Walter Burke was editor of the Australasian Photo-Review for more than 40 years and the first fellow of the Royal Photographic Society in Australasia. Born in New Zealand in 1866, by the 1890s he was a photographer for the Christchurch Weekly. This photo was probably taken around this time on one of his excursions with his half-plate camera. In 1904 he moved to Sydney to establish an Australasian agency of the American photography firm Underwood and Underwood.