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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!

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...

A couple of weeks ago I went wandering about by the Cam at Ditton Meadows with two SX-70 cameras: a regular one and a Sonar. Regular had PX100 in it, the Sonar had 600 film. It was cold, so the PX100 came out very pale, but magic seemed to happen with it. I love how the tree just looks like a tree in 600, but the PX100 lends mystery. And the river! I had tried keeping the film warm in a cold clip (sounds contrary), but clearly not warm enough. I'm glad.

First shot with darkslide and subject ... In which I share my learnings from my first pack of PX100 So after all the waiting, it's here! On Friday 26th of April, I went down to the Photographers' Gallery in London on the off-chance that they might have some Impossible Project film in stock (even though I'd ordered 5 boxes the night before - I'm impatient). They did - it's quite expensive there at £20 a pack, but taking in to account delivery costs, unless you order five or more, it works out less. Of course I'd like it to be cheaper, in fact I'd like it to be free, but we have to accept that re-inventing a photographic process, a highly technical instant one from scratch is not going to be a cheap venture. There seem to be a conspiracy theories floating about Flickr groups that the Impossible Project is some kind of evil company out there to rip people off. If that's the case, they've come up with a rather elaborate and expensive way to do that. It's not as if they've established a Ponzi scheme... As to how it looks and behaves, well in broad terms I like it very much. In this post I'm putting up every single shot from my first pack, showing up flaws and characteristics. This is not a normal film. It is not a normal Polaroid film. The Impossible Project have gone to great pains to let you know that this film behaves differently from the original integral films. The packs urge users to visit the website for detailed instructions before opening. If you were expecting a regular black and white film, you will get a surprise. Immerse yourself in the PX100 pool at Flickr to get an idea of what this film does. Read the notes as to how people get the best results. Also, to get a really good overview of what the achievement of the creation of this film is, as well as a bit of context, read Frank Love's excellent blog post. To get a bit of a headache, read through the comments; this will give you a flavour of the strength of feeling out there. Anyway, enough about you, let's talk about me. I loaded up my SX-70 Sonar with the good stuff (no sticking down ND filters, no pushing a used darkslide under the pack to get it to go in), and out popped the slide in the picture at the top. The darkslides are a series of 61 collectors' cards with impossible tasks on them.
Shot #1 - Daffodils The first thing I shot with this film. Controlled environment (indoors, no direct light, warm). Soft and buttery colours, smooth tones, a hint of red in the shadows. After the 'horror stories' I'd read, I was surprised at how even the shot was. A very slight white speckling (cleaned up in this scan), and that one white dot at the top right. This feels like something new and different. I love this shot, and quickly added it to my Etsy store. It sold within an hour! Also, Sarah Gilbert linked to it from her article for Daily Finance, which brought a large number of people to see it. But how would it behave outdoors?
Shot #2 - Carter Jonas Bridge, Cambridge I'm not so pleased with this one. I pressed this against my chest as it was chilly out, and this seems to have given it an uneven response, darker more red on the right of the image, perhaps where the pressure from my hand was stronger. Also, not the most captivating subject, as the texture has muddied away in the overcast flat light. Oh well.
Shot #3 - The British Library Stronger contrast in this image works better. The day was certainly a chilly one, overcast, drizzly. This picture shows how the bright blue opacity layer can still let in direct light as the film spits out - the lower part of the shot is lighter as it exits first. There are various solutions to this - here is a simple one. It helps to let the film develop somewhere darker than was traditionally the case.
Shot #4 - Mahatma Gandhi, Tavistock Gardens, London It was just about to start raining heavily, and I got one more shot out before I hid the camera. Doesn't seem to be suffering the dark top/light bottom of the previous shot, but perhaps it's just the positioning of the lighter part of the picture. The shot was lighter than I expected, but perhaps that was due to the statue being dark and tricking the meter. Also, cooler weather leads to lighter shots, although again, this went straight under my jacket. I love how what would probably be burnt-out highlights on digital retain the sepia tinge. The white speckles are fairly prominent here.
Shot #5 - J.H. Sparkes & Sons Gaaaah! Well I don't like it, anyway. Slightly late for my train on a Sunday morning, carrying a guitar in a large case that I was selling. This shop front is great - old fashioned, big wooden signs. I keep failing to get a good picture of it. Framed it perfectly and then wobbled as I took it. Awkwardly held it too tightly under my jacket. Grrrr. I'll try again one day.
Shot #6 - Jaguar E Type That's more like it! Nice contrast range and sharpness. This was a lovely red example of the car, absolutely gorgeous. There are speckles (more detail later), and that one odd splodge on the chrome. But even lighting. No special tricks, just straight (and lightly) under my top.
Shot #7 - Lincoln College, Oxford We went to Oxford for the day on Saturday. It rained nearly the whole time. I saw this college entrance on Turl street, then had to wait for it to clear of people. Again, unevenness in development, with what I would call 'hot' patches where it has had too much pressure/contact while developing. However, this adds to the timeless quality here. It looks like it could have been taken any time in the last 150 years.
Shot #8 - Rainy Saturday In the car park, setting off to go home from Oxford. A good summary of a typical British Easter weekend. This one came straight out and rested loosely under my top for the whole two-hour drive home. Perhaps the lighter colouring is due to it not being pressed against warmth. So there they are, warts and all. Here is a wart: a close-up detail of two features of the film: Firstly, the white speckles. Not sure what would cause those, but I'm certain that this characteristic of the First Flush production is the sort of thing that will get sorted out. The other thing is the strange reticulation texture. Not dissimilar to what you sometimes see on Artistic TZ film. I quite like it. And it's so important to remember that this is the first stage on a path. Like Frank Love, I feel it is so much more important that The Impossible Project let us play with this new creation in its early stages. And these early stages will fund the next stages and so on. It's like experiencing the experimental nature of early photography, tied in with the modern sharing of imagery and knowledge that the internet gives us through Flickr, Twitter etc. Understanding more about how this film behaves will make us better at using it. There is another post brewing as to my feelings on why film and cameras like this are good in a digital era, but until then, I'm looking at five gorgeous boxes (oh, the packaging!) of PX100, waiting to be shown some light.

An Open Chrysanthemum by Nancy Stockdale Just over a year in the making, The Impossible Project's first new film is available to order! You don't need me to tell you that I find this very exciting news. On Monday there was a press conference at The Impossible Project's New York base on Broadway, excellently live-tweeted by @jesshibb, with a great coverage here by Sarah Gilbert. And here is a thorough summary of the event by Darcy Perkins. (Incidentally Sarah Gilbert also covered Polaroid's recent douchebaggery in the face of Impossible Project momentum excellently. Essential reading) The film looks very interesting - we know this because 40 lucky souls were picked to test out a couple of pre-production emulsions, and these results can be seen here at the Impossible Project site, and a selection was enlarged, framed and shown on the wall at the press event (see here in Anne Bowerman's Flickr). They look absolutely stunning. These images are the start of the Impossible Project's Collection. I now have a new ambition - to be up on that wall... Over on Flickr there is a group for the new PX 100 and PX 600 films. As well as being where the new work will start appearing, there are more shots by the 'beta testers' in there. Do please have a look! Ah yes, Flickr. I'm not going to link directly to the threads, but there seem to be a lot of negative people out there, with something bad (and sometimes bizarre) to say about the whole enterprise. Yes, the film is not cheap, but who thought it would be? It's a small operation, creating a new, very complex film pretty much from scratch. They have to pay wages, rents, power, chemicals, research etc etc. Unlike Fuji, who are the only other manufacturer of instant film, The Impossible Project isn't a huge organisation with decades of investment and a huge corporate machine behind it. My response was as follows:

I’m guessing that whatever the price of the film, it’s going to be 100% more existy than it would be if TIP weren’t around.

Some complainers don't like the look of it, the 'artistic' nature of it, I guess the fact that it's not a point-and-shoot film. Well firstly, they haven't used it yet. The people who have seem to say that while it takes a bit of getting used to, it's a lovely film with a unique look. I love the images it's producing (like Nancy's Chrysanthemum at the top of this piece), and can't wait to experiment with it. It's not as if its quirks and sensitivities are a secret. As ever, Sean Tubridy (@Tubes, a founder of Save Polaroid) puts it succinctly and eloquently of Twitter:

Yes, haters, the new Impossible instant film is a little sensitive. Not up to the challenge, chickens? Would you prefer nothing?

See a theme? No Impossible Project = no new film. You may not like the film, but at least you have a choice not to buy it. And maybe you will like the colour films due later this year, and maybe you will like the PX100 as the production matures (this is after all being billed as the "First Flush Edition"). Maybe you won't. Whatever, blah blah blah, you're boring me. What's important to me is to support the incredible enterprise which has produced a whole new film, to allow me new ways to take photographs, to force me to try to only take the pictures that matter (being aware of cost focusses the mind). The people behind and the people (like me) supporting The Impossible Project are passionate about photography, passionate to make this a success, excited about the magic that instant photography is imbued with. So I'll certainly be shooting with it, and I look forward to trying the blends as they grow and change (see the transcript for the tea analogy...). Fortunately for me (or unfortunately for my bank-balance) the Photographers' Gallery in London will be stocking the PX loveliness, and is just around the corner from where I work. I'm going to see if they have it in stock tomorrow. I'm excited. P.S. Since I started writing this, I ordered 5 packs of the film. I'm even more excited now.