Most LA photoshoot location lists are written for engagement photos.
Twenty gorgeous places, no mention that half of them need a permit the second you bring a product and a crew.
We're based in Marina del Rey and we shoot brand content around the city most months. Here's where we go and what the rules are at each spot.
Permits first
Los Angeles treats anything commercial as filming, and still photography has its own permit through FilmLA. A still photo permit application is $104, and if your shoot has 16 or more people on it, or you roll any video at all, you get bumped to the motion rate (FilmLA, LA City fees). The video rule is the one that gets people, since every brand shoot has Reels in it now, so budget for the motion rate from the start.
The normal motion application fee is $931. As of April 27, 2026, FilmLA is running a six-month Low Impact Permit pilot: if you have fewer than 30 cast and crew, shoot three days or fewer and use three locations or fewer, the application fee drops to $350 and the notification fee drops to $156 per location (Hollywood Reporter, April 2026), and almost every brand shoot we do fits inside those limits.
County beaches have their own fee on top of the permit: $100 a day for a still shoot of 1 to 15 people, $400 a day if it's motion. Zuma needs a second permit from the City of Malibu. State beaches like El Matador don't go through FilmLA at all; those are California State Parks. Drones are banned on every county beach (FilmLA, beaches).
Lead time is three business days minimum (Wrapbook), so this isn't a day-before thing.
For a small brand, a two-person phone shoot with no gear usually goes unnoticed. Once there's a tripod and a rack of product, you're commercial, and the beach patrol has seen it a thousand times.
Marina del Rey
Our backyard, and underrated for product and lifestyle. The harbor walkways along Admiralty Way get you boats and palms in one frame, and the light off the water in the late afternoon is soft and warm. Fisherman's Village has the cartoon-colored lighthouse and the painted storefronts, which read as retro resort without any styling. Mother's Beach is calm and never busy, so it works for anything that needs sand without the Venice chaos. County permit territory, so the $100 still fee applies on the beach itself.
Venice
Abbot Kinney for murals and storefronts, and get there by 8 because it's packed by noon. The canals are gorgeous at golden hour, but they're also people's front yards, so keep the footprint small and don't block the bridges. The boardwalk is loud and full of texture. It's a county beach, so the fee applies if you set up.
Santa Monica
The pier if you want the Ferris wheel and the carnival feel. Santa Monica has its own film office and the pier is managed separately, so file there even if you'd risk it elsewhere. The top of Parking Structure 6 downtown is the one we send people to most: concrete, open sky and the ocean at sunset, and nobody cares that you're there because it's a public garage.
Malibu
El Matador has the sea caves and rock arches and is best at sunrise. Zuma is the wide postcard beach, and Point Dume if you want cliffs. All three are expensive to permit relative to the rest of the list, because El Matador is a state beach and Zuma needs the Malibu dual permit, so we only go out there when the beach is the whole concept.
Beverly Hills
The palm-lined residential streets off Sunset are the shot everyone wants and they're free to walk, as long as you stay on the sidewalk and don't block a driveway. Rodeo Drive for luxury context. The Beverly Hills Hotel is private property and will stop you, so if you want that pink, book a room or a table and shoot discreetly.
Downtown
The Arts District for murals and warehouse walls, the Bradbury Building for the atrium (ask first, they have rules), Urban Light at LACMA for the lamp field (also ask first) and the Lower Grand overpass for anything moody. Parking is easier than you'd think on a weekend morning.
Or rent a room
For product and anything with a lot of setups, we usually book a space. Restaurants, lofts and design-led houses rent by the hour on Peerspace, come pre-styled with the kind of corners we'd otherwise spend an hour building, and need no permit because it's private property with the owner's permission. There's a four-room house we keep going back to that beats a full day of driving between spots.
What we'd tell a brand doing this alone
Two public spots in the morning while the light is soft, then a rented room for the afternoon when it goes flat. Bring a tripod bag that looks like a gym bag, it helps more than it should. File the still permit at least a week out, and if there's any chance of video, file it as motion.
sound like you?
Planning an LA shoot?
It's a lot of admin. We pull the permits on every shoot we run, so if you'd rather skip all of this, start a project and tell us what you're launching.
Start a project
Written by
Hana Brenner-Katz is the founder and creative director of Beyond Bright Creative. She started her own design studio in 2018 and turned it into a full-service agency in 2023.
More about us