Matt Ladley swung through Aspen after rehabilitating his shoulder for a bit to enjoy some snowboarding with friends Broc Waring and Zack Black.

Matt Ladley, Lofty Back Tail, Aspen © Zach Hooper. Click to go BIG.

Behind the Shot brings you every week or so a sick shot from a rad photographer, where they explain the context of the photo session, as well as all the technical aspects you might want to know about. If you’re a snowboard photo geek, this is for you!

After we focussed on our senior photographer Matt Georges and then Scandi’s own Lucas Nilsson, we continue this serie with Colorado’s finest: Zach Hooper.

Here’s his breakdown:

Matt Ladley, Lofty Back Tail

Buttermilk pipe – Aspen, CO

Camera – Canon EOS 1D MarkIII
Lens – Canon 24-105mm f/4 IS EF USM AF 
Film: They still make that stuff? ISO 100
Speed – 1/320e
Aperture – f8
Flash – Elinchrom Ranger ASYM RX Speed – 2 A Heads – Full Power

You can go to school to learn photography but they can’t give you the eye.

The Tech

I could sit here and try and talk like I know what the hell I am doing with all of this fancy equipment which compared to most pro’s isn’t that fancy. Instead I would like to tell you a little bit about the madness behind the lens known as Zach Hooper. I didn’t go to school for photography simply because my family couldn’t afford anything. They were able to afford pens and paper where I found myself becoming quite the artist. I grew up fascinated by all the surf, skate and snow mags. I always told myself I would be in those pages one day just never realized it would be as a photog not as an athlete. As fine art started to burn me out the old snow TM at Volcom (Jay Twitty) hooked me up with his Nikon film body to dork around with. This new medium to create art was so inspiring to me just the nick of time. My first pic that made it all seem worth while to do this as a hobbyist, was of pro skateboarder Rune Glifberg doing a Madonna to Body Jar in a vert bowl in Huntington Beach California. When I saw the developed image I was hooked. It is funny how life works out like that and I feel very blessed for all the opportunities that have presented themselves over the years. My head/eye has been programed from countless images studied over the past 30 years in action sports especially with skateboard and fashion photography. I am pretty sure I have exhausted my professors (Blotto, Zimmerman, Basher, Serfas, Bartle) with endless photography questions but I had to learn somehow. So when I show up to shoot nowadays, angles/exposures seem to just come together that much easier. Then I just try and put my artistic twist on it.

Photographers always seem to know so much more about the technicalities of photography than I do. They will be talking about this piece of equipment and all the math that goes into using it. I’m sitting here listening to them thinking, “I hate math.” I just move some buttons till shit looks good to me, ahaha. So don’t believe the hype about having the most expensive equipment or have gone to the best school, just focus on making do with what you have while most importantly making your subject/work look amazing and new. Some one once told me: you can go to school to learn photography but they can’t give you the eye.

The Context

As far as professional snowboarders go, working with Matt Ladley is a breeze. This young man is a workhorse and a skilled all around snowboarder. Consistency and effort are champion characteristics when you are trying to get the shot in a timely manner. You don’t want to wear out the subject due to whatever technical issues you might experience along the shoot. If your original idea isn’t working out for you, move on without haste. So with that being said I try and create a very relaxed stress-free environment when I shoot with the emphasis always being on having fun with it. You need to know when you have the shot. I know this sounds very obvious but you would be surprised how many times photogs will exhaust the shoot out of indecisiveness. Things can start to go very wrong at that point.

This shoot went a little like this; Matt and I showed up to Buttermilk one sunny morning in Aspen to find a pipe with wavy walls due to the ZAUGG bouncing along the wall during its cut. This sucks for shooting pipe for us because it limits where you can make the pipe look clean. The emphasis was to be on style not tech on Matt’s backside wall. I knew that the sun was going to be out in full effect behind my subject so I would want to fill Matt with flashes to make him pop. While Matt warmed it up with a couple laps, we chose a spot where I placed my lighting pack and dialed my exposure/composition. One flash head was above him on the deck and the other below. We did 5 exposures in less than 30 minutes and called it a day.

You can see more of Zach Hooper‘s work on his website, on  Instagram @zachhooperphoto.

Not gonna lie, the footage of Heikki’s surgery made us gag on our coffee – get well soon bud! – but despite the man down Eero’s got quite the bench to call on: a quick shoutout and he, McMorris, Ladley and Teo are ready to rip the doors off the Northstar park.

Northstar teamrider Eero Ettala sat down with the Northstar park crew to design his own double-line feature last week, and then straps in for a session alongside friends Mark McMorris, Matt Ladley, and Teo Konttinen.

Eero Ettala at Northstar

The first ever World Snowboarding Championships has come to a close and the inaugural winners crowned. If you weren’t glued to the idiot box watching the live stream, watch how it went down. If you were, relive all the action from the top 3 runs in each discipline.

Despite some lacklustre riding in the early rounds and the premature exit of some big names, the latter stages of the World Snowboarding Championships in Oslo’s Vinterpark certainly kicked up a gear. Although the riding level in the slopestyle was clearly affected by the bulletproof conditions, Chas Guldemond and Spencer O’Brien both stomped heavy runs to take the win on their last runs, while the pipe – described by more than one person as the ‘best halfpipe ever’ – was hands down insane. Kelly Clark was pushed hard by young Spaniard Queralt Castellet but her monster front 10 sealed the deal, while Iouri Podladtchikov‘s heavy doubled up tech edged out the ridiculous height Matt Ladley was sending his rotations. The quarterpipe was great to see after a hiatus of a couple of years, and Olivier Gittler took the overall title, with Kim-Rune Hansen winning best trick and some old guy called Terje bagging the highest air.

Enjoy all the video highlights of the runs that mattered.

QUARTERPIPE FINALS

HALFPIPE MEN

1 – Iouri Podladtchikov

2 – Matt Ladley

3 – Louie Vito

HALFPIPE WOMEN

1 – Kelly Clark

2 – Queralt Castellet

3 – Gretchen Bleiler

SLOPESTYLE MEN

1 – Chas Guldemond

2 – Seb Toutant

3 – Seppe Smits

SLOPESTYLE WOMEN

1 – Spencer O’Brien

2 – Jamie Anderson

3 – Enni Rukajärvi

Results
1 Iouri Podladtchikov
2 Louie Vito
3 Matt Ladley

Iouri Podladtchikov’s winning run

Louie Vito’s best run

Matt Ladley’s best run

The last edit of the haps at Nike’s Vapen Session in Norway is live and direct, and the crew set about sending it in the pitch black. The wallride/pole jam session on the last day is also pretty dope. Peepit.

Hitting a 90 foot jump in the middle of the night might not be on everybody’s mind.

To get the perfect shot the team goes beyond their limits and nails banger after banger in pitch black light.

On the last day after an exhausting week it’s time for pleasure, the team has a fun session on a wallride and Halldor finishes the week with the best trick on the polejam.

To find out more about the boot that inspired the Vapen Sessions go to: nike.com/​vapen

Just a day after the HCSC people posted their session 1 recap the other big US snowboard summer camp, Windells, just fired over their wrapup video of session number 2. Their camp saw equally rad shredding, helped by the presence of the US part of the Nike 6.0 team and other pro shreds: Sage Kotsenburg, Matt Ladley, Mason Aguirre, Jake Black, Niko Cioffi, Benji Farrow, Nial Romanek and God knows who else.

Jake Blauvelt’s killer webisodes roll on with this in-depth look at his crew’s trip to Chile. It’s a mixed bag of highs and lows – they score some of the best snow ever in Nevados de Chillan, only for it to become windblown and bulletproof the next day; they meet the friendliest people but the walkway on the house they stay in collapses and the chimney catches fire; they rip awesome sunset pow but constantly struggle with snow chains.

This is far from your quick-fix interwank webisode – it’s a thorough look at what the life of a pro shredder is really all about. Set yourself aside 20-odd minutes to watch this interesting doco and shreddery mashup.