The folks at the IMPOSSIBLE Project are forging ahead into a whole new territory of photography. As you likely know, back in the fall of 2008, the IMPOSSIBLE Project swept in and saved the last Polaroid production factory for integral instant film. Since then, a super dedicated team has been working diligently to keep instant film as a medium alive and well. The IMPOSSIBLE Project folks have come so far in such a short time, and their incredible work allows photographers (a number of us Muses and so many of YOU in our Mortal Muses community) to keep enjoying and shooting with their vintage Polaroid cameras. Personally, I’m not sure where I’d be in my creative photography journey if it weren’t for the IMPOSSIBLE Project.
So while instant film is the name of the game for the IMPOSSIBLE Project, the folks there know that we also live in a digital age with amazing cameras built into our phones. In their brilliance, the IMPOSSIBLE Project is MERGING these two mediums. Yup. You read that correctly. The IMPOSSIBLE Project held an uber successful Kickstarter campaign last fall to develop and bring us the IMPOSSIBLE Instant Lab. The Instant Lab allows you to take your digital iPhone photos and transform them into analog instant film photographs. If you’re like me, you’re thinking: O.M.G.
A few weeks ago, as part of the IDEAS CITY festival at the New Museum in New York City, the IMPOSSIBLE folks were there with the Instant Lab printing out user-submitted images of cities, and creating an exhibition that grew over the course of the day. The awesome team at IMPOSSIBLE selected a number of iPhone photos that were submitted via Instagram, and used those to print analog film photos with the Instant Lab during the festival. I was fortunate to have two of my images selected with the best part being that IMPOSSIBLE would mail my Instant Lab photos to me to see and keep!
The first iPhone shot I submitted was a night photo of a neon sign from Nashville of the famous letterpress, Hatch Show Print…
And here is the Instant Lab instant film version of my photo…
The second image was from the storefront window of Portland, Oregon’s Kenny & Zukes. I decided to edit this photo with various iPhone apps like I normally would and see how that would turn out as it was transformed to an instant film version. Here’s my original iPhone image…
And the analog film version from the Instant Lab…
Suffice it to say, I’m in love. I think this new technology is super cool. It brings together two mediums in an entirely new and fresh way. I love the merging of completely modern digital, iPhone photography with the vintage and classic photography of instant film. I CANNOT wait to get my Instant Lab. For the Kickstarter backers, the Instant Labs will be shipping soon, and for those who want to keep updated with when the Instant Lab is available for order, you can sign up for email notifications.
Thanks for keeping instant alive AND for bringing us ever new ways to develop our photography, IMPOSSIBLE Project!
Meghan of Life Refocused
Meghan, Thanks for the Instant Lab preview. I would love to have one of these sitting on my desk.
Nikki
This is so cool Meghan! I love seeing your photos “updated” and can’t wait to see more! One of these on my desk too might be in order!
The Kenny & Jukes shot is so stinking good. and I am with the girls on this, I might need one for my art wall above my desk…
I may start stalking my mailman until my Instant Lab arrives! There are so many photos that I take with my iPhone that I WISH I could have taken with my Polaroid but either the moment was too quick to pull out and set up the Polaroid or the conditions were wrong (light, heat/cold, etc.). Being able to combine these media is so freaking exciting!
Oh wow. Just amazing. This is just perfect.
I…… just squee’d, outloud!!
This looks amazing. I can’t wait! I”m just hoping it is not going to be $$$$$ 🙂
holy moses! that Kenny & Zuke’s image is beyond beyond. I was on the fence before now, wanting to love something that put the fun of old school polaroid into new tech, but the color on these is soo soo good. i think I’m sold. thank you so much for the before and after for comparison.
These are such perfect fauxlaroids. I can’t wait to see the images you produce with this new piece of kit!
Now this is why I love the Impossible Project so much; they come up with these things you’d think were impossible to do – and end up succeeding marvellously.
The Polaroid Pogo already lets you do this. There is an Android app for it too. I am not sure about iPhone, but the color reproduction is much better and the Zink paper is much cheaper. Instax cameras by Fujifilm are great for instant photos, and the image quality is much better than Polaroids. Those also have cheaper film. The Impossible film is terrible and overpriced. Sure they are keeping Polaroid cameras alive but the image quality is so poor and the Fujifilm cameras are much better.
I feel that fans of Impossible Project have a misplaced faith in them because of their nostalgic love for Polaroid. Their film is very poor indeed. It is not artistic at all. Compared to Polaoid, it is expensive and not even half as good. It is sad that the original Polaroid folded and stopped manufacturing their film packs but the clowns that picked up the mess only did so because they knew that they can market crap to a niche that still harbours love for old Polaroid cameras. Sadly, the Impossible Project films produce very few usable shots. To add insult to injury, the film packs have less shots than the original Polaroid film. I think some people have a nostalgia for these things but they don’t remember the original technology. Sadly, people support this company because it is seen as a bastion of old world reverence. Unfortunately, its products speak for themselves.
Howdy! This is my firtst comment here so I just wanted to give
a quick shout out and tell you I genuinely enjoy reading your blog posts.
Caan yoou recommend any other blogs/websites/forums that deal with the same topics?
Thanks a lot!