M3 StudiosSpring, TX5 min readJune 16, 2026Texas now offers film and TV productions a cash grant worth up to 31 percent of what they spend in the state. The Texas Moving Image Industry Incentive Program, or TMIIIP, got a 10-year, $1.5 billion commitment under Senate Bill 22, which took effect September 1, 2025. Productions that launch after that date and spend at least $250,000 in Texas can apply for a reimbursement once the work wraps and the spend is audited. For a Houston crew, that is the difference between a production setting up here and a production driving to New Mexico.
The number that matters is 31 percent. That is the ceiling on the grant, paid as a direct check, not a tax credit a production has to sell off at a discount. A project earns its way up the ladder. Reimbursements start at 5 percent and climb based on how much gets spent in-state and what boxes the project checks.
Two rules decide whether a production qualifies. At least 60 percent of the work has to happen in Texas. And at least 35 percent of the cast and crew have to be Texas residents, per the Texas Film Commission. That residency floor is the part a working creative should read twice. The money is built to chase local hires, not out-of-town payroll.
Texas has run a film incentive since 2007. The problem was never the idea. It was the funding, which lurched up and down every two years. The state put $45 million toward incentives in the 2022-23 budget, then $200 million in 2024-25. A feature can take more than a year to get off the ground, and a two-year window made it hard for any studio to plan a multi-season show here.
SB 22 changed the math. It locks in $300 million every two years through 2035, a sunset the Legislature can renew or rewrite when it meets that year. Filmmakers and actors with Texas ties, including Glen Powell and Taylor Sheridan, pushed for the bigger number during the 2025 session. Sheridan was blunt about why it matters. "These networks cannot and will not finance a film without an incentive," he told lawmakers in late 2024. "I have lost shows because we were maxed out here."
The case for the spend is in the return. For every dollar of grant money, TMIIIP recipients have spent $4.69 in Texas, according to Adriana Cruz, who runs the state's Economic Development and Tourism office. Since 2007, projects have put $2.52 billion into the Texas economy and created more than 189,000 jobs. A production crew stays in local hotels, eats at local restaurants, and hires local electricians, carpenters, medics, and law enforcement.
There is a catch worth flagging. The Texas Film Commission is not required to approve every application. The law lets it deny a project with "inappropriate content or content that portrays Texas or Texans in a negative fashion." Sen. Paul Bettencourt of Houston raised that point during a hearing, citing the profanity in Sheridan's show Landman. So the grant is not automatic, and the content review is real.
SB 22 also stacks an extra 2.5 percent on top, still capped at 31 percent total, for projects that hit certain marks. Filming at least 35 percent in a rural Texas community counts. So does hiring Texas veterans, shooting at Texas historic sites, or partnering with a Texas college on the project.
For Houston, the state program is the heavy money. The city sweetener layers on top of it. Houston First runs a local rebate that returns 10 percent of in-region spend, capped at $100,000 per project, and a production can pull the state grant and the city rebate on the same job. Stacked, they make the Houston parts of a shoot worth keeping in Houston.
That is where the work loops back to the people who finish it. A film that shoots in Texas still has to be cut, scored, and mixed. Audio post, motion graphics, and the final mix all happen after the cameras stop, and a production already spending its qualified dollars here has every reason to keep that work local. M3 Studios handles film and TV audio post, motion graphics, and the final mix on the visual side. The grant pulls the shoot in. The finishing keeps it here.
The first full year under the new funding is 2026. The pool is set, the rules are public, and the state is watching what the money pulls in before the 2035 renewal. The productions will come for the 31 percent. Whether the jobs stay in Houston depends on whether the people here are ready to be hired.
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