Just the facts: Age - 41; Hometown - London; Education - advertising course at Hounslow College; Employ - with Hungry Man since March, 2006.

Previous Experience: Barry's mother was an account planner and his uncle a chairman at FCB, London, so he naturally gravitated towards advertising. He started with a writing stint at Simons Palmer before taking CD posts at Wieden + Kennedy and Lowe's London offices in the early '00s. His first taste of directing came while at Clemmow Hornby Inge in 2005, "The Williams Sisters" for The Telegraph. "I'd written a script for the spot but we didn't have a director. So I thought that I could do it myself. It wasn't easy, but I absolutely loved it."

Making the move: For Barry, the hardest part of making the transition from creative to spot director was "the money...often the scripts with the least money are the best ones."

Best work: Barry nabbed a gold and three silvers at this year's BTAAs for two spots: XFM "Babies", which cast young children as hardened roadies, and MTV's anti-drunk driving spot "Idiots".

Future ambitions: While in no hurry to leap into features, Barry's looking forward to doing work in the US. And the BTAA wins should elevate his profile considerably. "It's a massively competitive field - all of a sudden you're competing with the Ringan Ledwidges of the world."

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