It was an early childhood love of stills photography that led dop Barry Parrell to his place of prominence in Canada’s commercial industry today. That youthful passion, he says, is what continues to inspire him and have an impact on his work.

‘It sounds like a cliche, but you really have to love what you do,’ he says. ‘Otherwise, you’ll grow tired and start looking for something else. There is truly nothing I would rather be doing.’

Born in Climax, Sask., Parrell, whose father was an rcmp officer, moved often, through a host of towns and cities. ‘My dad had an old camera that I liked and he had access to all the labs and darkrooms – and the people who worked in these darkrooms would develop pictures for me. It started out as a hobby for me and then grew into a passion.’

By age 13 Parrell had developed a particularly keen interest in taking pictures of big prairie storms. By 16, he had his own darkroom. Three years later, he had enrolled in a motion picture photography course and had a part-time job at a local television station as a news photographer working on film. From there, he enrolled in the film program at Toronto’s Ryerson Polytechnic University.

After graduation, he returned to Saskatchewan to work as a director of photography at a production company.

‘Essentially for the next several years I worked in Saskatchewan, where the industry started to boom both commercially and in motion pictures,’ says Parrell. ‘From there I was able to build up a fairly decent commercial reel and a drama reel. So after about five years in Saskatchewan I felt I had a reel that would allow me to compete in Toronto somewhat.

‘About six years ago I arrived in Toronto and began to work in the dramatic and commercial side. It was gratifying to find that I was accepted in the film community and that my work was liked.’

Although Parrell, who now freelances, regularly takes on drama, documentary and arts projects, his mainstay is commercial work. ‘I’ve always been interested in both,’ he says simply.

Among the ‘stepping stones’ in his career, Parrell remembers a psa for Second Harvest (for which he won a Bessie award) with director Mark Walton, a Silent Sam Vodka commercial (‘Shadowlands,’ for which he snagged a csc award) directed by Cosimo Zitani, and later, the ‘Field of Dreams’ hockey theme for Labatt.

Other more recent award-winning projects that garnered attention for Parrell were a Compaq commercial with director David McNally (a little girl is crying on the subway, but is distracted when a man opens up his Compaq computer), and two Cantel/at&t theatrical commercials urging moviegoers to turn off their cell phones. In one, a ringing phone interrupts the diffusion of a sound-activated bomb and in another, a ringing phone almost saves a convict from electrocution.

‘Those were excellent projects,’ says Parrell. ‘The scripts were very good, which is something I always look for. Having quality creative to work with makes my job easier and more enjoyable.’