In 1953 he graduated from Tokyo Metropolitan Aoyama High School and entered the photography department of Nihon University.
He graduated from university in 1957, and tried but failed to enter various news companies, settling for darkroom work in Ginza for the photographer Osamu Yagi (八木治).
His second exhibition featured work from the same series, face-on images of buildings taken with a 4×5 large format camera.
[3][4] Takanashi had a tenured position at Tokyo Zokei University from 1980 until 2000 (a full professor from 1983), whereupon he retired but continued teaching there part-time.
[1] From 1992, Takanashi, Genpei Akasegawa and Yūtokutaishi Akiyama worked together in the group Raika Dōmei.