Old photos sometimes have surprisingly high quality
Its amazing for how long humanity has photography and for how long we are actually able to produce good looking photographic documentation of what we do.
Today I looked at some old Photos from Chernobyl and although mostly in black and white, although not all of them, they have more detail and resolution than the photos that I have from my childhood that were made with some Ipod touch or Samsung galaxy S1-2 phone. Back then photos of course were a lot less common than nowadays, but there were enough cameras around that not just the important events, but also everyday life has been captured in amazing detail.
One thing that separates those photos from Chernobyl from the historic photos one is used to seeing in documentaries apart from just technical maturity is how sincere they are. In the time after the world wars cameras became small and affordable enough to let people capture ordinary things and photography became a hobby. We aren’t limited to staged plate photography of important events with world leaders at some conference, but can actually see how normal life was. One revelation for me when seeing those photos was that life back then actually wasn’t that different even with all the technological advancements we made in the 50 years since those photos were made an afternoon drinking and walking in the park with friends still looks remarkably similar to those peoples afternoon. Another thing that sets those photos apart from other, older, historic pictures is how normal all the people seem. I think it is because of how „in the moment“ they are. The people don’t pose, they just do what they were about to do before someone pointed a camera at them and because of this they don’t look like historic figures, but like people that you could walk by on the street and pay no special attention to(apart from the clothing).
I don’t really have a point to make here, but look at those pictures. https://imgur.com/a/chernobyl-before-accident-V4cZT