After dropping out, she attended an institute of painting without telling her parents, and a dressmaking school.

[2] Sasamoto started her career as a part-time illustrator on the local news pages in Tokyo Nichinichi Shimbun (now Mainichi Shimbun, one of the newspapers in Japan).

[3] Sasamoto photographed subjects from General Douglas MacArthur during the American occupation of Japan to striking coalminers and protesting students.

Prior to her death, Sasamoto was working on a project called Hana Akari (Flower Glow) in honor of her friends who had died.

[5] Sasamoto turned 100 in September 2014,[6] and died of natural causes on 15 August 2022, at the age of 107.