The film festival starts today and runs until Sunday

The Sheffield Adventure Film Festival kicks off today, with another offering of cinematic thrills for armchair enthusiasts in its eighth year.

The grand prize in the event has gone to North of the Sun, a surf film with a twist.

Sheffield Adventure Film Festival director Matt Heason said: “This year’s judging was tougher than ever.

“We had more films and a higher standard than ever before. We’ve added a new best feature film award and hope the increase in the number of longer films is a sign that adventure sports film-makers are growing in confidence.

“But, the fact that best climbing film is shared between the long and short edits of Wide Boyz is really good illustration of how you can take similar footage and effectively the same story and produce two very different but equally captivating films.”

“A new best ski and board film category recognises the strength of snow films which made up a quarter of total entries.

“We’ve also created a new best run film category to reflect the fact that last year’s grand prize went to the running film Unbreakable and this year The Dragon’s Back won three prizes.

“Running films are increasing popular with our audience and we want to send a clear signal to encourage more film-makers, like Rich Heap, to focus on one of the Peak District’s most popular sports.

“We also awarded a judges’ special prize to celebrate Shaun Palme – Miserable Champion, a great multi-sport film which didn’t fit into any of our existing categories.”

Co-organiser Lissa Cook added: “What stood out for me this year was the number of British film-makers and quality of British-made films.

“That’s reflected in the hat-trick of top prizes for Wide Boyz, The Dragon’s Back and Janapar.

“Without being parochial, it’s also great that we’ve got a Sheffield director premiering his film in the city and winning three prizes. Plus Sheffield school girl Ella Kirkpatrick following in her dad Andy’s footsteps in My Life: The Big Climb and local mountain bike legend Steve Peat making a cameo appearance in a couple of films too.

“Personally, I’ve also been pleased by the increasing number of films featuring female athletes. We’re nowhere near parity but we’re getting there.”

ShAFF runs from today until Sunday at the Showroom Cinema in Sheffield.