[3] Sydney Wylie Samuelson was born in Paddington, London, to George Berthold Samuelson, a cinema pioneer of the silent film era, and Marjorie Emma Elizabeth Vint.
He was educated at the Irene Avenue Council School in Lancing, West Sussex.
[2] Samuelson started his career as a rewind boy at the Luxor cinema in Lancing, West Sussex.
After working in several cinemas in the Midlands as a relief operator for the ABC circuit, he got a job as a trainee film editor with Gaumont British, which was then at Lime Grove in London.
After serving in the Royal Air Force from 1943 to 1947,[4] he got a job as a trainee cameraman with the Colonial Film Unit.