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I came quite late to the game with Polaroid, taking my first shot (as an adult) in spring 2009. I bought one pack of ATZ to see if my dad's old SX-70 still worked. It did. I was hooked. 

 

Back home I did my research, got a neutral density filter for the lens and searched out some 600 film. Boots The Chemists in Cambridge had stock and I was on my way. I went back a month later and bought the last packs of Polaroid in the shop. 

 

I loved 600 very much - very easy to use, good clear colours. Along with the 779 promotions Pola Premium then Impossible Project ran, I shot a ton. Many of my favourite pictures are on it. After trying a couple of packs of Time Zero, I yearned for the magic of that film (I mostly found 600 to be slightly more prosaic than the dreams TZ produced, but none the worse for that). It served me well in the forest, on the city corners, in Paris and in Provençe.

 

Until eventually I was down to one single pack.

 

At the end of April I finally took the plunge and put that last pack of Polaroid 600 film in my SLR680. It's possible that I may shoot another pack if one turns up, but I'm not so keen on how the 600 ages: where Time Zero gets crazy flames and colour-shifts, 600 just seems to lose contrast and turn yellow. Not my favourite. 

 

The last 600 produced expired in the autumn of 2009, and this pack was one of the Giambarba edition bought from Impossible Project last year. Those Impossible guys have been excellent at sourcing the last stocks of films (especially the 600 and its twin, 779, as well as the Edge Cut packs), but all stock is gone, never to be replaced. 

 

This last pack had taken on a totemic value, sitting in my fridge, proclaiming "I am the LAST", waiting for the perfect opportunity to be used. And I worried about the right occasion to use it, fearing that I would waste it on poor subjects in poor weather. 

 

But that pressure has been relieved by The Impossible Project's PX680 film - there is now and going to be full colour film food for our cameras again! That pack of 600 lost it's fearsome aura, and demanded to just be used and celebrated. I'm mostly very happy with what came out:

 

1. Lion and Dragon

2. Long Roof

3. Green Man

4. Cross Keys

5. Corner

6. Hotel Russell

7. Abbey Ruins

8. Road sign

9. Doctor Land

10. Forest

 

So farewell then, 600. You've been an excellent companion, and thank you for the journey. And if any of you have film left, shoot it! The pictures come out much better if you use the film...

 

My father and I are very serious men. Many a solemn hour is spent discussing important things. Frivolity is frowned upon. In fact most things are frowned upon. Except frowning. 

 

Or not. 

 

I bought my dad a Polaroid EE100 as a Christmas present and when I was out in France in early April he was trying it out, taking a couple of portraits of me to get the feel of it. I don't often take portraits, but I was in the mood, so I got my 600SE with Chocolate film. Camera as prop, father deploying stern, serious expression. Exposure measure with the fab Pocket Light Meter iPhone app. 

 

Click. 

 

Pull out the film, wait, start peeling. Oh right, as I often do, I forgot to take out the dark slide. I need something which pops up in the viewfinder with the word "idiot" if I press the button with the slide in. Swearing and laughing ensued. 

 

Try again, and success. 

 

Next day we went for a matching shot, father at the camera. Me in stylish attire. 

 

Click. 

 

Dark slide in. 

 

Sigh. Laugh. 

 

Try again. 

 

Click. 

 

Lens cap on. 

 

Third time lucky. Successful serious face despite the terrible giggles. 

 

I'm very keen on this pair of pictures. I've kept the one of him, he the one of me. Perhaps I should do more portraits. 

Adventures in the new instant films, and a look at the future!

 

On March 22 2010, in the Impossible Project space in New York, Florian Kaps unveiled the first products of the factory in Enschede: PX100 Silver Shade First Flush, a sepia-tinged monochrome instant film. It was characterised by a soft, often golden quality. It was very sensitive to light when ejected, as well as sensitive to temperature. But handled correctly, and the results are great. 

Next came the faster PX600 Silver Shade. Also monochrome, but this time with more contrast. As the year progressed they improved the formula. I love this film. 

Then came the colour films. The PX70 Color Shade First Flush was soft, blue tinted. In the autumn came the PX70 PUSH! film. This one tended towards pink tones. Handled well, colours come through. 

So far the colour films have seemed artistic, potentially a bit 'niche' for a wider audience. The Holy Grail is a film which is not too scared of light when ejected, not too worried by temperature. And a fuller range of colour. Ideally something like the nostalgic beauty of the original SX70 films. 

Ladies and gentlemen...

PX680.

In the autumn of last year I entered a picture to an Impossible Project competition with the hope of being a beta tester for new film. I got through, and the film arrived in February. This first batch had an issue with white speckles (this is an issue with the first batch), but not with the colour. It's gorgeous. The blues! The reds! A fuller report on my experiences with this to follow...

And this is just the first test film. The second batch is better still. It's going to be a great year.

 

I spent Sunday with my sister and three of her children (the other is away at university). We had a fun time in the gardens of Cotehele in Cornwall, then went and had a big cream tea at Hotel Endsleigh in Devon. Of course I had some Polaroid cameras with me, and in my SLR680 I had some Impossible Project PX 600 UV+...

The X Files, Season 4, Episode 4. The one with the spirit pictures. And Polaroids! Or are they? Allow me to bore you with observational nerdery... A young girl goes into a pharmacy to get a passport photo taken. She has forgotten her cash, so runs out to the car to get it. She gets abducted. After waiting a while, the pharmacist peels apart the instant passport picture he'd taken, to see a distorted, screaming image of the very same girl, seemingly surrounded by demons or ghosts. Eeek! So let me get my nerd on: The pharmacist and his passport camera: It looks like a Polaroid MiniPortrait 203 camera to me. Except it's, um, called an ETAP. You often see this sort of thing on TV, where they will cover up a prominent branding: how frequently do you see a metallic laptop with a blank circular sticker where there would perhaps be a glowing apple? But The X Files go a stage further, because the plot revolves around scary spirit pictures imprinted on the film, without the need of a camera. So what film does an ETAP camera use? In one shot we see him peeling it apart, and it looks like Polaroid 100 type, but it seems the ETAP has its own range of film: Firstly: Gillian Anderson. *happy sigh* Secondly, the prop-makers went to a great deal of bother with this! Love the faux Polaroid 'squares' logo. I'm wondering if Polaroid expressly didn't want their brand being shown, or whether the producers felt it would be distracting. Perhaps licensing or payment issues. Either way, I want one of these boxes. Because I'm a nerd. But the steamy instant action doesn't stop there. At the victim's house, Mulder notices some 600 shots on the fridge, and goes looking for the camera. He covers the lens and fires off a couple of shots, to see if the scary images are there: I like how these are clearly real Polaroids, and they're really developing, not faked up. TV and film drama always likes to make things more exciting: digital cameras making the motor-dirve sound of film cameras; computers that beep and click at every occasion. But here they've clearly got a spirit photographer to imprint on the unexposed negative inside the Polaroid camera. No trickery. Kudos. Which makes it a slight shame that the passport camera makes the sound of the motor in an SX70 type camera when fired. Sigh. I guess "click" isn't interesting enough. Also fun is the part where Mulder gets the computer boffin to unscramble that distorted image. It's like a 20th Century CSI. With indexed colour graphics and dithering. So there you have it: the X Files was cool, and I'm a massive, obsessed nerd. No new revelations there. p.s. Special thanks to Carol for the heads up!

Soooo... I pretty much failed at The August Break. It wasn't that I failed to take pictures, it was just that I didn't do them thinking "August Break". So it just kind of drifted away. People who did see August Break through, I salute you! I particularly loved Jess Hibbard's notebook and Mark Von Minden's notated Polaroids.

 

Anyway, here are some of the pictures I took during August...

 

Oxford

Forest near Elveden

Hanover Square

Forest near Elveden

And so it ends! As ever, I've really really enjoyed 'Roid Week, especially as this time I wasn't a. violently ill or b. in hospital for an operation!

Do check out the pool and the discussions.

My final shots are daffodils, one on PX100, the other on Fade to Black which was peeled after a few minutes and scanned against plain paper.

I love the Fade to Black film, and am sad that it was only a limited supply (they've just sold the last of it from the Impossible Project store). It's also slightly anxiety-making as it needs scanning or peeling before the image goes too dark. A nice challenge though.

On a technical note, I discovered a great way to shield the emerging PX100 shots from light, using a Paul Giambarba Edition box from pack film. Worked a treat:

So that's 'Roid Week done for another spring. Bring on Autumn!

I had to post off my old Nikon D50 which I finally sold on ebay (only took me a year to get round to it), and even though it was a fairly grey day, I thought I might as well take my Holgaroid out and about with the Sepia film that's been in it since the Autumn. Just round the back of the Post Office is quite an old part of Cambridge by the river, and the street names - Abbey Road, Priory Road - give you an idea of what used to be there. Mostly, it's just Victorian terraces. One house has heavy wisteria on its front. Looks like an artist lives there. But as to the older stuff, there's an abbey building dating back to the 17th Century. I'm really pleased with how the focus and framing worked here. Anyone who's used a Holgaroid will know that aiming it is more art than science... The third shot I took (only two per day in this 'Roid Week) is of the last remnant of the 13th Century priory itself. Carefully framed to miss out the connoisseur of high strength lager on a bench nearby. Only two more days to go! Swim in the pool.

Day two. Took some shots during the day, another couple of London corners on 600 film which may go up during the week (but I don't necessarily want to repeat myself).

So instead, here are two melancholy angels from Mill Road Cemetery in Cambridge on Impossible Project PX100 film. Moody.

Visit the pool for so much amazing goodness.

And in another exciting development, the stars behind 'Roid Week are giving away two packs of PX600 film every day to two lucky people. And I won one for Tuesday! Obviously I have lots of film already, so watch this space for what I plan to do with it...

I love 'Roid Week. It introduced me to so many amazing photographers in the two blasts last year, and the shots coming out so far are amazing as ever. Such a great, supportive, interested community. The only problem is there not being enough time to look at everything as much as I'd like.

For the full pool check here.

And for the digested read of people's faves, check here.

Here are my two entries - two grand buildings in London, catching the evening light, captured on ATZ film.

Mortimer/Wells

Goodge/Newman