passage, Texas-born actor Matthew McConaughey told lawmakers, "If we pass this bill in Texas, we are immediately at the bargaining table for shooting more films and television and commercials in our state immediately."
'You don't have to be in LA to follow your dreams'
Greg Carter, an adjunct professor and director of University of Houston's film certificate program, is a Houston-raised filmmaker whose first film, Fifth Ward (named after the Houston community), premiered at South by Southwest in 1998. But a few years later, Carter left Texas for Los Angeles because he felt like that was where he needed to be to push his career forward.
Now Carter is back in Houston and helping start the university's new graduate film-production certificate program.
"You can go anywhere," Carter said. "You don't have to be in LA to follow your dreams."
The certificate program kicks off this summer, headed by Fleurette Fernando, director of UH's Arts Leadership Program. Fernando said that the course will be taught online at night so professionals who are already working in the field can participate.
The 15- to 20-student cohort will learn about the business side of the film industry and dive further into on-set production.
Texans should be among the "people making decisions from a business standpoint about how this industry is going to work," Fernando said. "It's not going to help our field if those decisions are made by outsiders."
Carter said investing in film education is a step in the right direction to ensuring that any boosts to local filmmaking outlast the state's 10-year incentive timeline. But Carter also said he's worried the minimum $250,000 spending amount to earn incentives is too steep to benefit most student and indie filmmakers.
Meanwhile, Chris Rupert, a board member of the Fort Worth Film Commission, said bigger movie productions will boost the local economy, making resources more accessible for aspiring filmmakers.
Rupert is also founder of Shine Cine film equipment rental company and Nametag Films production company.
"There is an interesting trickle down effect there: The bigger projects make the investment and rent a lot of equipment," Rupert said, adding that catering, hotels, restaurants and transportation businesses all profit from film sets.
He said from what he's seen, the success of these businesses helps film students or small-budget productions because those local businesses keep equipment affordable and accessible to them.
Too little, too late?
Even with new investments, Texas is playing catch up. States like Georgia and New Mexico have consistently incentivized local film production over the last 20 years. Georgia offers a base 20% transferable tax credit for cash back on films made there, and New Mexico offers local productions a 25% refundable tax credit on qualifying costs.
For filmmakers like Saxelby, who relocated from New York City to Georgia, coming back to Texas isn't really an option.
But hope for new aspiring filmmakers is on the horizon. Or rather, in the state's past. Austin Film Commissioner Brian Gannon said the state's rich filmmaking history will give it more edge.
Long before state film incentives were established, Texas made a name for itself in the movie business in the 1970s and '80s with films like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Paris, Texas. Those and other local low-budget films were so inspiring that Robert Redford referenced the 1978 Austin-filmed The Whole Shootin' Match as inspiration for creating the Sundance Film Festival.
In Amarillo, where the Palo Duro Canyon has long been used for filming dramatic scenery like Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and All the Pretty Horses, local film commissioner Sherman Bass said the Panhandle is using its rich scenery and history to market the region to film productions.
"The incentives being increased as they have is going to be great for the film industry and economy in Texas," Bass said. "We'll see most of that in the larger film hubs, but we're going to see some of it here in West Texas and hopefully more of it as time goes on.
"I just feel confident we're going to see the return on investment as a state, and the Legislature will continue to see it as a wise investment in the future — even beyond 10 years."
Copyright 2026 KUT News
