Film studio tours: Harry Potter, Thrones, Cinecittà, Hollywood

A film location shows you where a story happened. A studio shows you how it was made. On this theme the two come together. Outside London, the Warner Bros. Studio Tour London, The Making of Harry Potter, fills the soundstages at Leavesden where all eight films were shot, with the Great Hall, Diagon Alley and the Hogwarts model. In Northern Ireland, the Game of Thrones Studio Tour in Banbridge displays sets, costumes and props from the series, a short drive from the castles and harbors where it filmed.

In Rome, Cinecittà has been making films since 1937. Its public visit includes a museum of Italian cinema and, with a studio guide, the standing set of ancient Rome built for the series Rome. In New Zealand, the Hobbiton Movie Set near Matamata was rebuilt for The Hobbit films and left in place, and in Wellington the Weta Workshop shows how the armor, creatures and miniatures of Middle-earth were made. In Los Angeles, the Warner Bros. lot in Burbank and Paramount on Melrose Avenue run their own studio tours.

We have no special access to any studio and do not claim any. We buy the same public tickets anyone can, as soon as you book, which matters because the popular slots sell out months ahead. Studio days run to the studio's timetable, so they are the most fixed part of each tour. Photos are allowed in most areas and banned on some stages; your leader tells you before you go in.

Studio tours involve a lot of standing and walking on hard floors. Bring comfortable shoes, and expect bag checks and photo ID at the gate.

Most of our studio days are paired with real locations nearby, so you see both halves of the craft on the same day: the set built in a hangar, and the street or castle it was copying. Your leader brings stills and clips so you can compare the two, and explains which shots used which.