Born in Vancouver in 1950, Peter Battistoni loved photography from a young age. He took pictures with disposable cameras until the age of 10 when his parents gifted him a Pentax SLR which he used to document students, teachers, and his daily life. Battistoni planned to make a career out of photography and sold photographs to the White Rock Sun. At the age of 17, he took a year-long commercial course in New York.
Upon his return from New York in 1969, the White Rock Sun offered Battistoni a job where he briefly worked. Largely self-taught in journalism, he worked as a freelancer for the Surrey Leader, the Columbian, the Vancouver Province, and the Vancouver Sun. In 1973 Basil King at the Colombian hired Battistoni to cover the Canada Summer Games held in Burnaby and New Westminster. After the games, the Columbian employed Battistoni full-time where he stayed until the paper folded in 1983. Battistoni continued to work freelance for the Vancouver Sun, transitioning to full-time where he worked as a staff photographer until his retirement in 2008.
