LOS ANGELES — Howard Bingham, longtime personal photographer, confidant and perhaps the closest friend of boxing great Muhammad Ali, has died at age 77.

Harlan Werner, Bingham’s longtime friend, said the photographer died Thursday.

Photographer Howard Bingham, left, and longtime friend Muhammad Ali attend a reception. Associated Press/Brian Bohannon

No cause of death was given, but another friend, sportswriter Mohammed Mubarak, said Bingham had been in failing health in recent months after undergoing two surgeries.

During a friendship that spanned more than half a century, Bingham took literally hundreds of thousands of photos of Ali that ranged from the three-time world heavyweight champion’s many ring triumphs to quiet day-to-day moments with his family.

He captured the young, handsome champion preparing for his first heavyweight championship fight against Sonny Liston in 1964 and, years later, the aging Ali, hands shaking from Parkinson’s disease, preparing to light the flame opening the 1996 Olympic Games.

He photographed Ali greeting everyone from former President Bill Clinton to South African President Nelson Mandela to black Muslim leader Malcolm X. And he was there with his camera when throngs of awe-struck fans surrounded the champ on the street.

Although known largely as Ali’s photographer, Bingham also had a distinguished career as a freelancer.

He photographed the 1967 race riots in Detroit and was at Chicago’s Democratic National Convention in 1968 when violence exploded between protesters and police.

In the 1960s he developed enough trust with the fledgling Black Panther Party that its members gave him free reign to photograph them – and their weapons stash – for a feature Life magazine had planned.

After the story was not published he included the photos in his 2009 book.

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