Old photographs often give off a spooky vibe, and there are good reasons for that. With long exposure times, people couldn’t maintain a smile, so they often gazed at the camera with serious expressions. The grainy sepia tones and occasionally haunting child figures in the background contribute to this eerie effect. The Thanatos Archive on Instagram has collected many of these images, focusing on ordinary people in moments that seemed normal at the time but now appear quite unsettling. These photos show that humans can be quite eerie all on their own.
In 1838, Louis Daguerre captured an image of the Boulevard du Temple in Paris from his window. The street was bustling with people and carriages, but because of the long exposure time, only a man standing still while getting his boots polished ended up in the photograph. This man is recognized as the first human ever photographed. Daguerre announced his process in 1839, and the French government bought the rights and made them available to the world for free. A daguerreotype is a single image on polished silver-plated copper, meaning that each one is unique. The development process involved toxic mercury fumes.
Later, cheaper photography formats emerged, like the ambrotype in the 1850s, which used glass, and the tintype, patented in 1856, which utilized thin sheets of iron. Despite its name, a tintype does not actually contain tin; it likely gets its name from the tin snips used to cut the plates. These affordable and durable portraits became accessible to the general public for the first time. Soldiers from the Civil War often took tintypes in uniform to send home, and for many families, these images were essential, sometimes the last photos they would ever have.
A significant portion of this collection includes post-mortem photographs, which were common in the 19th century. During that time, death was ever-present, and early cameras were expensive. For many families, the photograph taken after a child’s death served as the only image they would possess, becoming a cherished reminder of a loved one.
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Source: Bored Panda, by Denis Krotovas