William Coupon was born in 1952 in New York but moved to Washington D.C. and later to San Francisco. He is currently based in Sante Fe, New Mexico.

He began taking photographs in1978 at Studio 54, then moved downtown to the punk scene at the Mudd Club, documenting its new wave participants. Commercial work soon followed for a variety of international magazines, record companies, and advertising agencies. He continued to shoot portraits, often of various subcultures and indigenous peoples in the 1980s and early 1990s, including death row inmates at Florida State Prison, Australian Aboriginals, Moroccan Berbers, New Guinea tribesman, and traditional Dutch, among others. These 30 series comprise his Social Studies, an ongoing and ever-expanding project. 

His current work embraces the digital medium, in places like Cuba, Venezuela, Colombia, Italy, the Philippines, and the United States.