I go back & forth a lot about my options as a freelance colorist. Working from home, working in a small facility, working in a large company.
At home, I have the freedom of making my own hours, an easy commute, low-to-nonexistent overhead costs and the comfort of not needing to wear pants unless I have a client over. The downside is a thoroughly unprofessional atmosphere that can reflect on me no matter the quality of my work, plus the need to invest in equipment maintenance and upgrades.
A large facility has state of the art equipment, dedicated support staffs and many creature comforts that discerning filmmakers may value when they are about to spend a lot of time over days or weeks in a dark room with me. An obvious downsides is the cost-big facities generally have to charge more, or have to rush out smaller jobs so their rooms won't be busy when better paying jobs come along. Additionally, most of these places already have their guys and no one seems in much of a hurry to retire. The only ways for me to get a foot in the door are to take a support staff job & sneak in during off hours to work on my client projects, or to have enough of a client base that the company feels confident in investing in my ability to generate business.
I know in good, but I'm self-aware enough to also know that I'm not there yet.
Which brings me to the idea of a small-to-midsize facility. On the one hand, a place like this will generally have higher end equipment than I can afford plus a more professional and comfortable atmosphere. The downside is the workload can be variable (see: the feast or famine post from before) and the jobs are smaller, lower profile.
The indie film world is struggling, I'll be honest about that. But it's happening nonetheless. I'm happy that I am starting an ongoing relationship with HotPixel Post ( http://hotpixelpost.com/). The color bay there is awfully good and I'm looking forward to doing a lot of work with them in the months and, with luck, years ahead.
Please feel free to check them out and, if you happen to be a filmmaker, let's talk about your next film's post needs. HotPixel can do it all.