The Auckland inner city through Covid

Our Production expert Mike is also a keen amateur photographer. Living and working from home in an inner city apartment over the last two years he has had a unique view on the city over these unusual times.

I live in the inner city and I ride around it on my bike every day, so it was really interesting seeing the changes over the pandemic. The empty city was really weird and I wanted to capture that – empty streets, empty buildings and reduced traffic.

These shots were part of a personal project where I make myself take a photo every day. I started this on April 27 2021, so it’s coming up for a year very soon. I did a similar project when I was living in London back in 2012. That one ended up lasting for 4.5 years.

My photography hobby started seriously in 2012 when I bought myself a new camera to replace a broken one. I decided to get a camera where I could manually set the controls and do more ‘proper’ photography rather than just point and shoot. I started by watching YouTube tutorials and then I did a lot of practising.

Eventually I completed an online photography course, and from there I started doing inhouse product photography for the London company that I was working for at the time. I still do this today at Dow Goodfolk, and I really enjoy the mix of professional and personal work.