Benjamen Chinn was born in the Chinatown district of San Francisco, the ninth of 12 children. At the age of ten, his older brother, John, introduced him to photography. Together, they built a darkroom in the basement of their home and John began to teach Ben how to process his film and print the images. Ben invested in a $0.99 Univex camera to capture images. Photography would from this point be a consistent part of Ben’s life, from serving as a school staff photographer during his middle, high school and college days to studying art in Paris, France.

By 1942, the United States was in the midst of World War II. During this time, Chinn served in the U.S. Army Air Corps, working as an aerial and public relations photographer at the Hawaii Hickman Field. He flew in modified single and twin-engine aircrafts, with only extra gas tanks and cameras to do his aerial photography. During his three-year enlistment, Chinn produced thousands of matched-toned prints for military maps.

After the war ended, Ben returned to San Francisco where he learned about the photography program at the California School of Fine Arts (now the San Francisco Art Institute). Ben enrolled in the program from 1946-1949, where he was able to learn from the primary instructors Ansel Adams and Minor White, and guest instructors including Ruth Bernhard, Dorothea Lange, Imogen Cunningham, Edward Weston, and Lisette Model.

Chinn focused intensely on his photography while at the California School of Fine Arts until 1949 when he would depart for Paris, France. Over in Paris, he continued his art education, studying under Alberto Giacommetti and Fernand Leger. Aside from his studies, Ben spent time wandering through the streets of Paris and hitchhiking around Europe, allowing him to take in the European culture and capture it all through the lens of his camera.

Ben eventually returned to San Francisco, where he began work as a civil servant with the Photographic Services of the U.S. Sixth Army. As the Chief of Photographic Services, he would train many army photographers until his retirement in 1984. Today, Benjamen Chinn still lives in the Chinatown district of San Francisco.