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…

hatch

And here is the Instant Lab instant film version of my photo…

PX680_CP_HatchShow_Instantlab_rs

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…

kenny

And the analog film version from the Instant Lab…

PX680_CP_KennyZuke_Instantlab_rs

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