SANTA BARBARA — Industry photographer and filmmaker Jay Allen passed away in Santa Barbara according to industry friends. He was 53 and was hospitalized with cancer.
Allan was known for timeless glamour photography and videography. His craft and professionalism ensured a busy schedule shooting projects for companies and performers, especially in the solo and girl-girl niches.
His last notable project was 2021’s “Solo Sirens,” a characteristically lush title for Adam & Eve, the studio for which he worked the most since 2013.
Allan’s classic pinup style made him a reliable contributor to Playboy, Penthouse and Hustler over the years. He started at the studio of J. Stephen Hicks, where he built DigitalDesire.com, before striking on his own at Danni.com. Allan was one of the leading lensmen to effect the transition between magazines and online content, being a notable contributor to Babes.com, Twistys, HollyRandall.com and many other sites.
In 2020, Allan launched the AgentErotica.com site with Elevated X, offering thousands of never-before-seen images from his archives and a selection of videos featuring some of his signature model collaborators such as Charlotte Stokely, Bailey Rayne, Lacy Lennon, Skin Diamond, Casey Calvert, Joanna Ange and Jenny Blighe.
Allan intended the site to be the archive for over 300,000 slides here from his decades shooting for “men’s magazines” like Club, High Society, Gallery and Finally Legal.
Industry Remembrances
“I’m deeply going to miss Jay being a part of this industry,” Lacy Lennon told XBIZ. “Natural talent is hard to come by in this industry. Being humble is hard to come by in this industry. This one hits deep as his work meant something in this community. Jay was good to his girls, good to his crews and brought quality to porn. His vision for lesbian films and photography portfolios constantly inspires me.”
Lennon said she was “grateful for him seeing something in me very early on. Without that type of support and encouragement I know I wouldn’t be where I am today.”
Casey Calvert told XBIZ she “worked quite a bit with Jay early in my career and I always loved shooting with him — he really knew how to make a girl feel beautiful and special in front of his camera.”
“Jay was always kind and knowledgeable,” his colleague Holly Randall told XBIZ. “He was an extremely accomplished technical photographer and a perfectionist. He really knew the art of cinematography and he executed everything that he did with unrivaled attention to detail and love of his craft.”
Charlotte Stokely said through a statement that she has known Allen for 18 years and he “was consistently an amazing and ethical human being. We cultivated a closer and dear friendship in the last five years. He taught me how to work camera settings and taught me about lighting. He loved to freely share his knowledge. We’d talk on the phone for long lengths of time about ‘Star Trek’ or the current new show he was watching , vintage cars, and his favorite places to watch the sunset or some cool new photography gadget he’d acquired. That man never missed a sunset. He would send me pictures saying “where I am now” showing me how beautiful it was.”
Stokely also shared that she “liked to visit him in Santa Barbara and we’d head to the beach where he’d smoke one of his favorite cigars, Partagas, and sip a scotch. In my career we worked together a few or more times mostly for Adam & Eve features, him as the director and myself as a performer. He always had great catering.
“We started to work for Playboy as a team, he was directing and I was executive producer,” Stokely reminisced. “He was so excited for our first Playboy shoot together because we filmed at a location Star Trek had filmed. The last photo he sent me was of a sunset and the last text I sent to him said ‘I’m going to break you out of that hospital and we’ll escape to the rooftop. I’ll bring you a cigar and scotch and we’ll watch the sunset.’ That was three weeks ago. I never did make it to see him after that last text because of my ankle injury. I felt this urgent desire to text or call him the day he passed. For whatever reason I didn’t , thinking ‘I’ll do it tomorrow.’ He died later that evening. There was just something special about him as a human and my heart is so sad he’s gone. His legacy will live on.”
Bailey Rayne said through a statement earlier today that she chooses to remember Allan “laughing, smiling, surrounded by the people who loved him so much, and standing at a grill full of meat,” as she saw him in August, when he threw “a huge ‘I beat cancer’ party and was surrounded by friends and family from all over the country. That was our Jay. There may have been whiskey and cigars involved, too.”
“That was the last time I could see him because his cancer came back shortly after,” she added.
Bailey also called Allan “a brilliant photographer, who would do anything to get the perfect shot, and someone truly genuine in a superficial world, something I thought was nearly impossible to find, especially in L.A.”
Later she told XBIZ that Allan “was a fighter — he beat cancer once and put that brave face back on when it came back. He stayed positive and optimistic throughout both diagnoses, but he fought like hell until the end.”