Dan Barba

 When I take a photo, I feel as if I'm stealing the beauty of my subject for all time, or at least taking with me whatever I find visually stimulating in the world.  Anything at all can capture my attention.  As you will see, I'm normally attracted to beautiful, positive and compelling subjects, and tend to stay away from their opposites.  I think that there is just too much of that in the world already, to be sure.

Originally, having studied Engineering and not finding the work fulfilling, I picked up the photo hobby, or 'bug.' Eventually, I ended up as a full time pro photographer in South Florida.  Soon thereafter I moved to Manhattan, New York with my wife, Olga.  There, I worked with the leading Advertising Agencies, Corporations, Magazines and top models, initially shooting fashion and beauty and later on, large format still life commercials for single ads and/or campaigns in my studios.

Working with Advertising/Commercial clients is extremely demanding and competitive, with many creative constraints, and considerable equipment/business investments, although the financial rewards are great.  One has to execute very specific layouts exactly how the concept demands and a lot of money can be involved in the production.  So, it had to be done right, the first time, especially when there was no digital equipment, just film.  All the while, appearing as cool as possible.  Wheew!

On any given day in my studio, there could have been an Art/Creative Director from the Ad Agency, any number of clients, attorneys, client/account representatives, an Art Buyer, models, prop stylists, make-up and hair stylists plus assistants, hangers-on, and also my Agent/Representative.  That is a lot of people intruding on one's private mental world.  It is all highly intense and it can only be done sanely for a given number of years.  Some photographers can do it indefinitely, but many don't even try; nor should they, I believe.  I certainly didn't.

So, at one point, after a fruitful career, I retired to sunny South Florida.  But I continue to shoot (for myself only) personal creative work, which is what I originally went into photography for.  No more creative constraints now.  Anything that strikes my eye is game.  This is what really fulfills me.  And not only shooting pictures, but hand-holding them all the way to the finished concept/print through the wonderful medium of today's digital workflow. 

I am also a classical music lover and a serious self-taught amateur classical pianist.  I devote 2.5 hours/day, every day, to practice my Chopin, Liszt, Rachmaninoff, Scriabin, etc. I'm just crazy about it.

Dan Barba joined Pixels.com Licensing on July 13th, 2018.