Holy Polaroid!

Yet another detour on my very extended train of thought...Polaroid has been saved! Seriously! Word on the street is that an Austrian businessman has come to the rescue, and that film will be back in production in 2010. The man of the moment, Florian Kaps, is behind the Polanoid online gallery and The Impossible Project, and he now plans to revive analogue integral film with a little help from British photography company, Ilford. According to The Independent, Mr. Kaps has hired 11 original Polaroid employees and is working on prototypes to reinvent films with two exposure types for both the SX-70 and 600 series. Although the film will be rebranded under the Impossible label, vintage Polaroid junkies like myself are obviously the target market.

[My little Land Camera 1000 will no longer be a display piece!]

And let's be honest, my Land Camera has been a decorative piece since his purchase last year, because the price of film skyrocketed after the February 08 announcement of the discontinuation, not to mention the Australian dollar plummeting to scary new lows. So call me selfish, but I'm absolutely thrilled that I may actually be able to afford film for my camera! Yayyyyyy!

A big thank you to Mrs. French (of Bliss fame of course!) for sharing this wonderful news with us, and props to Save Polaroid and the vast online community that banded together to show their support and love of all things Polaroid.

And a HUUUUUUUUGE thank you to Mr. Kaps, my new favourite patron of the arts, who said:

The project is more than a business plan;
it's a fight against the idea
that everything has to die
when it doesn't create turnover.

Amen Florian!

He's already got Polaroid's old equipment and their old factory, so now all he needs is our support! Head over to The Impossible Project and sign up to keep the Polaroid dream alive!