Location is sealed off — no pedestrians, vehicles, or interference in frame. Non-negotiable for clean takes.
Lockup
The shooting location is under absolute control — no traffic, no random passersby, no disturbing external noise. That's a lockup. Without it, you'll inevitably shoot with compromises: vehicles drive into the frame, people walk through your shot, a siren wails somewhere in the distance. You'll then sit in the edit and get annoyed because the atmosphere and the image aren't clean. A lockup means that the production management has previously clarified with the responsible authorities, police, and residents: this street, this square, this area is reserved for the film within this time window. Period.
In practice, it works like this: the location manager and line producers secure the permits — often weeks in advance. On the shooting day itself, the production assistant sets up bollards, blocks access roads, and positions traffic controllers. Sometimes, local police are even needed to monitor detours. This costs time and money, but it saves you tenfold in post-production. Because with a lockup, you have clean takes: no visual or acoustic foreign bodies that you have to fix later in color grading or sound design — or worse: takes that are completely unusable due to a passing car.
The duration of a lockup varies considerably. Sometimes it's two hours for a short scene on a side street, sometimes a square or an entire street must remain closed for the entire shooting day — for example, for driving shots or when multiple setups are running in parallel. This also dictates how much buffer time you need to plan: with an open location, you shoot faster, but less cleanly. With a lockup, the time pressure is distributed differently — you have security, but also responsibility towards the community.
Classic mistakes: underestimating the duration of a lockup to save costs. Then everyone is rushed, material is forgotten, takes are fragmented. Or: the lockup is formally approved, but communication with residents and road users isn't smooth — then there are frustrations and potential conflicts on site. Professional productions also distinguish between Hard Lockup (complete closure, including pedestrians) and Soft Lockup (reduced through traffic, but with control). Both require planning and communication — but both variants protect your images from chaos.