Looking to tap into the burgeoning surf community on the east coast, Keith Maddison and some fellow surf enthusiasts are launching the first Canadian Surf Film Festival in Halifax next week.

After seeing the popularity of Yassine Ouhilal’s Arctic Surf Film and other surf-related fare at last year’s Atlantic Film Festival, Keith Maddison and some colleagues decided to continue riding that wave. CSFF, which celebrates surf culture, will run from September 30 to October 2.

“[Surfing is] something a lot of people love to do here, but when you go to a place like Australia and they think of people surfing in Canada, they think you’re completely crazy,” says Maddison with a laugh. “When the idea of a Canadian Surf Film Festival came up, they thought that was really unique.”

As surfers themselves, they set out earlier this year to make the fest happen. Two of the four founders had experience in putting on a similar event on a smaller scale, and Maddison himself currently works for the Atlantic Film Festival, which is just wrapping up this week. They looked to the New York Surf Film Festival for inspiration and through those folks and Ouhilal, they put together the first fest of its kind for Canada.

Along with getting the attention of the local surfing community, Maddison says the novelty of the fest has been attracting attention. It’s also thanks to the help of the Surfing Association of Nova Scotia, of which Maddison is also a board member, and SBC Surf in B.C. that they’ve been spreading the word on both coasts.

The fest opens with two films, starting with Fiberglass and Megapixels by Derek and Craig Hoffmann, a doc that takes a look at surf photography and photographers, with a focus on Hawaii’s North Shore. It’ll be followed by Mick Sowry’s Musica Surfica, which snagged the award for best feature at the 2008 New York Surf Film Fest, and explores the parallels between playing classical music and surfing.

As part of the inaugural fest, Maddison and co. have also launched a film challenge in which they will be unveiling the winner at the end of the three-day run.

“Most of the submissions have been from Nova Scotia,” says Maddison. “They’re 10 minutes or less and they just had to get out there with a short film that has to do with surfing. We’ve had everything from music videos, to interviews with pros, someone submitted a film about some underprivileged kids who did a surf camp.”

A jury of filmmakers and surf community leaders will decide the winner, who will take home – you guessed it – a brand new surfboard.