High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Ukai Gyokusen (1807 1887) was a pioneering Japanese photographer. Although he is much less well known than his contemporaries Shimooka Renj and Ueno Hikoma, he is important for being the first Japanese professional photographer, having established a photographic studio in Edo (now Tokyo) in 1860 or 1861. Ukai was born in what is now Ishioka, Ibaraki Prefecture, the youngest of four brothers. The family was well-off, Ukai's father being a finance commissioner for the daimyo Matsudaira Jij Yorisaki. When Ukai was thirteen, he was adopted by the sake supplier to another daimyo, Mikawaya, and he thus became a merchant. Ukai developed an interest in art and antiques after coming to know the bunjinga painter Tani Bunch , and in 1831 he left the sake business to become a full-time artist.