What is Alexander Hassenstein, Erdinger sports photographer at Getty Images doing now?
Erding– A Bundesliga game lasts 90 plus x minutes. It is an eight-hour day for Alexander Hassenstein. 49-year-old Erdinger is a sports photographer at Getty Images. He has already captured 14 Olympic Games, twelve World Athletics Championships, 15 Champions League Finals and five FIFA World Cups in pictures.
He recently explained his working day in the Allianz Arena to the FC Bayern blog “Mia san Rot”. At 1 p.m., he set up his technology, took the first pictures of the teams warming up and established the online connection to his Getty Images team, which is based in London and centrally located there all the pictures of his photographers from other Bundesliga and Premier games League processed and forwarded to their customers. Then - at 3.30 p.m. - the game kicks off and Hassenstein sits there, which he describes as "the first row of the south curve".
Konrad Kressierer, legendary Erdinger Merkur photographer, once raved about the busy calm that he enjoyed in the darkroom after the Bayern and LöwenSpiele at Grünwald Stadium in the 1960s. Hassenstein no longer has to develop pictures, but his stress is much higher. It is important to find out the best from a series of photos and send it to London with information about what can be seen on it. 90 plus x minutes of stress. "After the game, I edit all the other, currently not relevant images in the Allianz Arena with more peace of mind - I usually leave the arena around 9pm", he continues on the Bayern blog. He comes up with a good 1,500 photos per game.
A day in the life of a sports photographer who started at Deutsche Sportecho in 1990, at that time the only daily sports newspaper in the country. His other positions: 1994 permanent employment at Bongarts sports photography in Hamburg. And since 2004 Hassenstein has been taking photographs for Getty Images.
Football, Formula 1, winter sports - where action is popular, Hassenstein is on site. The art is to have everything in view: the playing field, but also the bench, the spectator ranks and the scoreboard to keep track of time. Hassenstein: "The left eye looks more at the group, the right eye at the camera."
He describes the Olympic Games as "the highest for a sports photographer". He has been there 14 times. The most beautiful games? "Everyone was unique in their own way, for sport as well as for me."
London, Beijing, Rio - and then back to Erding. The father of two has lived in Semptstadt since 2007. There are also great motifs here. "The Long Line - beautiful. During the day, in the evening and also at night. Hassenstein raves about the sunrise and the “romantic light in the evening” from the lighting in Erding's boulevard. "And if you jog through the city park every day for two months, you will always discover new, beautiful facets." Thanks to his permanent position, Hassenstein has so far had no loss of income during the corona pandemic. But the work has also changed for him, as he reports in our interview.
Mr. Hassenstein, what percentage of your monthly income have you had to forego in the past few weeks?
No, I'm a permanent photographer as part of a strong Getty Images team.
How do you use the extra time that Corona currently gives you?
As sports photographers, we supported the Getty Images News photo team with current photos of the Corona crisis. I was traveling in Munich, Erding and the surrounding area to photograph the effects of the situation on press conferences and life with Corona. The topic was of course new to me. I saw a lot and learned about the people and the challenges. On the way back to Erding in the evening after my last and only ghost soccer game in Linz on March 12 - in the European League, Linz lost 0: 5 against Manchester United - I decided to jog seven kilometers a day in Erdinger Stadtpark - see you at some point ... and I've kept it up until today. That is around 400 kilometers. Since I have the great joy and honor of traveling a lot for Getty Images, it was a great time - just staying at home. I think I've never been in the same place for so long in my life. I also had all my photo cameras in check, so I can start.
How do you assess the Bundesliga start at the weekend?
I think everything is said on the subject, the security concepts are implemented to the maximum and professionally, and everyone has to classify this topic for themselves. I am looking forward to what I have loved so incredibly for 30 years, namely sports photography, to simply do it again and press the trigger again.
What lessons and conclusions do you draw from the current situation?
I hope that the new and sometimes unknown mindfulness of people in dealing with each other will remain. And that the obligation to wear a mask continues to protect us, but does not have to persist forever.
You can find photos of Alexander Hassenstein on the website www.gettyimages.de
Our series:
How are people who pursue sport for professional reasons? We will introduce some of them in a batch. So far Tobias Fischbeck, Christian Riedel, Justin Werner and Alexander Hassenstein.