Early screenings held in a makeshift projection room upstairs from a local coffee shop drew a moderate cult following.
AFS eventually grew in scale and began developing various programs to boost film production and education.
This transition marked a significant milestone in AFS's commitment to fostering local media production and independent filmmaking.
AFS has also hosted numerous regional and world premieres of films including: Sin City, Bad News Bears, School of Rock, The Adventures of Shark Boy & Lava Girl, Jackie Brown, and various other films usually directed by Austinite filmmakers like Richard Linklater and Robert Rodriguez.
New artists services programs like the Docs-In-Progress series allow filmmakers to screen rough cuts to AFS members as a test audience.
Various studio films shot at Austin Studios include: Miss Congeniality, The New Guy, The Rookie, The Life of David Gale, 25th Hour, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Secondhand Lions, Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over, Man of the House, Friday Night Lights, The Adventures of Shark Boy and Lava Girl, The Wendell Baker Story, Idiocracy, A Scanner Darkly, Infamous, The Hitcher, The Return, Stop-Loss, and Grindhouse.
The Flaming Lips video "Psychic Wall" from The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie was shot in one of the stages and shows a behind the scenes look at the hangars.
As of 2023, the film society has given out over $2,400,000 worth of grants to over 500 filmmakers since its inception, providing the seed money for several projects that went on to screen at festivals like Sundance, Cannes, and SXSW.
Honorees have included Morgan Fairchild, Marcia Gay Harden, Matthew McConaughey, Billy Bob Thornton, Farrah Fawcett, Amber Heard, David Gordon Green, Horton Foote, Terrence Malick, Jack Valenti, Woody Harrelson and music acts such as the Dixie Chicks, ZZ Top and Lyle Lovett.
Past recipients include Dazed And Confused, From Dusk Till Dawn, Rio Bravo, Rushmore, State Fair, Easy Rider, Giant and The Last Picture Show.