the Goal

The mission of this project is to re-familiarize the general populace with fun and artistic potential of discontinued Polaroid cameras, with the help of the Impossible Project's* line of film for vintage cameras.

We recently came across a box of old 700-style Polaroid cameras at a yard sale in central Maine. Included in the box was a bevy of accessories, but no film (which we all know is the most expensive part of Polaroid photography).The film for these cameras has long been discontinued by the Polaroid corp. and, until recently, could only be found secondhand for a hefty price.

After a bit of research, I discovered that the Impossible Project, a relatively new company in the grand scheme of the film industry, is still making film for these long forgotten, discontinued cameras. Film which can potentially be purchased for a reasonable price. The purpose of this blog is to display some of the results attainable through use of their 'old generation' film, which is the cheapest, for the SX-700 style cameras.

the Cameras

We got three different types of SX-700 style cameras, as pictured below. The cameras are basically just plastic shells, receptors for the battery and exposure element that is the film cartridge.

They are all pretty much the same except the one in the middle, Pronto B has a glass lens with a manual focus. The only other manual option the other two share with the pronto is the 'electric eye' (as Polaroid calls it), which is like an aperture setting on a normal camera, controlling the amount of light let in by the lens. These, in this case, are mostly useless as the Impossible Project recommends setting, and leaving them on the darkest setting for use with their film. I have found this to be sound advice through experimentation.

Variable Outcomes

The Impossible Project's PX70 film is extremely light sensitive and must be shielded from light immediately upon ejection from the camera or else the exposures end up looking super over-exposed (very light images with low contrast/color saturation, as seen above). There is a great (and relatively easy) technique for this outlined on their website, with a link to said site on the 'darkslide' which is ejected from the camera upon inserting the film cartridge. It is best to shield the photo from light for the first five minutes or so after it's taken.

Without a flash, indoor exposures can be a little dark (we do have a flash and will get more into that later). This can be compensated with the slight adjustment of the electric eye towards the lighter side. It is starting to seem like indoor shots come out the with the most contrast and depth-of-field due to the sensitivity of the film. They are consistently darker and more true-to-life in their coloring than are their outdoor counterparts, though the one on the right  side of this collection was taken at too short a distance to become properly focused.

 The two-person self shot (left) was taken with help of the cable release accessory (below), which allows the user to extend the camera at arms-length and still take an accurate shot (notice it's a lot more on-target than the one i took of myself in the mirror- center). The kit also contains a tripod mount and a self timer and fits all three camera models for this style.

Outdoor photos are the easiest to take, since you just set the eye to darkest, shoot it then catch it with the darkslide. I usually bring along two or more darkslides, sandwich the photo as it comes out, tape it up and stick it in my pocket. I really like the effect these full-light outdoor prints have, they feel the most like "vintage" Polaroid shots to me. All three of the above photos were taken on a nice sunny day with the electric eye on the darkest setting.

*I am not associated with the Impossible Project, and do not imply that they in any way endorse the work being shown here.