He’s 23, seriously wealthy and is at the top of his game. He has gone toe to toe with Michael Schumacher on the track and even managed to give Ralf the finger while still spinning in his runaway Grand Prix car in Monaco. He is the object of affection and admiration of millions of adoring fans but, today, he only takes orders from one man: Steven Tee.

Who? Is that Flavio’s replacement? A new race engineer? Nope. Steven is one of the world’s most respected motor sports photographers and is the Managing Director of the photography agency, LAT, which is the largest archive and news agency of its kind in the world. Steven and his team travel around the world snapping away for the commercial sponsors, as well as magazines and newspapers world-wide. For now, he has been contracted to shoot Fernando Alonso live in Manila and allowed me to tag along to see what goes on behind the scenes of a day in the life of an F1 driver off the circuit.

The first thing you’ll notice about Steven is that he’s constantly framing things. You can see that even when he’s not holding his camera; he’s got this look on his face that if something were to go down right now, he’d have the perfect shot of it. He seems to be doing endless calculations of light conditions and anticipating his subject’s next move so that he can nail the shot in his head even before it happens. He also takes very few safety shots, as if he knows what exactly he wants and everything else isn’t worth the memory space.

I first met Steven at the closed press conference in the morning at the Manila Peninsula Hotel. He walked around the outskirts of the room, surveyed the scene and snapped two maybe three pictures. I was just as thrilled to meet him as I was Fernando. I’ve followed his work in F1 Racing magazine and his contribution to the official Canon book on lenses, The Eyes of EOS. He begins to tell me of a life that I’ve only ever dreamed about – flying around the world with the biggest sporting superstars creating images. He works under contract for each job. For this shoot, Steven needs to create publicity pics of Fernando on location.

Steven excuses himself early to allow him time to scout around for a suitable location and find some photogenic pockets to shoot Fernando in an unmistakable local setting. A wise choice, Steven singled out the historic site of Fort Santiago - one of the most well known remnants of the 300-year Spanish colonial rule in the Philippines.

As soon as the van parked, Steven was off into the gates taking total control of the shoot. For me, even if every picture he took still sucked, (which, needless to say, didn't) he had already earned his salt as a world class photographer based solely on his confidence and control of his subject and situation. He works quickly, quietly and void of all the fanfare that some photographers need to surround themselves with like make up artists and big heavy lighting equipment. Most of those in our group hadn’t even realized that there was a shoot in progress.

He travels light, too; a couple of beaten up EOS1D Mark 1 digital bodies that have probably seen more grand prix action than half of the drivers on the grid. One body houses a 550 Speedlite flash with a 50mm f1.4, while the other looks through a 35mm f1.4L prime lens. “I used to shoot on Nikon, but when it comes to lenses, Canon just have the edge,” Steven says as he digs into his shoulder bag for a lens. He sees the shot, frames it, and then puts his subject in place. Three, maybe four shots before he says, “we’re done.” Before the rest of the group has even caught up, we’re off to a new location. It was literally a walk in the park.

Steven has a manner that, well, I wouldn’t say relaxes his subject, but it definitely leaves no room for misinterpretation. Sometimes photographers have a habit of being too nice to their subjects, when really, what people appreciate more than niceties and politeness is someone who is very clear about what they want. People tend to respect that a lot more and end up performing a lot better as a result. It’s all business. We can laugh and joke around in the van on the way home – right now, there’s a job to be done.

Fernando begins to drop his guard – his defenses slowly melt away as he starts to get more comfortable with my presence. Steven has little patience for shyness or silliness. No point for his subject pretending to be humble – millions of people will see these images and they want to see Fernando looking cool, not meek and seemingly unworthy of the attention. There is a certain expectation from the fans, potential or otherwise, that Steven seems able to immortalize. I’m the third nostril here, shooting over Steven’s shoulder as Fernando dry surfs the waist-high historic walls of Fort Santiago seeming carefree and incredibly relaxed.

Steven, on the other hand, is constantly moving. He takes us from one pocket to another with supreme confidence. He is what is referred to in the trade as a lensman and is a master of his craft. He is our eyes into the glamorous world of Formula One. Steven’s gift is that he is able to compose, shoot and calculate a perfect exposure even before anyone can say, “I think a nice shot would be…”