Carol Badaracco Padgett
Senior Staff Writer
It’s an indie world in 2026. So if your budget is tight and your team is lean, you can still tell a big story. And you can find excellent, small studios to help you do it, ones with professional services from which you can pick and choose.
It’s also an age where anyone can tell the story, free from the confines of the traditional studio model. Now, there’s a staggering demand for short-form, branded content, and authenticity is often valued above the overly produced.
This is why.
Today’s audience is always connected, even when handling other tasks: taking the train downtown, sitting in a coffee shop, scrolling while we wait in line. We’re constantly checking our feeds throughout the day.
You’d think we’d all be too busy to ingest more media. But most of us are down to try.
Brand builders
By scrapping heavily produced glossy ad campaigns, many brands have simplified their approach and are reaping the benefits in followers and sales.
In 2026, human connection is what sells.
In a 2025 interview with The New York Times written by Yola Mzizi, the head of marketing for street-style clothier Damson Madder reported that peer-to-peer marketing is more interesting to consumers today than a brand telling them what to buy.
In the same report, Jonah Berger, marketing professor and author at the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania, notes that off-the-cuff messaging with an insider perspective enables viewers to look behind the curtain and engage more deeply.
In the sea of short-form videos on Instagram and TikTok, the ones that bubble to the surface most consistently depict authentic scenarios that win consumer views and seemingly their trust.
To stay on top of social media, some brands have built in-house creative studios to keep pace and control the content. Mailchimp, Sephora, Nike, Red Bull and Home Depot are among them.
In the instance of Sephora, the amount of content needed to support a global beauty retailer is reportedly much higher than for other types of brands.
Brent Mitchell, vice president of social media and influencer marketing at Sephora, reported this to a beauty and fashion media brand, Glossy, in a 2024 report, “We publish 40-50 pieces of content a week across TikTok, Instagram and YouTube. It’s hard to find days of the week where the studio is not booked or double-booked for shoots and studio events across several marketing business needs.”
Sports is in on the action, too. Professional franchises such as the NFL’s Kansas City Chiefs and Los Angeles Chargers have their own content studios that produce scripted and unscripted content to report on the teams and their history. Behind-the-scenes features and documentaries are examples of what they produce.
The NBA’s Atlanta Hawks and Chicago Bulls utilize their own content studios, and the MLB’s Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees created their own studios some time ago.
The fine art of opera, equal parts art and vocal athleticism, is another example of content studio adoption. The Atlanta Opera, for example, started its content studio, The Atlanta Opera Film Studio, during the pandemic. Because patrons were unable to attend performances during that time, it utilized the studio to take the performances directly into people’s homes. In the process, a new audience segment unfamiliar with opera adopted an appreciation for the art.
Content creators outside the realm of big brands, sports and arts and entertainment are also turning to small studios for support. Their options, it turns out, are plenty in 2026.
Professional small studios for independent storytellers
Let’s say you have a story to tell. A podcast, short film, audio book, social media clip, Zoom business presentation and more, but you don’t have ample time and your tech skills aren’t up to par. How are you going to produce it?
A quick browser search will reveal content studio options in your area that can help get the job done within budget and in nearly any timeframe. Many of these studios are equipped with professional engineers, videographers, editors and other types of support.
One example of a studio option for independent storytellers, business or personal, is Global Media Studios in metro Atlanta, owned by Rich Hart. Hart is an international speaker, entrepreneur and media professional, and he has created a more than 20,000-square-foot, full-service production house with state-of-the-art facilities to help storytellers produce their messages with excellence.
Global Media Studios services include live production space, audio and music recording and audio and video post-production services such as mixing and color grading, live event space, in just about any flexible configuration a production may require.
One of Hart’s stated goals in the design of Global Media Studios is to make it so the content creator has only to focus on the message or story itself, while his professional staff handles everything necessary to produce it with excellence.
Large-scale studios that bend and flex
Major film studios, such as Assembly, Shadowbox and Great Point Studios, are pointedly empowering independent and alternative filmmakers, as well. As the professional film industry experienced a shift and pivot during the pandemic and the writers, actors and union strikes that followed, idle sound stages echoed the need for a new entertainment ecosystem: one that allows storytellers into a front seat position in malleable and meaningful ways.
At Trilith, storytellers with film projects of all sizes are educated, supported and celebrated through the Trilith Institute, which offers programs to educate and train today’s and tomorrow’s storytellers and makers.
In addition, the Trilith Foundation, its tagline “Be Well, Do Good. Together,” offers community programs that provide crisis care for storytellers, athletes and creatives across the board. Other programs offered through the nonprofit foundation include mental health subsidies that give creatives access to counseling services.
Additional functions of the foundation include support for crew members on the Trilith Studios lot, tours and classes for children, events that bring creatives and supporters together in community and several resources offered by partner organizations looking to serve storytellers and creatives.
Shadowbox Studios, located 10 miles from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, partnered with Georgia Entertainment in late summer 2025 to present “The Creator’s Toolbox.” The packed soundstage hosted discussions with leaders in film and television, gaming and esports, branded content and music. Their conversations focused on the evolution of storytelling, shifts across their industries and the growing convergence and access that will shape how creators succeed in 2026 and the years ahead.
In panel discussions at the packed soundstage, visionaries and creators in the realms of film and television, gaming including esports, branded content and music, spoke about developments in storytelling and media, evolution in their given industries, and the media convergence and open access required and available to help storytellers succeed in 2026 and beyond.
One telling takeaway from the Creator’s Toolbox activation came from Tom Luse, producer and executive producer of the acclaimed, Georgia-lensed series “The Walking Dead.” As Luse noted, “We’re starting to switch from a moon to a sun.”
SIDEBAR:
Atlanta Falcons’ Ticketmaster Studios
The Atlanta Falcons rose as early adopters of the custom content studio concept when, in 2022, the franchise opened Ticketmaster Studios. The multimillion-dollar digital production and media facility is located in Flowery Branch, Georgia, at the football franchise’s headquarters.
The Falcons reported making “a strategic investment … to deliver on growing demand for engaging content from fans, media, corporate and league partners across multiple fan touchpoints.”
As reported on atlantafalcons.com, Ticketmaster Studios allows “the Falcons to capture and produce exclusive, all-access content for use across the broad technology in Mercedes-Benz Stadium to further enhance the game day experience. Having achieved significant growth of consumption of Falcons content in recent years, fans will now see more in-the-moment analysis of breaking news, in-depth analysis during key moments such as the NFL Draft, expert review of player transactions, exclusive content with various Falcons personalities, in-depth player features and more.”
This article appeared in the 2026 edition of the Creative Economy Journal. See more from the Journal here.
