Aside from his apprenticeship with Eikoh Hosoe (and Takeji Iwamiya), the Osaka-born Moriyama is essentially self-taught. He began his career as a freelance graphic designer and switched to photography in 1963.
Moriyama has preferred hand-held cameras and his images are characterized by their high contrast. Primarily photographing in city streets, he has paid little attention to technical and compositional customs, often intentionally blurring his subject and has been known to scratch and mis-expose his film.