Polaroid

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The Polaroid Corporation was founded in 1937 by Edwin H. Land. The original name was Land-Wheelwright Laboratories. It was renamed after their first product Polaroid. Polaroid meaning Polarize and the suffix -oid as in to make. It is most famous for its instant film cameras, which reached the market in 1948, and continued to be the company's flagship product line. The company's original dominant market was in polarized sunglasses, an outgrowth of Land's self-guided research in polarization after leaving Harvard University at 17 (he later returned to Harvard to continue his research). In 1944, while on vacation in Santa Fe, New Mexico Edwin Lands' daughter asked why she has to wait to see a photo he took of her. Research started in developing an instant photography system the same year. In Christmas 1946, the company assembled in a movie theater showing the Jack Benny movie The Horn Blows at Midnight. In the movie, an instant passport-type camera is shown, and Land announced to the confusion of his employees This is SX70 without further explanation. In February 1947, Land demonstrated a one-step, one minute photographic process at the Optical Society of America.

The first camera sold was the Model 95 in November 26. 1948 in a Jordan Marsh department store in Boston, Massachusetts. Polaroid started working with Timex; mostly known for manufacturing timepieces. Roll film as well as pack film cameras were manufactured at their Little Rock, Arkansas plant. In 1958, 4x5 instant sheet film was released. The system allows using instant film with 4x5 cameras by loading instant film sheets into a Polaroid holder. In the 1960's Polaroid made many cameras and systems designed for industrial and professional use. Most well known are passport, macro and copy cameras. Their first camera with an 'electric eye' was released called the Polaroid Model 900. Nippon Polaroid Kabushiki Kaisha (Polaroid Japan) and Polaroid Italy is establish. In 1963, instant pack film was introduced with the Polaroid Land Model 100 camera. By this time over five million Polaroid instant cameras have been manufactured. Entry level consumer cameras were introduced most famous was the Polaroid Swinger for under $20.

In 1972, the SX70 system was introduced. This is a new OneStep instant photo system that has self contained developing, timing with motor driven automatic film ejection. This reduces 'PolaTrash' as the previous systems requires discarding a lot of wasted materials.

After Polaroid defeated Kodak in a patent battle, Kodak left the instant camera business on January 9, 1986.

Early instant cameras were often named "Land Cameras," named after the inventor of the instant process, Dr. Land. Instant cameras have been produced to use three main categories of film: rollfilm, packfilm, and integral film. All of these films can be expensive, usually costing about $1 per shot, or print. Through its history, Polaroid has been known as a company that builds quirky cameras cheaply that work quite well. Most Polaroid cameras have fully automatic exposure systems, with an electric eye to determine correct exposure. Quality can range from extremely good, as in the Pathfinder or SX-70 cameras, to extremely poor, as in the JoyCam. Despite its history of innovation, the company entered the digital photography market very late, and as a result has neither a significant market share nor significant innovation in this area.

Professional applications of the Polaroid instant film and cameras were as screen-shot cameras for scientific instruments, passport / identity photos, or large format cameras of other manufacturers equipped with Polaroid sheet film holders or pack film backs. Polaroid shots were often used to test studio lighting setups before use of other types of film or camera, before the instant playback of digital cameras became available.

The company filed for federal bankruptcy protection in October 11, 2001, and most of the business was thereafter carried on by the Polaroid Holding Company (PHC), managed by Bank One. Much criticism surrounded this takeover because the process left executives of the company with large bonuses, while stockholders, as well as current and retired employees, were left with nothing. Polaroid's bankruptcy was widely believed to be the result of the failure of its senior management to see the effect of digital cameras on its film business, a fate that also befell its primary rival, Kodak. Since the bankruptcy Polaroid-branded LCD and Plasma televisions and portable DVD players have appeared on the market.

On April 27, 2005, Petters Group Worldwide announced its acquisition of PHC. Petters has in the past bought up failed companies with well-known names for the value of those names. The same year, Flextronics purchased Polaroid's manufacturing operations and the decision was made to send most of the manufacturing to China. In September 2008, the Petters Group was infiltrated by the FBI on evidence of a $3.7 billion investment fraud. In October 2008, Petters Group Worldwide filled for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Thomas J. Petters was sentenced to 50 years in prison for the fraud.

In March 2009, following bankruptcy proceedings, the Polaroid brand name was sold once more to Hilco Consumer Capital and Gordon Brothers Brands. It is now known as PLR IP Holdings, LLC. At the time of writing, no film is being manufactured under the famous name, but various projects are being undertaken by people wishing to revive the Polaroid format.

In January 2009 Polaroid introduced the digital instant camera PoGo TWO, a variant of Polaroid's portable PoGo photo printer with built-in digicam. The very compact PoGo printers use special "Zink" paper for ink-free printing.

In May, 2017 PLR IP Holdings, LLC was sold to Wiaczeslaw Smolokowski who also is majority shareholder of Impossible. It was announced in Sept 2017 that Impossible will now use the Polaroid Originals branding on their products.

Types of Polaroid instant cameras

Instant rollfilm

Type 40 rollfilm

Type 30 rollfilm

Type 20 rollfim

Instant packfilm

Polaroid produced various model lines of cameras to use the peel-apart 80 or 100 series packfilm. These types of film are no longer manufactured by Polaroid, but Fuji makes FP-100 instant film for the latter size.

Folding Cameras - Series 1 (Mid 60's - Mid 70's)

'Bellows'-type models which fold down into a solid body, with a flip-up cover to fold over the lens assembly. All these models have rangefinder style focus mechanisms, and some of the more expensive models include Zeiss Ikon-produced rangefinders. The shutter must be manually cocked after every release of the shutter before another photograph can be taken. All cameras in this series use 100 series film.

Camera examples:

Folding cameras - Series 2 (Late 70's - Early 00's)

Rigid, self erecting bellows-type cameras where the base of the bellows structure becomes the cover for the camera when folded. These models do not feature rangefinders at all, instead they all rely on distance scale focusing by turning the front lens element. These cameras can all take either 100 or 80 series film; the fixed viewfinders feature guides for each format.

Camera examples:

Non-folding consumer models (Late 60's - Mid 70's)

Fixed plastic body cameras, most have front lens element distance scale focusing, though some are fixed focus. Most models use 100 series packfilm, a few use 80 series, and some are able to use both. Many models exist in this series; often they are very similar and were simply renamed for different markets. Model names include Colorpack, Minute Maker, Square Shooter, Swinger.

Non-folding professional models (60's - 90's) Professional, metal-bodied cameras with very high build quality and excellent optics, and passport cameras. Most of these are pack film based cameras, but some are interchangeable and can use integral backs.

Camera examples:

  • Polaroid 600/600 SE
  • Polaroid Miniportrait
  • Polaroid CU-4
  • Polaroid CU-5
  • Polaroid DS-34 Direct Screen GelCam
  • Polaroid ED-10 Microscope camera(1969)
  • Polaroid CU-5 (1964)
  • Polaroid CR-10 (1983)
  • Polaroid ID-2 (1966)
  • Polaroid ID-3 Identification System model 710 (1971)
  • Polaroid ID-4 Instant Identification System
  • Polaroid M-10 aerial camera (1968)
  • Polaroid MP-3 (1962)
  • Polaroid MP-4 (1973)
  • Special Events (1968)
  • Special Events 2 (1975)
  • Polaroid SE-5 Special Events 5

Miscellaneous

  • Polaroid Polaprinter Slide Copier model 3410

Instant film holders

There are several exchangeable backs for 35mm, medium and large format film cameras that use peel-apart packfilm as well. Not many of these were made by Polaroid themselves. Polaroid manufactured the backs, other manufacturers bought the backs to modify and integrate into their products. They are often used to take 'preview' shots on photo shoots, though they can be used as high-quality manually set Polaroid cameras with interchangeable optics.

  • Polaroid CB40 - Type 40 roll film back - 1951
  • Polaroid CB100 - Type 100 packfilm holder (all metal) - 1963
  • Polaroid CB101 - Type 100 packfilm holder (metal bar)
  • Polaroid CB103 - Type 100 packfilm holder (plastic bar)
  • Polaroid CB70 - SX70 integral holder
  • Polaroid CB72 - SX70 integral holder
  • Polaroid CB80 - Type 80 packfilm holder - 1971
  • Polaroid CB80 Camera Back for Holga
  • Polaroid CB405 - Type 100 CB103 back for 4 x 5 cameras - 1974
  • Polaroid 500 - Type 50 4 x 5 instant sheet film holder - 1958
  • Polaroid 545 - Type 50 4 x 5 instant sheet film holder - 1968
  • Polaroid 545i - Type 50 4 x 5 instant sheet film holder
  • Polaroid 550 - Type 550 4 x 5 pack film holder

Instant integral film

There were three main types of integral film produced by Polaroid: SX-70, 600 and Spectra film. All follow the same basic design: the film packs contain batteries which power the camera's exposure meter and automatically eject the pictures on shutter release.

SX-70 (aka Time Zero) and 600 film are identical in size - both produce square prints of 79mm x 79mm with the familiar 'Polaroid border' around the image. Many users of cameras designed for SX-70 film today use 600 film instead. Certain measures must be taken to prevent overexposure if 600 film is used in SX-70 cameras as 600 film has a speed equal to ISO 600; SX-70 develops at ISO 150.

The format of Spectra film is slightly larger and less oblong: the image produced is 92mm x 73mm. Like 600 film, Spectra has a speed of ISO 600. Spectra is known as Image film in some markets.

Examples:

SX-70 Film

600 Film

Many Polaroid cameras were designed to take 600 Integral film. Mostly they were low-specification plastic models designed for one-touch snapshots at parties (e.g. Impulse, 636, P 600) but there were a few SLR models aimed at professional photographers.

Spectra Film

Sheet film

Polaroid offered a giant variety of sheet film for its daylight loading sheet film holders Polaroid 545 and Polaroid 545i. The Polaroid company no longer produces film in the 4x5 inch large format enveloped sheet film, but Fujifilm produces it as part of its FP range.

Other types of instant film

Polaroid has produced several different types of smaller format film over the years, as well as experimenting with various types of disposable, toy and miniature camera formats.

The films include:

  • Captiva (also known as 500) film - 73 x 54mm image size, ISO 600, 10 pictures to a filmpack
  • Pocket film - 36 x 24mm image, ISO 640, 12 images to a pack. Available in a sticky-backed version.
  • Mio film - 62 x 45mm (Uses technology licensed from Fuji. Although Polaroid issued its own Mio film, the cameras also use Instax Mini film.)

Camera examples:

Rebranded Fujifilm cameras

Digital

  • Polaroid A200
  • Polaroid A310
  • Polaroid A500
  • Polaroid A544
  • Polaroid A800
  • Polaroid A932
  • Polaroid PDC-1050
  • Polaroid PDC-1100
  • Polaroid PDC-1300
  • Polaroid PDC-2000 (4.1996)
  • Polaroid PDC-2000/40
  • Polaroid PDC 2000/60
  • Polaroid PDC-2150
  • Polaroid PDC-2300Z
  • Polaroid PDC-300
  • Polaroid PDC-3000
  • Polaroid PDC-310
  • Polaroid PDC-3350
  • Polaroid PDC-640 / PDC-640 Plus
  • Polaroid PDC-700
  • Polaroid PDC-800

Digital color zinc paper

  • Polaroid PoGo TWO camera

35mm

fixed focus

zoom

  • Polaroid PZ1710 (2004)[1] - 35 to 57mm zoom
  • Polaroid PZ1800 - 28 to 50mm zoom
  • Polaroid PZ2001 - 35 to 70mm zoom
  • Polaroid PZ2300 - 38 to 90mm zoom
  • Polaroid PZ3000 - 38 to 115mm zoom
  • Polaroid 6300Z - 35 to 70mm zoom
  • Polaroid 8500Z - 38 to 115mm zoom
  • Polaroid 900Z Super Macro

single-use

APS

  • Polaroid 5500FF
  • Polaroid 7100FF
  • Polaroid 7200FF
  • Polaroid 7300AF
  • Polaroid 7500z - 25 to 50mm zoom

Notes

Links