Complete Biography

I´ll start briefly describing who is Alberto Barbera Navarro. I was born in Valencia at the end of the year of the dragon. I have been a martial arts practitioner since I was 13 when a bunch of bullies began to harass and intimidate me and most of my fellow high school newcomers.

   

As time went by Martial Arts became not just my protection, but the base of my own "Life Phylosophy". Later on, and after having gone through many adventures, experiences and reflection periods, I realized that I was happier when I was working on something I really liked and was passionate about ... it was then when I decided to stop walking the comfortable path that tilted through the hills and began to climb the more majestic and beautiful mountain I found. If you want to know more about me, just keep reading...
 

    

Like many other Spanish children, football (soccer) was my deepest passion.
  

     

My first dream I can think of was to become someday a football player . I wanted to get into a good team and be a successful footballer . However, as it often happens with those who never turn their dreams into goals, my interests and motivations began to shift and the more I entered my puberty, the less interested I was about becoming a pro player. My football dreams started to faint and by the time I was a teenager, I did not want to become a football player no more… All this leaded to my first "Success Important Life Lesson": No passion and no determination leads to nothing. 

   
Jim Carrey, Indiana Jones, Jackie Chan and Disney movies were among my favorites... Watching movies was great fun for me. I loved adventure and comedy films. 

A great afternoon for me when I was 8 would be composed of; a street football match with my friends, playing Playstation (Crash Bandicoot, Metal Gear, Tomb Raider, Final Fantasy) and watching Ace Ventura ... and if the next morning I could see "Doraemon", "Captain Tsubasa" or "Dragon Ball" it would be as good as it gets.

When I was a kid I really loved Martial Arts movies, especially the ones with Jackie Chan or Jean Claude Van Damme ... Kickboxer, Rumble in the Bronx, Lionheart, Rush Hour ... Watching my heroes kicking the bad guys ´assess was just great ! Another TV series I cannot forget is Dragon Ball! That was really something. Goku and his friends teaching the bad guys some manners!... Screams, energy balls, punches, incredible transformations, brutal explosions... what more could a kid ask for?

    

Not everything that I liked was related to Action and Martial Arts... "Doraemon", "Shin Chan", "Kinnikuman", "Captain Tsubasa", "David the Gnome" and "Cow and Chicken" also attracted me towards the TV screen like a magnet.

    

I had a pretty good time at school. I still keep very nice memories about most of my professors and classmates. There were some not very pleasant experiences, but the good times and adventures I lived with my school friends from Federico Garcia Lorca School is something I will never forget ... In fact, the hardest part of my school time was when I had to leave my friends and go to my new high school.

    
The first year in "Francesc Ferrer i Guardia" High school was by far the worst year I have ever spent in a class. Not only I was separated from my old school friends, I was surrounded by a large number of professional experienced bullies whose only goal was to make newcomers time as hard as possible. It was then when I decided to change football for Martial Arts ... 

    

I have to be honest in this matter. I didn´t decide taking Taekwondo classes because I was being bullied at school. The decision to start doing Martial Arts was taken the summer before entering high school. Learning to defend myself from those bullies that bothered me was becoming a great stimulus to keep on training and improving my techinques, but I would be lying if I´d say that it was the main reason for which I started doing Martial Arts.

  

There were many experiences and knowledge I gained during my first Taekwondo year. My interest in the Martial Arts was growing and growing. Every month I bought every Martial Arts magazine I could find, and progressively became more and more interested in someone whom I didn´t know anything about, but who was gradually to become my main role model and inspiration… Bruce Lee.

  
Learning how to do flying kicks and being able to kick head height was just great! However, at the age of 15 (about 1 year after I started taking my Taekwondo classes), my ego received a pretty hard blow when I found out that I was not the wild and dangerous street fighter I thought I was... That experience change my life and point of view toward Martial Arts. It made me grow much more than I could have ever imagined. It was then when I decided taking Martial Arts more seriously. I became a very disciplined and driven person. The first thing I did was signing up for my new "Jeet Kune Do" (Martial Art / Philosophy / Combat Style designed by Bruce Lee) classes. Workouts in the new gym were very hard. I was the youngest student (the rest were adults, policemen and bouncers). The atmosphere there was totally different from anything else I had ever experienced. I didn´t it know by then, but I had taken a very important step, a step that would make me grow both as a martial artist and as a person… a step that would shape a very important part of my life. 

The more my interest in Bruce Lee grew, the more films from the 70´s 80´s and 90´s I started to watch. 

 

   

That genre that thrilled me so much as a child, was becoming an important part of my life. I was more interested than ever in watching Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan and Van Damme fighting the bad guys on screen…

  

  

  
You may already know that Dragon Ball was one of the biggest influences I had in my youth and childhood (now you start realizing why I am so crazy), and since my interest in the Martial Arts field was growing, Goku and his friends became once again another extra motivation to train harder and harder. I can´t forget the anime "Naruto" and his influence too. Although I started watching it in my 17s, it became very soon an important inspiration for me to keep on training and fighting for what I wanted. My passion for the visual world and the Martial Arts was growing very rapidly… but all of a sudden a new element appeared: Japanese culture.

    

   
As years went by high school was easier... I gained confidence in myself every day and those with more will to disturb than to study started dropping out progressively. After four years it was time to make an important decision… I had to decide what I was going to do after getting my High School Degree?... What am I going to study? Am I going to take the safe boring path or the passionate one? Am I going to search and fighting for something I am passionate about? The answer was clear in my mind… and if you think I started then following my heart… you are wrong.

"Life Inertia" leaded me to study Industrial Engineering at Polytechnic University of Valencia. That was my decision ... I stopped going to my Martial Arts classes , I stopped going to the gym, I stopped watching my old movies, I stopped exercising... All I did was: Study, go to math classes , physics ... lab ... study ... chemistry classes… study and study for the exams… pass, fail, pass, fail…  the more time I was in that University, the less motivated I was. The turning point came in the second semester when I was attending this class called "Introduction to Industrial Engineering" or "IIE".
      

    

That afternoon I was sitting in one of the little class chairs trying to to remember how to solve one of the problems, when the teacher started explaining which were most likely the Jobs an Industrial Engineer could have… Something like working in the Production Control in a Factory, Quality management, Mechanical Projects Development, Industrial Facility Supervision, Designing the Engine of Large Electronic or Mechanical Structures, Industrial Machines Supervision, etc... When the class was over I took my bike back home. The teacher's words still echoed in my mind when all of a sudden I realized I got sidetracked… I was not at home, surprisingly I was in front of my Martial Arts gym ... Then it hit me BOOM! My inner voice started shouting at me "What the hell are you doing Alberto?". It was then when I decided to make some changes in my life. First: Not to come back to my IIE classes or to any other Industrial Engineering classes. Second: I had to go back to my Martial Arts Classes. Third: I was going to decide what did I really wanted to study. That's when I started wondering which University school was the one that I really liked… Which were the field I did wanted to know more about… The answer was clear.
  

     

When I studied Ind. Eng the average number of years any student had to study until he got his degree were 8 years ... You better be sure about that before you get in. 

After training and overcoming the physical tests I finally made it. I was enrolled in the "Physical Activity and Sports Sciences University". A new stage in my life had just begun. I was really enthusiastic about it. I wanted to know my new class mates and initiate this new stage in my life.

My first positive surprise came in the first semester after the first exams, when I saw that my grades were significantly better than I expected... Wow! I couldn´t believe it, I was failing half of my Ind. Eng. courses a year ago and now I had the best grades in my whole class!!

My first year was great, I was having a great time learning and learning in my university and I really liked it. I was training, learning and fighting in the gym, competing in several Martial Arts, growing every day…. everything went smoothly during that year... but something was still missing ... there was still a question that had to be answered… Who did I wanted to be? Did I wanted to be a University professor? Interesting ... But was it my deepest passion? Was it my dream? Did I wanted to concentrate all my efforts in becoming a teacher? It was time to decide. I said to myself: "Alberto, you have to make a decision".


   
The first summer after my first college year arrived and I was ready to give an answer to the most important question of my life so far... I was 20 and it was time to decide: What did I liked? What was I passionate about??

    

    
I wanted to practice and show everyone the benefits of martial arts, I wanted to express myself, I wanted people to get thrilled with my stories and inspire with my characters ... and most important of all: I wanted to do be happy in my work. I was determined: I would create and star in my own stories and adventures, I would inspire and motivate people not only to practice Martial Arts, but to fight for their dreams too, I wanted to be able to stimulate, teach, entertain and motivate others as much as I had been in the past. I had to fulfill this necessity to express myself that I have since I was a child. I would inspire people not only through the screen, but also with my own life. This was to become my main goal. I was determined and focused, "I am going to prove that whatever you can conceive you can achieve if you really wish it and go for it with passion and enthusiasm.
  

    
Now it was time to leave the boring path and start climbing the top of the mountain.

   

   
I have to become a role model to show everyone that it doesn´t matter who you are, where you are, or how big the mountain you want to climb is, it is never too late to turn your dreams into goals. I am going to do Martial Arts Movies and show people the benefits of Martial Arts through the screen".
   

After my reflection period, I had to go back to university. Over there I started creating and coordinating a "Martial Arts Group". We made several exhibitions and shows in Spain, the best of all was the one we did in Murcia Sports Centre in front of 2000 people.
  

     
A few months later and after many English tests, exams and paperwork Valencia University granted me a scholarship to go to the USA... I was selected to study one semester in America!! I couldn’t believe it! Many students every year presented their application and very few were chosen to receive the top scholarships… and I was one of those who were selected!! It was great, another one of my goals achieved! I couldn´t wait to go the States!

  

  

    

   
My days at Rutgers University were great! Every day something unexpected happened, a new experience, new people to meet, new problems to face, new adventures to live, new friends to talk… 

     
My time there was a process of continuous self discovery ... Despite of all this, I would lie if I ´d said that I never felt alone… Many times -especially during the early days- it was quite hard ... but I can honestly say that in the end the good experiences really surpassed the difficult ones. My time in Rutgers really made me grow both as a person and professionally. 


   
Upon my return to Spain and after having received several Acting and Film classes in the States, I started working on a plan for me to move a closer to my goal... It was going to be difficult to be a Martial Arts actor in a place where there were no stories or projects that satisfied my needs of self expression and personal growth ... 

How to solve the lack of opportunities?... The answer was very simple: Creating them. It was then when I decided to work and produce my own projects and stories, creating my own characters and selecting my own team and actors. After many classes on Acting, Self Expression, Filmmaking, Screenwritting… It was time to test in real life everything I had been learned. "It was time to get out there and do it!". It was time to learn working on an audiovisual production: pre-production of Ucronía began.

   

Starting from 0 and with no contacts whatsoever I started writing the screenplay, scouting locations, looking for Technical Equipment, Contributors, Actors, Camera, Lightning ... The process was tough, but eventually and after many many many meetings and hard work, I managed to gather a group of young people willing to work in an original and interesting project. The amount of effort was bigger than any of us could have ever expected. Filming Ucronía was difficult and very stressful many times ... but it was what I wanted to do, every failure was a lesson, every failure leaded to an extremely valuable revelation, I learned something important every day I worked on the movie ... After many more arguments and months I never imagined, Ucronia was finished.
   



   
My first film was very different from what I had originally visualized ... It was not as good as what I imagined at first ... It was not the masterpiece I had envisioned every night while I was writing in my room...

   

Despite of this, I did not feel like accepting the idea that something I had worked so hard on and with so much enthusiasm did not have the quality I expected ... It was the first time I had worked so long and so hard on something that afterwards didn´t turn out as good as it should have been!... Too many errors, too many mistakes ... It was then when someone close to me told me:-Alberto, now it's the time for you to do something great. Take advantage of all that knowledge and experience and make the best Martial Arts Action Short film that has never been made in Spain ...

  

It was a hot summer day in August 2011 when the inspiration came to me and I started writing "Red Freak Fighter".
  

  
It began as a story about a boy who is in love with his childhood friend.  

This time I knew I needed an expert to aid me transforming my vision into a screenplay.
             

   
If you want to do something great, you need great professionals to aid you attain your vision. You can´t do everything by yourself!!. Juanma is one of those "stars" that really helped me jumping from the "Amateur" to the "Professional" field. His knowledge and experience helped me when planning the scenes. He always cheered me to look for the best and taught me to put myself in the place of the audience, and I am (and always will be) really thankful to him for everything he did for the movie and specially for me.
   

  
The script and the story went through many many revisions... The pre-production process was longer than Ucronía´s… After many months scouting locations, looking for competent people for each area, revising the script over and over again, planning the scenes, drawing the Storyboard, creating and rehearsing the fight choreographies, selecting the crew and choosing the appropriate actor for each character… the day came.  

   
Saturday, November the 27th, 2011 we began the production process of Red Freak Fighter ... It was not until four months later that we had everything we needed. The process had been difficult, we had to work very very hard… we sacrificed many things… hours and hours of fighting, arguing, laughs, tears, accidents, ex-girlfriends and boyfriends, threats ... but in the end, everything was worth it. 
  



  
The material was excellent, the hard work had paid off. Now I had to select the material between 400 gigs of HD video. I began carving my sculpture. It had to be the best martial arts short film ever made in Valencia until then… After many months of hard work we finally had Red Freak Fighter. It was April 2013. More than 1 year and a half after I started envisioning how great my second movie would be, I had it, and it was much better than I had thought. It was fun, original, dynamic and entertaining!! I know I learned a lot by doing it, I know there were many things I could have done better, but I also know the next one will be more than Great!!

  

I have always liked teaching and showing people curious and positive aspects about Martial Arts. I have been a "Youtuber" since 2010/11 approx. 
  

  

  
Due to the great amount of dedication and work the short films required, I wasn´t able to upload and create as many Martial Arts and Exercise videos as I'd had liked. However, I want to stress the last ones which I produced and starred.

  Motivational Video:

Fitness and Martial Arts in Japanese:

The motivational one it´s very special to me. I express many of my own ideas and beliefs about life and success. My intention was to arouse people to live a better life, boosting everyone to fight for their dreams. I really enjoy it doing this kind of visual material. It is necessary to contribute to create a better society. Also, I had never seen a motivational video like this one in Spanish before. I felt it was necessary for the Hispanic community to have at least one Exercise and Martial Arts Motivational Video in its own language.

   

As you may know, I love Japan and its culture. I think it´s a very interesting and captivating society. I started studying Japanese a couple of years ago. With the aid of my team and my dear friend Kazuya I was able to create a video that I had always wanted to do: "Fitness and Martial Arts in Japanese".
   
My last years in college were interesting but not as much as at the first ones... I feel I could be writing about this for years… maybe later... 

    

After having decided what I really wanted to do in life, I lost interest in my University classes. 
Even though I got to play and learn a lot about sports, in most classes I didn´t feel I wanted to know more about whatever the teacher was talking about… 
   

    
As you know, after my American adventure I decided to direct and star on my own productions. The amount time I spent on my studies -as well as my interest in college- was progressively decreasing... However, fortunately for me, my grades didn´t drop as much as my interest and I was able to maintain my GPA almost as high as during my previous years.
   

    
The truth is that it has never been difficult for me to get good grades ... in fact I think the secret is not to study until your head explodes or threatening your professor with a bazooka, the only thing you have to do is... Well, I think I am boring you with so much University stuff, am I not?... Anyway, 7 months after my Graduation Ceremony, I received a letter from my University informing me that I was going to be granted the "Award to the Outstanding Graduate of the Year". I was so happy when I read it! We were 120 in my class, and I was one of the three students selected to receive this prize! It was a very very happy day for me.

   

Receiving this price was an extra motivation for me to keep on chasing my goals, but now I want more. I hope… no! I am sure I will achieve even more things in the future. I will keep on showing my Martial Arts and creating exciting and funny Movies to inspire and boost people to live a happier life and create a better society.
  

   


Last updated: May 25th, 2013

My intention is to progressively update my bio. I'll be posting more info about my life chasing my goals in the blog section. Hope you like it.