Later in life, he worked as a cinematographer, and was one of the principal camera operators for the film documentary "Woodstock.".
His family fled the Nazi regime in Germany in 1936 and settled in Brooklyn, New York, where his father worked as a butcher.
He received his first camera as a gift from his older brother. He graduated from the Cooper Union in New York in 1951. He served two years in the Army before launching his photography career. He took publicity shots of celebrities in the 1950s, including Lena Horne, Perry Como, classical pianist Artur Rubinstein, and Elvis Presley.