In the Qing Dynasty, cameras were introduced to China from a Frenchman. 1839, photography was officially born in France. 1842, China and Britain signed the unequal treaty of nanking, and China opened five trading ports to the outside world. Subsequently, a large number of businessmen and missionaries came to China, and photography was introduced to Hongkong and Canton in China in the 1940s. After photography was introduced to China, people in China quickly learned this technique. But at that time, there was no such title as "photo studio". It turns out that before photography was introduced, people needed to save their own images to help painters and their "painting houses" or "image shops" and leave people's faces on paper with traditional painting techniques.

Since the Qing dynasty, photography technology has flowed into our country, leaving a lot of precious historical materials, so everyone is likely to develop. Most of the historical photos of the Qing Dynasty are serious, and there are few smiles. Why?

Faced with this new high-tech thing at that time, the rich people in China were curious. The picture shows the wedding photo of a well-off family in that year. Facing the camera, the man's eyes are wide open, full of doubt and anxiety.

A common explanation for old photos not smiling is the long exposure time. The characters in the photo need to be as still as possible so that the picture will not appear blurred. It is said that it takes eight hours to take a photo at first, and it takes so long to find a painting.

When you look at this photo, you will find that this person's face is blurred because the exposure time is too long. Theoretically speaking, in the case of long-term exposure, it is necessary to keep a posture as still as possible to make the photo clear, so it is easier to keep a flat facial expression than a smiling expression.

At that time, it was very serious for people to take pictures. They all wore their best clothes and took pictures seriously, but they couldn't fix them after taking pictures. At that time, there were few photo studios and they were very expensive. Some people have only taken photos once in their lives, so big families have money to take photos.

Reference: Draft of Qing Dynasty History