BOFA Director Owen Tilbury said it was only a small break for the festival, which would be launched with a new look in 2018.

“While BOFA has always screened digital movies at Inveresk Precinct, none of our venues has cinema grade projection and this has now become a problem,” he said.

“Most major films of the quality we need to retain our status and credibility as a significant film festival on the Australian circuit, are now unavailable to us without the higher grade projection.”

Mr Tilbury said festival organisers had been trying to solve the projection issue for “a number of years” but the cost for the equipment needed was about $110,000.

“There was not much point in spending that kind of money for four days a year,” he said.

The 2017 festival struggled to secure feature films because about two-thirds of the normal distributors would not supply the work, Mr Tilbury said.

“The battle is that the distributors have allowed us to take the format and put it down onto a hard-drive or USB, but there are troubles with international piracy of digital material and they also don’t want to be showing a multi-million dollar film on an upmarket data projector,” he said.

Mr Tilbury was clear that this was not the end of BOFA, just a small break, with the the City of Launceston considering a three year deal for Signature Event funding from 2018.

“Our negotiations with venues such as the Village Cinemas, Launceston and The Star, Invermay, which have cinema grade projection, have raised pricing and timing issues, but discussions continue,” he said.

“In the meantime, we will regularly screen thought-provoking movies that we know you will love. BOFA’s reputation and track record has also raised the possibility of working with friends such as Mona Foma and the Human Rights Arts and Film Festival.”

The UTAS Northern Campus move to the Inveresk Precinct could also bring new opportunities for the film festival.

“They are going to be moving-in in a big way and we are told that they will actually have one venue with the upmarket equipment, but that discussion is a long way down the track,” he said.