Tuesday 29 September 2009

Death of Polaroid / Moerenuma

As everyone knows they stopped making Polaroid film and the last batch expired more than a month ago now. I still had two films (one left now) and was looking forward to using them up, so I took the big, lumpy camera-cum-spaceship to Moerenuma Park when Andy, Yuki, Tara and I went there for an "outing" last week.

The first time I pressed the button on the new film two pictures came out at once, one blank, the other partly ruined / enhanced by the effect you can see below (hint: there wasn't really a giant caramel blanket over half of the world). After that the camera refused to finish the film and now the plastic film cartridge seems to be jammed in.

So maybe they weren't shitting about that expiry date huh?!

Or maybe it's just that I've got some midas touch that breaks cameras at the moment.

Either way, I'm really happy with the way some of these shots came out. In scanning them I've tried to preserve the "Polaroid Palette" as much as possible. As Andy said, it has an instant-nostalgia effect - when he looked at the snaps he felt like it was the record of some warm, old memory; when in fact the trip had been earlier that day.





I hope you enjoyed that latest installment of "The Last Days of Polaroid." I'm going to take a knife to the camera and try to drag it out a little longer.

3 comments:

  1. hey hey, your friendly polaroid representative is here to help.

    Those expiry dates are a load of BS (on this 600 film anyway) they are good for years, YEARS after they say, just the colours become less vibrant and true, seriously if you find this stuff even 10 / 15 years out of date it will usually work fine. unless the foil packet has been opened, its been kept in the sun, heat, or you just have a duff pack, with weird chemicals, the caramel splodge is the crazy chemicals, so im thinking thats what you had here sonny.

    as for teh cartridge getting stuck?! thats unusual, unless chemicals leaked and stuck it? like batteries sometimes do, but i dont think thats it. see if you can get it out with a knife and try some more film.

    that will be $14.95 please sir, and thank you for using polaroid.

    ps. BUNNY WANTS TO GO TO MOERENUMA!!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. pps. i like your pictures!!!
    and i like exclamation points !

    ReplyDelete
  3. I thought Midas' touch turned anything into gold. I never realised that he also managed to break cameras with his touch. This for me is especially impressive since cameras were yet to be invented.

    Sorry, I'm just one of Andy's friends.

    Instant nostalgia is a subject that is covered quite extensively in Jean Baudrillard's book 'Simulacra and Simulation' if you're interested.

    Also, advertisers are paid to use stuff like Polaroids in creating 'autobiographical references' which are essential memories that you never had.

    ReplyDelete