Three Pros, One Camp: Shooting at Magnolia Masters

2026 note: The bike sessions below were shot from the bed of a moving truck, and I wouldn't do it that way today. If you try it, use closed or very quiet roads, a dedicated driver, the rider's consent and nobody riding on the tailgate, and check your local laws first.

While the Magnolia Masters Pro Swim Camp was in The Woodlands, I had the chance to photograph several of the pro triathletes in town. I wanted to change things up for each athlete, so every shoot got its own locations, angles and ideas. Here are three of them.

Matt Hanson

I first met Ironman champion Matt Hanson in Kona, at his last race as an amateur, while I was doing some work for Balázs Csőke. I had no idea how fast Matt would climb the rankings or how talented an athlete he really is. Hailing from Iowa (yeah, buddy!), he was down for a few weeks for the camp.

We started Matt on the Waterway in The Woodlands, the main drag of the Ironman Texas run course. We headed out right at sunrise, caught some morning rays bouncing off the towers to throw light into the background, and powered up the Profoto B1 to overtake the sun (I can't get enough of that light). We shot in a warm-up kit and in Matt's new race kit for the 2015 season. The run shots were quick, and I mean quick. That man can run.

Then Matt slipped on his Huub wetsuit and his Magnolia Masters cap for some shots on the pier at Lake Woodlands, where the Ironman Texas swim starts. It was a brisk 40-something that morning, so we stayed out of the water and focused on Matt looking like he was about to prepare and enter the water for a race. We had a blast joking back and forth, trying to make him laugh while he did his best to keep his composure and give us these shots. The morning sun behind him and the quality of light from the B1 and beauty dish were stunning together, and I honestly thought we couldn't do any better. I was wrong. We still had the bike.

We headed back into The Woodlands and loaded up in the back of the F-150 again, with the same truck setup I've described in other posts. Before we set out, Matt had asked the people at Quintana Roo whether they needed shots of him for marketing, so we really wanted to come through for them. I don't know if Matt felt any pressure, but I double- and triple-checked every shot lying in the back of that truck.

After the first few runs I was a little disappointed. The sun wouldn't come through as a backdrop, and we fought some technical problems. By the third round we pulled it together, the sun came out to play, and the magic kicked in. I put my camera about two inches off the pavement while we rolled and got some hero shots of Matt to cap the shoot. It was hard to pack up once the sun came out, but after a few more loops we had intense close-ups of Matt crushing the big gear and hero shots that show him as he really is: larger than life.

Aubrey Aldy

We worked with pro triathlete Aubrey Aldy earlier in the camp and had a blast getting to know him, the coaches and the other athletes. For Aubrey, we wanted to establish strong cycling shots first, while the morning sun was still low. Swim practice pushed our start a little later, but we still beat the rising sun in an area we knew well.

We used the same truck technique, but with my older Einstein lights, since my new Profoto B1 was still being shipped. Same concept: a beauty dish and constant communication with the rider about where he needed to be. Aubrey was easy to work with and very comfortable on his bike, so the whole experience was low-stress and we got great images quickly.

Toward the end I knew we had strong shots of Aubrey riding alongside the truck, shot low with my 16-35mm for the "hero" look I enjoy creating to show these athletes as larger than life. With those safe shots in the bag, I wanted to try something different: get into the cockpit with Aubrey, up close and personal while he pushed behind us on a chilly Saturday morning. We redirected the light straight behind the truck, and I moved back toward the cab (no hanging off the tailgate!) to shoot with the 70-200mm. I love the compression that lens gives at 200mm. It brought Aubrey into the frame and right into the viewer's face. As soon as we stopped to check the back of the camera, I was hooked. Aubrey's intensity made the image pop.

Then it was time to run. We headed to North Shore Park, a stretch of the Ironman Texas course along Lake Woodlands where I'd shot other athletes before. With the water and park as the background, I set a beauty dish at about a 60-degree angle from the sun and had Aubrey run past me. That angle didn't exactly backlight him; the sun filled in the other side of his face nicely, which helped stop the action and define his arms, legs and face.

One thing I wasn't prepared for was Aubrey's stride. It's insane for an endurance athlete! I normally ask athletes to stride out a bit more than usual for the camera, but fitting all of Aubrey's gait into one frame was the toughest challenge of the day. It made for great images, and after nailing one, I shot from the front again and caught him flying down the path in his team shirt.

That shoot pushed me to keep looking beyond the places and angles I normally shoot from. No matter how many times you've made a similar image, you can change the position, lighting, framing, angle, background, composition or lens to add some creativity and challenge the way you see it.

Caitlin Standifer

Caitlin Standifer was the newest pro in the group, and she is a tremendous runner. With her running background, we wanted to do something different for her and for us that highlighted her track history.

We kicked things off with portraits of her warming up while the sun was perfect. I used my favorite portrait modifier at the time, the 69" Elinchrom Rotalux octabox, for soft light that balanced the direct sun and softened the edges. We tried mimicking the sun, then had Caitlin face us to create a little flare before we started running. One light gave us two very different looks.

Then I swapped the Rotalux for the beauty dish, and we were off to the races. Seriously. She came flying at me in the first few frames, and I barely had time to react. I was getting too much motion blur for my taste, so I had to think quickly and turn down my strobe's power. Why?

What stops motion when you shoot with strobes isn't the shutter speed. Shutter speed has a little to do with it, but you're limited by your sync speed (I just don't go above 1/200 on any camera), so it can only stop action to a point. The real workhorse is flash duration: how long the burst of light lasts, typically in the thousandths of a second. To make sure motion is completely stopped, a good rule of thumb is to keep it faster than about 1/6000. Shortening it means giving up power, so be aware of what's happening in your image and use your lighting ratios to work out what fits your situation. Conveniently, my Paul C. Buff Einsteins showed that data right on the back.

With the power down and the light faster, we were back in business, and the sun flare made it even better than I had originally pictured.

After the track, we were walking to another area when Caitlin took a detour into the woods. She popped back out and called us down into a ditch for trail running shots. Not what I expected from a triathlete (we like our pavement!), but I was thrilled she wanted to try something different. I love working with creative people who want to push a concept. Lying in the mud, we got a few frames before it got too dark, including Caitlin coming over the leaves and tearing off down the creek bed.

For her cycling shots, we changed the concept completely. Instead of taking her to another Woodlands road with a similar background, we shot her on a white backdrop to be cut out later. On a recent trip around the state, I took a detour to grab a few backgrounds to place her into, for a very different look from the other athletes. The hyper-realism of these shots always wows me. You can toy with reality to make something new, fixate on details and push concepts further, because there are fewer boundaries.

The behind-the-scenes video from Matt's shoot is below.

The film

Watch the behind-the-scenes film

Originally published on the Ruddock Visuals blog, March 2015. Lightly edited in 2026.