On the last day of this year, Polaroid will cease production of its magical film.
In 2004 I became fascinated by a beautiful old chrome and leather folding SX-70 polaroid camera a friend had. Within a week I had bought two on ebay, and a year-long project was born. Every day I carried a camera with me, and made one polaroid of something interesting I saw that day, and published each of them online at Polaroidiary. It was an exciting exercise in seeing, discipline and storytelling, and the resulting collection is an evocative document of a turbulent year of my life.
After playing daily with the SX-70, and the magic of holding the framed object-photo and waiting, breathless, for an image to surface out of the grey murk, the finality of polaroid’s decision to cease production does indeed feel like the death of an old, well-loved friend.
Here are few of my favourites from Polaroidiary. You might also like to look through the archives, or just start at the beginning.
It’s definitely just not the same, but in typical optimistic, cheerful Photojojo style, they’ve gathered some ways to keep the Polaroid spirit alive in spite of it all.
3 Comments…
What do you think? Leave a comment…
…no you didnt
http://www.polaroidiary.com/2004/04/250404.html
Smartass. But you’re right, I didn’t. I *had* considered just faking it – making a bunch of polaroids on one day and posting them as different days – but decided to go for honesty instead.
Why not stock up on film and do it again in ‘09 (even though you’ve missed the first few days).
600 film is now more than $2 a shot, but there’s plenty of it around…