Comments

Not so sure

I'm not so sure... Polaroid has always been a premium product, costing way more than 35mm back when; it's only natural they would want to develop expensive and innovative new ideas.

As for digital instants, with the heritage of Polaroid in instant, why would you not launch it? iPod wasn't the first mp3 player, nor the first hard drive mp3 player.

Don't criticise the LG stuff for being new, and then criticise the digital instant for NOT being new!!

In reponse to the above comment.

Polaroid is not Apple, who seem to make a habit of taking existing technology and selling it as their own.

Dead?

... hardly.
I love the 'clunk wizz whirl' ofthe old cameras and i still use a 600 and exploit the impossible projects stock as much as i can; I love film, period. This christmas i was given a zink printer, its amazing. I print every think from my little leica compact and carry them both around with me in my bag.
The Lady Gaga gigs are admittedly naff, but the camera .. stroke of genius. I think it will sell, and in buckets.

Death of Polaroid

Back in the 1980s I created Polaroid Murals by photographing analog system computer system monitors. My Polaroids were the only result of what I saw on the screen. No scanners, no digital storage devices, only SX-70 Polaroid. That is what makes my Polaroid Murals so valuable in today's collectible Market. Obviously Polaroid never took a cue from Warhol's famous expression, "Everyone will be famous for 15-minutes." While we have learned to be an instantaneous society Lady Gaga is a brief moment in time. Polaroid as we knew it to be, will live in glory. Timelessness is what we have all forgotten along with history. To sum it up, "Anything for a quick buck." It is why we are in so much trouble. - Laurence M. Gartel/ Digital Media Pioneer

Lighten up

The Polaroid name has a longer heritage in sunglasses than instant film and was never shy of gimmicky marketing in the consumer arena. You Push the button we do the rest... So why not a polaroid Sunglasscam?

You can't kill something that has long been dead.

Don't you mean, "Polaroid killed Polaroid" starting about 15-20 years ago? The latest offerings are the only thing since the 90's with a Polaroid name on it that shows any sort of thinking. The previous Zink technology based products Polaroid offered were an interesting technology that was used on products that were toys and gimmicks at best. By offering an improved version of Zink with larger format and higher resolution prints, Polaroid may have found a way to make this new technology sell and sell a modern version of instant photography. Adding Bluetooth and other technology that we have come to expect may actually help them sell a couple if these new gizmos in real numbers. They surely haven't sold any Zink based products is any real numbers before. As for the form factor of the camera, well why not? Polaroid's current owners are using their heritage to go forward. Good for them. The glasses? A novelty that will get lots of attention for their approach and willingness to create something different. How rare. They are silly and I wouldn't think of ever buying them, but some teenagers might which is a good demo for any company that wants to survive. I don't think anyone at Polaroid is expecting everyone to be running around taking pictures with these, but it gets them noticed. It gets them the publicity. For goodness sake, people are taking about Polaroid and not in the past tense. When was the last time that happened? Will any of these things take good pictures? Frankly I hate Polaroid pictures of the 70-90s era; integral film and cameras were expensive and took the worse pictures in colors that don't exist anywhere in the real world. Could they have made the film any more expensive? They can only improve at this point in my opinion. Impossible Project? An interesting footnote and nothing more. There isn't a package of film they have produced that is anything but wildly overpriced and playing on the retro hip. They call their offerings experimental. That is a nice way of saying our film produces terrible, terrible pictures so awful they must represent high art. Please. Polaroid's presentation at CES is the first signs of life from a company that wants to go forward and that kills the Polaroid name? I couldn't disagree more. You can't kill something that has long been dead.

polaroid who?

Uhh, polaroid went away. People who actually used the stuff, not just for gimmicky photos just switched to fuji fpc film.

I shoot "polaroids" all the time with my medium format and fuji fpc-100. Which is actually intended to be used for test shots so you know you're exposure and settings are all right before you start using up film...

TIP Film Worse Than Gaga

I have tried The Impossible Project Film and it is crap. White dots, mushrooms, can't be used in temperatures over 75 degerees, has to be shielded from the sun immediately after coming out of the camera. Is this what you call semi decent? I think their film is more of an insult to the memory of Dr Land than any Lady Gaga glasses or reworked Pogo printer. Has the author actually tried using the film?

Impossible crap !

Agree with the film of impossible, they never reach the quality of the past ....now 20 people in the past more than 300 responsible for the quality.....impossible film is for instant nerts with a tale and not for Jo Public

Dressed for the occasion

Well, Lady Gaga is dressed like she is going to a funeral....

Suicide?

Polaroid killed itself years ago by taking on Kodak over its instant film and camera. What judge or jury could understand the chemistry? To them instant meant Polaroid. Kodak retaliated by putting a 1 hour processing station on every street corner.

Dead already.....for years.

Come on, Polaroid has been dead for AGES. No one has shot it seriously for decades, save a handful of weirdos (the same kind of people who still make platinum prints). It's like all the pretend sadness for Kodachrome by people who never shot it when it was considered "de rigeur." Christ, I'm glad I shoot digital now...

ugly purse

in this day of age who prints pictures? That's sooo 500 years ago! Please!

...

Lady Gaga= an idiot. Just another pop culture weirdo (who thinks she's artistic) doing all she can to make a buck while she's still "famous." Watching the video of their presentation, it's easy to tell that none of them really care/ know hardly anything about the crap they're trying to sell.
"Polaroid" company= an idiot as well. But they are a completely different company from the one that actually used to make good products, so I can't really blame them.
I'm just kind of sad that the polaroid name has to be soiled in such a way.
As for the impossible project, they are much different in that they actually care about what they are doing. Also, they realize that their product is not yet ready for mainstream use, and mostly sell to the niche of users that are actually willing to put some effort and thought into using their products.
I have been, and will continue to support a company that is doing something that they believe in, carrying on the original vision of Edwin Land.

They got some attention, but have no real vision

From mmmaccano:

"Frankly I hate Polaroid pictures of the 70-90s era; integral film and cameras were expensive and took the worse pictures in colors that don't exist anywhere in the real world. Could they have made the film any more expensive? They can only improve at this point in my opinion. Impossible Project? An interesting footnote and nothing more. There isn't a package of film they have produced that is anything but wildly overpriced and playing on the retro hip. They call their offerings experimental. That is a nice way of saying our film produces terrible, terrible pictures so awful they must represent high art. Please. Polaroid's presentation at CES is the first signs of life from a company that wants to go forward and that kills the Polaroid name? I couldn't disagree more. You can't kill something that has long been dead."

Sorry mmmeccano, you find encouragement in this pompous wrong-headed stunt, but heap derision on the old Polaroid and the Impossible Project?

I strongly disagree. The new Polaroid company has driven a stake through the heart of the Polaroid legacy and has absolutely no idea of what they're doing. They'll make some money no doubt, but there's no compelling vision behind these abominable 'products'. It's just a stunt, making short-term profits by ripping off the once-great Polaroid legacy with a cheesy imitation of the instant photography brand.

Meanwhile, IP has sold over 500,000 of their 'crappy' film packs to Actual Paying Customers, and are shooting for around 1,000,000 film packs/year for the next 9 years or more. While that's not a huge business, it does show that Polaroid was foolish to abandon the only product line that gave any real meaning to their name. By embracing the old technology and using it as a bridge, they would've gotten more real positive publicity that would've been well worth whatever it took to keep instant film photography alive. Instead they just look like a bunch of clueless wannabees that are slapping the name 'Polaroid' on anything that will stick.

It is true that the original Polaroid mgmt, and the crooks that bought it after the first bankruptcy did run it into the ground, and did far more to ruin the brand than the vultures that now own it.

However, the best Polaroid film and cameras were high quality systems that produced far better results than you seem to remember. The cost was higher, but if you took into account the processing you didn't have to pay for, it was not nearly as expensive as you seem to think it was.

I used both Polaroid 100 and large-format film cameras back in the day and Polaroid was the "better deal" in that it was far more convenient--you'd waste far less film, and the proofs would be right there to discuss with the client, while the regular film was off at some overpriced ripoff pro lab. When flatbed scanning became commonplace (and while digital capture was still too expensive), I hardly ever needed conventional film. Regular film was technically 'better' for enlargement, but today's, Fuji FP-series instant pack film is nearly as good, more convenient and actually a little less expensive than conventional 4x5 film and processing.

The Polaroid integral films of the 1990's were much better than you describe, easily the equal of the best 35mm films of the same period. Yes Polaroid sold a lot of crappy cameras to bad snapshooters, but in the hands of good photographers and artists, Polaroid did extremely well.

As for the Impossible Project film sucking, well yeah at first. But that wouldn't have been the case if Polaroid hadn't been so eager to sever it's ties with it's own legacy. Letting the supplier contracts expire was one thing, but they actually ordered the destruction of the unique machines that produced instant film. A wiser management would've at least 'mothballed' the machines--they didn't even try to find a buyer or look for interest from anyone like Fuji or Ilford in downsizing the declining but still potentially profitable product line. The impossible project had to start literally from scratch with only a few machines in working order and no suppliers of parts & chemistry. The fact that they have film packs that even work is pretty amazing. IP's latest revision does show significant improvement, and if they can sell half a million 'crappy' film packs in one year, there is likely a significantly large enough market for better film and maybe even some small growth in the business.

IP Film Very Dissapointing

It is widely known that Ilford looked at buying the film production from Polaroid and declined so you are wrong about Polaroid not shopping it around.

I tried using the new IP film and was very dissapointed. Unless they make terrific improvements in the next year I dont see them around very much longer. I do see Polaroid around for years, especially if they produce cool products like the ones they showed at CES.

Polaroid Did Look For Buyers

If you read the accounts of the Impossible Project, it is clear that Ilford/Harman were only involved in talks with Dr. Kaps and his investors, AFTER Polaroid already decided to scrap instant film. Need an independent source: http://fractionmag.blogspot.com/2009/01/ilford-and-polaroid-match-made-in.html

If Polaroid did indeed "shop around" for buyers, they certainly didn't try very hard. One eccentric film nut, and one former Polaroid employee were able to secure investment within a few months in late 2008. Why couldn't the new Polaroid do it? Answer: they didn't want to.

I'm sorry you got bad results from the IP film, and I certainly can't blame you for being down on IP based on that. I just ordered some and I'm hoping for a decent experience, but I do understand it's still in development.

Nevertheless, what you or I think of the film quality does not matter. It's what the many Polaroid camera owners think. As I said above, IP was able to sell half a million film packs last year to these people, which is around $10 million (US) revenue. Their goal is one million packs, around $20 million dollars per year.

You have a point. It's already pretty expensive stuff. If they don't improve the price/quality, they might not be able to get to their yearly sales goal.

However I still believe Polaroid's mgmt were fools to throw this technology away and leave millions of Polaroid camera owners high and dry, while pretending they really understand the instant photography market and know what it takes to bring it into the digital age.

I still agree with the author, these abominable products that seem "cool" to you, they offer little that you can't get better and cheaper from other digital camera companies. They have no appeal to anyone who likes instant photography, and unless Polaroid has discovered a new "GaGa" market, I don't think they'll sell very well.

The printer has potential, but the camera and the glasses, yikes! Do they really look cool to you? To me they're hideous and awkward, like they were designed by a disturbed child--oh wait, they were ;)

Great post, agree 100%

Great article thank you and an even greater line about Edwin Land turning in his grave. It's a sad day for photography.

Maybe a re-branding is needed....

I've been using Polaroid products nearly all of my life, from the day my father brought home the first SX-70 camera when I was a child, until today. I still shoot with long expired Polaroid materials; I just cannot give them up so easily. That will end eventually, of course. I can understand the disdain people feel for what Polaroid is putting out now....it's just not what people think of in terms of the brand. If they want to put out some whiz-bang-hipster-I-wanna-be-a-superstar-glasses, then by all means, go ahead. However, maybe put them out under a re-branded name. We'll all know that it was the "former" Polaroid, with new, insensitive owners that are behind it, but it ought to be called something else. Let the name of Polaroid pass into a state of historical notoriety. We can still call The Impossible Project and Fuji materials "Polaroids" if we want to, it's only natural. The name is synonymous with instant photography. We often call photocopies Xerox's, even though there are many, many manufacturers of copiers out there.

I realize that the name has been used on all kinds of things from sunglasses to scanners to televisions, but it was the instant film that carried all of the weight. There simply seems like some distinction between what used to be Polaroid and what is now Polaroid should be made.

For Polaroid read Fuji

Considering Polaroid decided to completely ditch instant print film cameras, why did they start to sell rebadged Fuji instant print cameras and film when the IP became a reality and with a an actual product to sell? It was such a short sighted decision for Polaroid to throw everything away in favour of digital tripe.