Lakers photographer recalls Kobe Bryant's private moments: "I got to see the private side of him"
The first time sports photographer Andrew D. Bernstein met Kobe Bryant in 1996, he was taken aback that the young Laker knew who he was. "He had all my posters in his room hanging up as a kid," he told CBS News' Dana Jacobson.
"Who reads the photo credits except another photographer? So this is a kid who is like, obsessed from the beginning," Bernstein marveled.
The pair had grown close over the years, with Bernstein getting a firsthand look at some of Bryant's most intimate moments before Bryant's tragic death in a helicopter crash that took the lives of nine people, including his daughter Gigi, this past January.
"We all saw how ferocious he was on the court – relentless. I got to see the private side of him that was very introspective," Bernstein said.
Between game pictures, photo shoots and candid shots, he documented Kobe Bryant's entire 20-year NBA career. He even collaborated with Bryant on his book, "Mamba Mentality."
He described how Bryant, wearing white gloves, rifled through the pages of his first official copy without saying a single word.
The process of creating the book gave Bernstein unique insight into Bryant's mind and work ethic.
"I didn't notice actually until we started to do the book together, that he said he used my photos to break down his own game," he said. All along he had been using Bernstein's photos "to look at what's going on in the photo, how he's playing defense properly or improperly."
"He would look at it like a science experiment," he said.
But, Bernstein said, the late superstar was not always an easy subject to capture.
"He was challenging to photograph as an athlete because he played above the rim. You know, the young Kobe was the dunk machine," he said. "But he was easy to photograph as a subject off the court, incredibly respectful of what I had to do to do my job. And there was this great mutual respect that we have for each other."
Bernstein described the only time Bryant had ever asked him for a photograph – during a locker room visit from Mohammed Ali in his rookie year. "The seas parted in the locker room. And Mohammed shook every person's hand in that room."
The veteran photographer who spent so much time around Bryant remembered a few rare moments he got a look behind his "Black Mamba" persona. One of those times was when Bryant tore his Achilles in 2013, and Bernstein saw a side of him he had never seen before.
"It's the only time I really saw fear. Coming off the court, he came towards me and for the first time, I saw in his eyes he knew something was just really wrong here," he said.
Bryant would come back from that injury spectacularly, ending his career in 2016 with a 60-point performance in his final game.
But Bernstein also saw another, gentler side of Bryant when he was around his family.
"I got to see him in his private moments with his girls and how he was so full of joy just to be around them," he said. Bernstein said Bryant "shed this whole persona of having to be the 'Black Mamba,' You know, it's just like – 'I'm done with that, it's daddy time.'"
Asked how he would like people to remember Kobe Bryant, Bernstein pressed that it was important to remember "what he stood for in terms of never giving up and never stopping short of what your potential is."
"Mamba mentality is going past your own potential," he said. "It's really seeking out greatness above and beyond."
