No. 6 "Larger Than Life"

Polaroid macro-photography is not something you'll hear or see very often. So naturally I was intrigued when I found out that Polaroid made a macro camera! The camera is called the Macro 5 SLR, uses Spectra film, and has five fixed magnification settings ranging from 0.2x to 3x. The camera is huge, though, it's about the size of your head! That's only a minor drawback however since it can take some pretty spectacular photos.

No. 5 "That Lovely Green Tone"

Polaroid Artistic Time Zero film (or ATZ for short) was made from expired Time Zero chemicals after they stopped production of the original Time Zero film for SX-70 cameras in 2006. Because ATZ was made with expired chemicals, the film has some quirky characteristics, its biggest one being that the image starts turning green in the (sometimes hours) days and weeks after the initial development. The scans above were taken just after the photos were taken and they have since developed a more pronounced green color cast. The film also has such a nice softness to it, and the scan just does not do it justice of just how beautiful the originals actually are.

No. 4 "Fade to Black..."

When Polaroid released the Artistic TZ "Fade to Black" film at the end of their manufacturing days, many people hated it and thought it was a terrible idea. Their reasoning? The film was made without a fixer so the chemicals would keep on developing until the image "faded to black" after about 24 hours. The only way to stop the process was to peel open the photo and let the chemicals dry. The film soon became popular because of the beautiful colors and effects that it produced. Sadly though, they only produced a small amount of the film with leftover materials and the film is now extremely rare to find.

The most spectacular colors come and go within the first few minutes of developing so you you really need to be prepared to peel as soon as you take the shot if you want to capture those colors. Here is my favorite shot with this film, peeled after about 2-3 minutes.

No. 3 "Into the Night"

 If someone came up and asked me what my favorite time to take pictures was, I'd have to say at night. I love night photography. Some of my favorite shots were taken at night. Different colors seem to come out at night, more vibrant colors. Artificial lights also create different colors that you have to be careful of. Scenes seem to take on a different tone at night, too.

I have an entirely different shooting process at night. Every step takes longer because you're generally shooting with a tripod and setting the exposure for the scene is more complicated, plus the exposures can get really long really fast. When shooting film in low light situations you have to worry about the film's "reciprocity failure." For longer exposures, the film becomes exponentially less reactive to light, so you have to make the exposure even longer to compensate for this. I'm usually in one spot for at least 5 minutes while I make sure everything is just right, plus I usually take several different exposures of the same scene just in case. You can also shoot hand held with really fast film, like the last image which was shot on ISO 3200 film to freeze "action" scenes.

When I'm out shooting at night, I really enjoy the whole process and the final result is pretty cool, too!

No. 2 "A Sad Ending"

Lembert Dome in Tuolumne Meadows, Yosemite National Park

 

The end of 2010 didn't just mark the end of the decade, it marked the end of Kodachrome. The iconic film that we all (and by all I mean people over 30) came to know and love. The film reproduced colors like no other film and also has extremely long archival ability. With the end of 2010, the last lab in the world equipped to develop the film, Dwayne's Photo in Parsons, KS ended their Kodachrome processing. The film was first introduced in 1935 and was discontinued by Kodak in the middle of 2009. It's sad to think that Kodachrome will never be produced again and will be greatly missed because there really is nothing like it. I'm glad to say that I was able to shoot some while it was still around. Now I just have to wait for my last seven rolls to come back from Dwayne's and see how they turned out!

No. 1 "A New Beginning"

This is my first shot of The Impossible Project's (TIP) new Silver Shade film for Polaroid cameras which was taken in April of 2010. I was so excited to start using their new film and was even more excited about the results! It really is a beautiful film, and the new versions only keep getting better and better. This first version of film had a lot of problems and I was really lucky in that I seemed to have avoided most of them, namely the "Killer Crystal" which totally destroys the image after a few weeks. None of my shots were affected by it, and all of them look pretty much the same as the day they were developed.

This film has such a softness to it that the scan doesn't really do it justice of how beautiful the original actually is, which is why I have come to love instant photography. The film can also produce unpredictable, yet beautiful results that you can't always control. You create a one of a kind image that is so special that nothing will ever be able to replace it.