Why Did People Never Seem To Smile In Old Time Black ‘n White Photographs?
September 15th, 2009 | 
Author: Was life so difficult for them that they couldn’t smile? They usually have the most morose looks on their faces.
Was life so difficult for them that they couldn’t smile? They usually have the most morose looks on their faces.
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Unlike modern methods and materials photographs were often a lengthy process involving several minutes of exposure.
If you didn’t sit still you would be blurred – try to sit really still for say 10 seconds and see how difficult it is. Well often the people had to sit for a few minutes and many would use a metal frame against their neck to help them. I doubt they felt much like smiling after the first few seconds.
Even early flash photography took pictures over a second or so whilst the ‘flash’ material burned.
In the really old days, people believed that smiling in pictures stole your soul, it wasn’t just because they didn’t want to smile. They thought that if a person smiled in a picture, their soul would be taken by the devil, and before this, people believed that cameras themselves did this evil deed.
Hope this answers your Q!
In early photos, they had to hold still for a couple of minutes for the long exposure. You couldn’t hold a smile that long – your lips would move.
Also, later, that just wasn’t the style. They weren’t unhappy, just felt people didn’t smile all the time,and a pic should look like the normal you.
Oh because all the muscles in your mouth.
Cameras took way too long to take photos.
It was hard to smile for that long
Like if you smile too much for too long you feel the muscles/nerves in your mouth move/shake
So if they took the picture while you moved it would come out blurry
It took a long time for a photo to take/develop and the they could not hold a smile for that long. If they would move at all the photo would blur.
Yeah. Black and white pictures were around during the 1920s-1940s. Basically during the Great Depression, so I’m guessing the people were depressed.
because back then the cameras werent instant, when they took a picture, it could take minutes… if not hours. The people had to be completely still, and its much easier to look mad than to smile for a long period of time
This whole concept that life is all about “fun” and “good times” is fairly recent. People used to have the attitude that all pleasures were bought with toil and sweat. Too much smiling was seen as being strange or conceited.
Photos back then were not for pleasure like, to share. But for a historical record of your family. I guess no one wanted to be seen as undignified. Unlike today when we really don’t care what others think.
in the old days the camera took about an hour to process so they had to sit there for that long. it hurt to hold a smile for an hour so they chose not to.
back when those old pictures were taken, the cameras took FOREVER to load and take the pic. sometimes it took up to an hour for a camera to complete its process.
All this is true, but remember these were desperate times, and there was a higher amount of working class, a smaller middle class, and even fewer wealthy families…
Public opinion of the day dictated that everyone was serious when taking a picture, this did not really change until the late 40.s when Moving pictures were invented and people saw actors smiling and having fun.
Actually the pictures took so long to take that no one could sit there that long and just smile the whole time.
Photos where formal events, they took them very seriously.
i think they had to hold the pose for a long while and it was just easier to not smile
Maybe the time was dark as the photo was.
They were all dying of the plauge. There was no reason to smile.
because they didn’t have good dental hygiene back in the day and lots of people had messed up or missing teeth.
My ancestors did. I don’t smile sometimes in pictures.
Good question! I guess that was the style back then!
they probably thought cameras stole your SOUL
it was the thing to do. smiling was not popular back then
hmmm good question. maybe because not everyone can afford a camera and can have their picture taken. (say what? haha)
maybe they were not happy
because they had really bad teeth back then
They didnt have Yahoo!Answers. Wouldnt you be sad too?
clearly they wanted some street cred
idk i looked thur photos of my grandparents and they didint..idk why