Aerial photographer Peter Barrow dies

Peter Barrow, who died suddenly last weekend, was the "go-to guy" for aerial photography for all the property agents and developers in Ireland for several decades. People in the property business remembered him this week as a "legend". "He could not have been more helpful," said Gordon Lennox of Sherry FitzGerald, who worked for Jackson Stops when he first met Peter. "If you wanted a job done quickly and efficiently, he was the guy."

Back in the 1980s and 1990s, “doing aerial photography was a big deal. He would sit in the helicopter with the door open, his foot on the rail” to get the photograph, said Lennox. “He was a lovely guy, and very proud of his family.”

Barrow had been an aerial photographer since 1982, and, as well as taking aerial pictures across Ireland, he had carried out aerial assignments for Arsenal, Wembley and Tottenham football clubs. "Peter would always be trying to get the best picture," said Pat Davitt, chief executive of the Irish Professional Auctioneers and Valuers , remembering the trouble Peter went to on one occasion to show how close the property Davitt was selling was to the edge of Lough Derravarragh. Peter Lynch, chair of DTZ Sherry FitzGerald, who knew Barrow for 20 years, remembers that the photographer would ask clients "Do you live nearby? If you did, he'd fly over your house and take an aerial picture of it."

He photographed everything from commercial sites to houses owned by high-net-worth individuals, said Lynch.

All of them remember how he would send out regular emails to agents all over the country saying he’d be in their area in a week or two, asking if they wanted anything photographed. He had aerial photography to himself up to 10 years ago, after which photography from drones presented a challenge, said Lynch.

Barrow had moved from Dunlavin, Co Wicklow, to Kilkenny. He died suddenly on Saturday and is survived by his wife Miriam, son Robert and daughters Suzanne and Nicole