Same here except one thing is the same for me: the feeling of the photos or the "vibe" if you will. Because I've seen so many black and white or sepia photos of

Same here except one thing is the same for me: the feeling of the photos or the "vibe" if you will. Because I've seen so many black and white or sepia photos of the past I have this weird image in my head that everything back before color photos was dark and dreary and even people living in that time, in color, saw everything as washed out and bleak. After seeing these in color, "true" color (as in not added after the fact), one thing stays the same. If you pay attention you'll notice that every shot with people in it feels dreary. No one is smiling. Everyone has the same almost depressed, somewhat emotionless expression on their faces. So while I have a hard time dealing with the fact that the world was in color back then the one thing I don't have to reconcile with my preconceived notions of the past is how gloomy the people all seem. I wonder why everyone in old photos states blankly like that. Is it because they're genuinely living a hard life? Could it be that smiling for photos wasn't customary back then? Both? Also, photos from the 60's through the early 80's also seem to have a unique feel to them. I live in Chicago where some of the buildings have been around since just after the Chicago Fire and to see pictures taken of such places through the 20th century is so strange. I know intellectually that people saw the area in full color like I see it today but somehow older photos of the same streets and places I walk by feel like they're just not the same place. In an old photo a certain building or park will seem, well, old yet when I walk by it, it seems modern as ever even though the place hasnt physically changed much if it all since the early 1900's. It's weird and I'm glad to know other people have that same sort of relation to older photos. I don't even quite know how to describe it but I did the best I could here.