Action sports series starts tonight; action sports filmmakers panel Saturday

After watching "Lymelife" open the 10th Newport Beach Film Festival last night, we're excited for the debut of the action sports series inside the NBFF tonight with the screening of "Waveriders."

It's a feature-documentary about surfing off the coast of Ireland - sort of a surfing version of "How the Irish Saved Civilization."

"Waveriders" is the first of 20 films in the action sports series - including five world premieres.

And a new event popped up today, when the folks at ChopShop announced an action sports film makers panel to be held on Saturday afternoon.

The panel is at 4:30 p.m. following the screening of "Steezy Riders" at the Edwards Theaters in Newport Beach at Fashion Island. "Steezy" is about the adventures of Jeremy Jones and his cadre of pro boarders as they travel through the western U.S. on Harleys.

Mark Sperling of GroupY will moderate the discussion about opportunities, challenges and what it takes to produce compelling action sports films.

Panelists include

• Mark Jeremias, a documentary and action sports filmmaker and executive producer/creative director for Bluetorch TV and the producer/director of One California Day and DRIVE.
• Zach Lyons, the creative director and co-owner of ChopShop and an action sports, TV and commercial producer/director.
• Shon Tomlin, VP of programming & development for FuelTV.
• Chris Zam, and action sports filmmaker and the director of "Street Dreams."

Here's a link to the action sports schedule, and a link to the Newport Beach Film Festival.

The action sports series is produced by ChopShop, with sponsorship by industry companies FuelTV, Surfing magazine, etnies, Surfrider Foundation and PacSun's Pipeline to a Cure.