The Australian Surf Movie Festival (ASMF) is in it’s 11 touring year as an organised series of short movies that visits towns and cities of the Australiancoast. The Festival is a one-night-show about 2 hours in duration that showcases short stories documenting the biggest, most gnarley swells surfable on the planet over the previous 12 months.

At the ASMF, you will typically see 4 to 5 surf movies – One film will be the main feature this year it is ENCODED, others will be shorts this year includes the winner of the Short Surf Film Competition and Wild Australia featuring Kelly Slater, Alex Gray, Mark Mathews, Richie Vass and 16 year old Russell Bierke.

The Festival is self-produced and screens the work of Director and Camera man Tim Bonython, however a number of other films have toured in the past as well including Flow, Storm Surfers, Strapped, Quicksilver’s Mad Wax and Tim’s own films including Blackwater, Maydayz and multi-international award winning Immersion the Movie.

The footage that becomes the festival is also sometimes acquired from surfer’s GoPro cameras for point-of-view action, specialised Phantom Cameras at certain swells as well as any other footage that is available from another angle to provide you with the best coverage from all angles of the waves.

Tim’s passion is filming big waves and the surfers that risk their lives to conquer them. He follows the swells as they gain momentum throughout the year and picks out his locations with a group of big wave surfers before heading out, usually to a very isolated location.

Tim and wife Sandrine run the independent distribution label Tim Bonython Productions it is important to them to keep their work independent so they can maintain creative control over what they do and continue to build the Australian Surf Movie Festival on the platform they have successfully created.

The ASMF includes a live acoustic artist each year as Tim loves to help support local upcoming artists by giving them a chance to tour with the festival. In 2014 Jack Dawson joined the tour for all stops at non-cinema venues. His music has a rich earthy feel and fits in perfectly with the vibe of the festival this year.  In the past the tour has been supported by Alys Longmate, Juzzie Smith, Nick Saxon, Josh Boots and Tokenview.