Driftwood

Driftwood is more than simply a film about paddle surfing, but equally about culture and discovery. Surfers Sam George, Noah Yap, Ammy Naff, and Jim Brewer travel to Sri Lanka, Iceland, and Colombia, among other places, on their quest to paddle rivers and oceans around the world.

Did you set out to make a travel/cultural/surf film, or is that just how it presented itself?

Jim Brewer envisioned and produced the film. His idea was to make a film that focused more on the places we visited rather than the travelers themselves. It was my job to capture details for each location. Hopefully, the viewer will get a sense of the experience of the many different locations and cultures.

The soundtrack provides mood and sense of place in each location. How did you get the music just right?

I put an incredible amount of time into finding the soundtrack for the film. I wanted the music of the film to be representative of locations we visited and help to create a feeling for the country and our adventures there. For me, the music is the most important part of the film so I put a lot of effort into finding tracks that help to highlight the images.

What inspired the film?

The concept was inspired by Jim Brewer, owner of Blueline Stand Up Paddle in Santa Barbara. Brewer’s original idea was to travel to out-of-the-way areas and document the experience for magazine and web video content. In the process, Brewer recruited me to document the adventures on film. After we did a couple of these trips, we quickly realized that we were able to capture and present all the adventures in short web videos, so we decided to focus on creating a full length feature film.

Driftwood screens on Thu., Jan. 31, 7 p.m., at the Lobero Theatre.