Ohana Media Limited.
Ohana Media’s Phil Erickson started getting serious about photography around 16 years of age. He spent a couple of years taking surf shots of his friends at home, before heading to Southern California on his ‘OE’ in 1985 . After 10 months in mainland USA, he ended up on the North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii where its beauty was to leave a lasting impression. An american friend had offered him a room at the ‘Pipe’ house, which overlooked the ‘Banzai Pipeline’. Phil had acquired a water housing while in California, which allowed him to capture close up action of the top pro surfers of the day.
Joey Buran, ‘Banzai Pipeline’, North Shore, Oahu, Hawaii (December 1985)
Once back in New Zealand, Phil pursued surf photography, as well as taking images in the mountains as snowboarding began to make its presence felt. In 1992 Phil and Ste’en Webster created New Zealand’s first snowboard magazine, New Zealand Snowboarder. Phil has handled all aspects of the magazine’s 63 issues to date, including production, advertising sales, photography and editorial contributions. The magazine also gave him the opportunity to work with some of the greats of world snowboarding, including Travis Rice, Terje Haakonsen and Gian Simmen along with most of New Zealand’s top riders. He also created New Zealand Skateboarder magazine in 1997, and owned and produced New Zealand Skier magazine in the late 90’s. In 2002, Ohana Media Limited was formed to oversee Phil’s publishing titles and photography business.
New Zealand Snowboarder Magazine covers…since 1993
One of New Zealand’s most experienced alpine backcountry photographers, Phil’s snowboarding images have appeared in many international publications as well as New Zealand titles, most recently being a 6 page feature from his archives that ran in the June 2018 issue of Adventure Magazine.
6 Page Spread, Issue #208, Adventure Magazine 2018
Phil has travelled extensively throughout New Zealand and has captured some incredible scenes along the way. From his archives and those of other talented New Zealand photographers will come a series of T Shirts depicting some of Aotearoa/New Zealand’s most iconic natural features.
Phil currently resides at Wainui beach, Gisborne, where he provides freelance digital publishing and photography services.