[2] The early 17th century art historian and biographer Karel van Mander reported that Badens trained with his father who died in 1604.
It has been suggested that this studio located on the Oude Turfmarkt in Amsterdam was known as a place where local citizens could buy paintings in the Italian manner.
[6] The contemporary reputation of Badens is evidenced by the inclusion of an engraved portrait of the artist in Hendrick Hondius' Pictorum aliquot celebrium praecipue Germaniae inferioris Effigies (Effigies of some celebrated painters, chiefly of Lower Germany), which was a collection of 69 portraits of prominent, chiefly Netherlandish artists published in 1610.
The accompanying Latin verse underneath the portrait begins with the line "addit picturae meliús nemo colores", which translates as "no one was better at adding colours to a painting.
[2] Karel van Mander lauded Badens as an accomplished painter of history and portraits, and reported that he excelled in painting conversation pieces.
[3] Frans Badens is known to have collaborated on a Ganymedes (now lost) with the landscape painter Govert Janszn called Mijnheer who enjoyed a considerable reputation at the time.