NATCHEZ — Eleven tiny ducks perched prominently on the front edge of Patrick Mulhearn’s desk speak volumes about the man and his background.

For the visitors — including many Hollywood heavyweights — to Baton Rouge’s Celtic Media Centre, the ducks represent a little light-hearted humor.

“I’ve got my ducks in a row,” Mulhearn says, laughing.

Indeed he does. The Natchez native is director of operations at the largest film studio in Louisiana.

In his daily role, he wears a number of hats from being a “glorified landlord” for the various film production tenants to problem solver and even a middleman to help broker production deals.

Recent productions at the Celtic Media Centre include the HBO series “True Blood,” Sony’s “Battle: Los Angeles,” NBC’s “Battleship” and Summit’s “Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Parts 1 and 2.”

Although Celtic directly employs only approximately a dozen employees, the companies that rent space there can make the campus swell.

“When you’re in production, there are days when it’s 150 people, and there are days when we would have almost 1,000 people,” he said. “(On those days) it was really like a small town.”

But for anyone who knows him, the ducks are really more about Mulhearn’s Natchez roots.

“I’m from Natchez, and I’m a duck hunter,” Mulhearn explains. “I really enjoy it. It’s something I’ve done with my dad.”

Although Mulhearn regularly rubs elbows with television and film stars, he still has fond memories of Natchez and credits Natchez for his success.

The 1993 Trinity Episcopal Day School graduate said the school played a big part in his early interest in TV and film.

“Mrs. Young, Mrs. Anderson and some of the others, they would always ask us to make videos with a home video camera,” he said. “We had the best time editing videos — with two VCRs.

“And gosh, I don’t know how many videos I rented from Southgate Video.”

In addition, Mulhearn was actually in a production that filmed in Natchez in the late 1980s, “Good Old Boy.”

“I remember getting to stay up until 1 o’clock in the morning, throwing popcorn,” he said. “That made a lasting impression on me, I guess.”

College led him first to Colorado, but dating a girl in Natchez led him back home, eventually taking some classes during a summer session at LSU, with plans to return to Colorado in the fall.

“I ended up breaking up with the girl and I fell in love with LSU,” he said.

After earning degrees from LSU, Mulhearn worked for several years in television production in Baton Rouge and New Orleans. His work for WWL in New Orleans earned him an Emmy in 2005.

He joined the Louisiana Economic Development office as the assistant director of film and television in 2006.

It was there that Mulhearn became one of the state’s experts on film tax credits and helped improve, promote and administer one of the most lucrative motion picture incentive programs in the country.

A recent analysis by the BaxStarr Consulting Group estimates more than $1.5 billion was spent on motion picture production in Louisiana in the last three years.

“That was a game-changer,” Mulhearn said. “The transferrable tax credit is the greatest invention that’s been invented.”

The tax credit works like this. If a film production spent $100 million, they might earn $30 million in tax credits. In most cases, the production companies don’t actually have that much tax liability, so they don’t really need the credits themselves.

At that point, the tax credits can be sold to others — from very large corporations to individuals with high net worth.

It’s a win-win for the state, Mulhearn said.

“If you have a credit, someone within the state is able to knock out that liability and the money stays in the state,” he said.

Mulhearn thinks Natchez and other parts of Mississippi could benefit if the state adopted a similar tax credit program applied to destination weddings and even out-of-state conventions.

“To get people with a high net worth to just put eyeballs on Natchez might be a way for them to say, ‘Hey, I’d like to get a house there,’” he said. “And there’s a system that works already that can be copied, the Louisiana film industry one.”