Life after Shorty AMANDA'S NEW PASSION

The actor's side hustle is putting women firmly in the picture

- Wendyl Nissen

Amanda Billing may have spent 10 years acting in our most popular soap Shortland Street, but underneath there was always a photographer lurking.

“The first time I remember taking pictures consciously was at the end of Form Two, when I had a little Kodak Instamatic,” she explains. “At the end of the year, I tried to take photos of my favourite teachers.”

The results were disappointing as it was a cloudy day in December, but there was one of Mr Smart.

“He had quite thick glasses and wore walk shorts with walk socks,” she recalls. “This was when you could smoke on the school grounds. So I got a picture of him in the staffroom sitting on one of those classic wire seats with the blue fabric and wooden handles. He’s basically just sitting there, one hand holding a Arcorac glass mug of tea and the other his cigarette. It was really very artistic for a 12-year-old!”

Amanda, 48, grew up in Masterton, but she and her family would often visit her grandparents in Browns Bay in Auckland, where she immersed herself in every copy of Life magazine she could find in their home.

“At quite a young age, I was looking through those magazines and they’ve got some really intense pictures, like World War II stuff. I decided to find the photographs that really had an impact on me, that made me want to take photographs.

“There was one of a young French woman who’d had a baby with a German soldier, and they’d shaved her head and were marching her out of the village while she held the child. I’ve never forgotten that photo.”

Amanda also remembers a photo of a mother who is holding her daughter in a bath in Japan.

“It shows the impact of mercury poisoning in Minamata in Japan. It’s a heartbreaking image. This is what photos do – they can go straight to your heart. A lot of the women started having children with developmental delays intellectually and physically, and there’s this beautiful photograph.”