Kim Komenich graduated from San Jose State University in 1979 with a B.A. in Journalism. He was a 1993-94 Knight Fellow at Stanford University. He also received the 1987 Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the Philippine revolution, the 1983 World Press Photo award for news picture stories, and the 1987 SPJ national distinguished service award.

Komenich has photographed the ramifications of conflict in the Philippines, Vietnam, Guyana, El Salvador, the former Soviet Union and most recently in Iraq, where photos from his three trips to the Sunni Triangle in 2005 earned him the Military Reporters and Editors' Association's 2006 Photography Award.

He is a 2005 recipient of the Clifton C. Edom Education Award from the National Press Photographers' Association and was a 1993-94 John S.Knight Fellow at Stanford. He was a 2006-07 Dart Ochberg Fellow at the University of Washington's Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma.

In 2007 he received his MA in Journalism from the University of Missouri, where he studied the history and practice of multimedia photojournalism.