History Main / SpookyPhotographs

* ''Film/TheOthers'', when Grace finds the death portraits of [[spoiler: the servants]].

* ''Manga/MahouSenseiNegima'' played with this one. [[CuteGhostGirl Sayo]] shows up in both a photograph and Nodoka's mind reading book, unintentionally looking really scary, even though she just wants to talk to someone. So the class exorcists show up and try to get rid of her. Sayo is saved when Asakura accidentally takes a picture of her in which she isn't scary-looking.

* Parodied in the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTjj8fPFi9U Were Phoenix]] skit of the fourth ''VideoGame/{{Touhou}} [[WebAnimation/TouhouM1GrandPrix M-1 Grand Prix]]'' fanvid, where Keine teaches Mokou how to act in a funeral parlor. Mokou suddenly decides to take a picture of the recently deceased, but when she looks at the photo she took, she sees a picture of [[spoiler:the original CuteGhostGirl of the ''Touhou'' series, [[ChuckCunninghamSyndrome Mima]]!]]

* In ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'', ghosts will appear in your photographs if you take pictures in certain areas. ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid 2'' has a hidden ghost image as well.
* ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid 3'' has several ghost cutscenes.

* [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] during one story in ''Manga/XxxHOLiC'' when a desperately distressed woman comes to see Yuuko with a photo that doesn't seem spooky at all- another pretty young woman standing on the edge of a cliff with her back to the camera. Yuuko agrees to deal with the photo and puts it in a silver frame to try and seal its power, but the frame starts to melt and the woman -very, ''very'' slowly- begins to turn around to face the camera. After the frame completely melts away, the woman finishes turning and [[spoiler:the first woman who brought the photo to Yuuko's store steps into the picture, holding the camera which took the photo, and shoves her off the cliff to her death. The photo was a living record of her crime which she couldn't hide.]]

* ''VideoGame/StrongBadsCoolGameForAttractivePeople'' gives you a camera feature in all episodes that you can use to take screenshots of the game. In the final episode, "8-Bit Is Enough", after completing the "Spirits of '76" event, you'll hear a spooky noise in certain areas. Pull out the camera and take a picture, and a ghost from "Spirits of '76" will be in the shot, along with a box that wasn't visible before the picture was taken. Afterword, the ghost still won't be visible, but the box it appeared alongside will actually be there to provide you with a bonus collectible.

* One episode of the Canadian horror anthology radio drama Nightfall featured a cursed camera. In this case, anyone who had their picture taken would die under mysterious circumstances within twenty-four hours. And when the photos were developed...the victims looked like they were already dead.

# '''Negative Negatives:''' One step beyond Foreboding, these photos actively curse the victim, causing unfortunate, often ironic, events to befall the subject. Sometimes overlaps with BrownNote

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* ''Film/ThePact'': A ghostly hand pcan only be seen in photos (printed copies, or through the viewfinder of a digital camera). Subverted when the viewfinder shows a gaunt male figure walking through the living room. We're led to believe this means the figure is a ghost. It's actually a trick of perspective: we would have been able to see the figure even without the camera, because he was an alive human.

* ''Series/MysteryHunters'': Christina explores a cave allegedly full of ghosts where photographers have taken photos that seem to show ghosts when they are otherwise invisible. Downplayed though as Doubting Dave points out the equipement the photographers had with them may have been what was responsible for the ghost like imagery.

* ''TabletopGame/TheWorldOfDarkness'': if someone in your photograph appears to just inexplictably be a blur, it's advised you steer clear of that person - because they're a vampire.

* A bizarre, [[RiddleForTheAges never-quite explained]] version appears at the end of ''Film/TheShining.'' After [[spoiler: Jack Torrance freezes to death in the hedge maze while his wife and son escape the Overlook Hotel]], the camera pans along a series of photographs hanging on a wall in the building. The central picture, dated July 4th 1921, features a happy crowd of individuals at a party...[[spoiler: with Jack standing front and center, smiling for the camera.]] Stanley Kubrick, known for messing with his audience, has [[ShrugOfGod offered no official explanation for this]], and even when he does talk about it in interviews, his fans are cautious about believing him. The most commonly accepted idea (and one that Kubrick himself suggested) is that [[spoiler: the Overlook "infects" anyone who fills a particular role in the hotel with an evil spirit; the photograph is simply a manifestation of that spirit, which has infected every caretaker the hotel has ever had.]]

* In ''Film/Amityville3D'' one of the main characters takes some pictures seemingly predicting the death of the evil house's real estate agent. Later, after finding a demonic face in one of the photos, she rushes to tell her friend about it, only to crash her car. Right after the crash the pictures randomly burst into flames, burning the girl down to a skeleton before causing her car to blow up.

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* There was an old ''[[Series/TheTwilightZone1959 Twilight Zone]]'' about an instant camera which took pictures five minutes into the future.

# '''Negative Negatives:''' One step beyond Foreboding, these photos actively curse the victim, causing unfortunate, often ironic, events to befall the subject.

* The 2008 Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Florida featured their own take on Bloody Mary, in this case a phobia therapist who attempted to cure her patients of their fears by exposing them to the extremes of their fears (usually accidentally driving them insane). The website featured a long backstory and buildup to the event, showing her various cases. Her first patient to ''die'' was a photographer who saw frightening images in his photographs; she locked him in a glass coffin with a limited oxygen supply and flashbulbs going off all around him, giving him the choice of leaving the coffin to face his fear or suffocating. He chose the latter. As each case was tied into a haunted maze, the photographer's case became Dead Exposure, which was supposed to be traveling through a zombie apocalypse through photographs. The house was completely black and key props, scenery, and costumes were painted with blacklight-sensitive paint and blacklight strobes flashed simultaneously with the sound effect of a camera snapping, giving the impression of being caught in a series of photographic negatives.

* ''Manga/SoredemoMachiWaMawatteiru'' has an unusual explanation for this trope.

* When Mai of ''[[Manga/{{Skyhigh}} Skyhigh Karma]]'' hits her head during a minor car accident in the first chapter, she's taken to the hospital for x-rays. The x-rays reveal a spectral hand gripping her skull -- the first concrete evidence of the ghost that's haunting her.

* When Mai of ''[[Manga/Skyhigh Skyhigh Karma]]'' hits her head during a minor car accident in the first chapter, she's taken to the hospital for x-rays. The x-rays reveal a spectral hand gripping her skull -- the first concrete evidence of the ghost that's haunting her.

* The [[Creator/MontagueRhodesJames M. R. James]] story "The Mezzotint": every time the protagonist looks at the title photograph it has changed, indistinctly depicting the progression of something horrible which, it turns out, happened in the past.

* There are a lot of these in Franchise/TheSlenderManMythos. There's some perfectly normal picture... and then [[MeaningfulBackgroundEvent somewhere in the background]], [[HumanoidAbomination this tall, thin, black figure is watching]]. The best ones are really easy to miss unless you're paying close attention.

* In ''Film/TheOmen1976'', every single photo Jennings takes has some clue on how the pictured person is going to die... by {{Satan}}'s influence.

* In the Literature/{{Discworld}} book ''Discworld/TheTruth'', Otto Chriek's "dark light" iconograph combines Spectral Snaps with a bit of Foreboding Photos. A picture of William de Worde shows him with [[WellDoneSonGuy a spectral version of his father looking over his shoulder]], while a photo of career killer Mr. Pin shows him with a large cloud of sinister, shadowy figures behind him. The latter picture also predicts a fire that breaks out near the end of the book.

* Referenced in ''Manga/DrStone'': After Senku invents the daguerreotype, [[HotScoop Minami]] sets about photographing as much as she can to preserve a record of humanity's progress. However, when she tries to get action shots of the people relaxing (swimming in Summer and snowboarding in Winter), ActionGirl Kohaku is moving so quickly that she leaves a high-speed blur on the camera, causing Gen to snark that people who look back on the photos are going to mistake her for a ghost.

* ''[[Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000 MST3K]]''-featured film ''Film/{{Tormented}}'' does this. Except only one guy can see the ghost in the photo, and he's the only guy who can see the ghost outside of the photo, so it's quite pointless.