Darrell is a professional photographer located in Galesburg, Illinois. He specializes in portrait photography and prefers the personal environment of on-location portraiture, but will also shoot in studio if the client prefers. Darrell has a background in the fine arts, having studied oil painting, sketching and sculpture and he brings that artistic eye into his portrait work. As a hobby, he began shooting nature scenes and it has developed into a passion. People began asking for copies of his photographs and then a friend suggested he begin selling his work, thus birthing this page as a new adventure in life.
After having grown up in the Saint Louis metro area, Darrell and his wife, Libby moved to Cleveland, Tennessee in 1986 and lived there for nearly 6 years. Their first son, Daniel was born in Cleveland. It was there in Cleveland that Darrell met Joe Bell who hired and trained Darrell to shoot family portraits. Darrell traveled throughout the southeastern and Midwest United States as a photographer for Joe's studio, Continental Photography. While Darrell enjoyed the work, he frequently had run-ins with his employer because he did not like to just shoot the standard shots, but liked to get artistic with his clients. This was frowned on by that company because they were doing fund raising portrait programs which required 100 to 150 or more families to be photographed in a day to a day and a half and they did not want him to take the extra time to be creative.
In 1991, Darrell and his family returned to Illinois to become a pastor. At that time he laid aside his photography, but always spoke about 'one day' opening his own studio. In 1993, Libby and Darrell's second child, Ashley was born. They have pastored in Illinois in the cities of Bridgeport, Danville, West Frankfort, Lincoln and Galesburg. When their son was a Senior in High School he had his Senior Portraits taken and was very unhappy with the product he received. Daniel had heard his father talk about 'one day' opening a studio and he began trying to persuade his dad to shoot his Senior Portraits for him. Ashley joined in with the pressure for daddy to do them, and before he realized it, Darrell had bought a camera and studio equipment. The time had come, and 'one day' became a reality. Darrell decided to name his studio after his beloved children who had pushed their dad to bring his dream to reality, and thus was born 'Dan Ash Photography.'