Martyn Taylor grew up in Newcastle, but he lives in Sydney, where he works as a cinematographer. But he's mighty proud of finally completing his passion project, The Making of the Amazing Merewether Aquarium, a 25-minute documentary with footage that he shot during 2014 when artist Trevor Dickinson and his team were painting it in the Ridge Street pedestrian tunnel leading to the beach under Frederick Street.

The film went up on YouTube on Friday. It can also be found on Martyn Taylor's website (martyntaylor.com.au). It not only features candid conversations with Dickinson, visiting artists Michael Bell and John Earle, surf legend Mark Richards, but also locals, plus Merewether casual surfing footage, and great drone material recently shot by Clifford Wakeman.

Taylor had the footage in the can, but lacked both the time and confidence to turn it into a film. The pandemic lockdown gave him the time, and he found an editor to work with him.

"I didn't have the confidence to cut it myself," he says. "I felt I was too close to it. I wanted to use every single frame. It was so intoxicating - the beautiful paint and colour."

Trevor Dickinson's aquarium gains a new life in documentary

Taylor's favourite elements of the mural, by the way: "I like the green monster ... The whale with the tattoo on the arm ... and I'm a real dog lover. Seeing all of the dogs that were in Michael Bell's 1998 iteration, and the fact that Trevor retained as many as he could and incorporated them, like scuba diving dogs, is great as well."

(I like the 310 bus myself.)