When the last Harry Potter book was released, we went down to Barnes & Noble for their midnight release party. They had a number of activities for the kids, including a ‘magic camera’. It took a ‘blank’ photograph, which then magically transformed itself into a photo of the junior witch or wizard…
The Kiddo had never seen such a thing. He was suitably impressed…
I still have a OneStep Flash 600 in good working condition. I’ll have to pick up some film before it all goes bye-bye. Man, what a shame.
My celebrity Polaroid camera story.
Before moving to Las Vegas, I lived in West Hollywood and decided to have a garage sale on the front walk of my apartment building. One of the things in my packrat pile of junk was an old Polaroid camera that I got in the late 60’s for a birthday present.
I had barely been on the sidewalk for 10 minutes when a guy came running across the very wide street - he had seen that camera from half a block away! He was all over it - looking for scratches or whatever, and deemed it to be in great shape and said flat out, “I collect them. How much do you want for it?”
I suppose I could have asked for some outrageous amount, but figured it the camera was going to a “good home” and why screw the guy over - even though I knew it was the rather successful actor, Brendan Fraser, who was buying it. I think I sold it for about $15.
He was really, really happy to get it and carried it away like it was a treasure. About a year or so later I happened to see some quick interview with him and he actually mentioned his love of Polaroid cameras and his rather extensive collection of them. Wikipedia even mentions that a collectors book on Polaroids gives him a special dedication.
One of those is still in use where I work. I think it’s a later version though; it can also write to a memory stick.
My family never owned a Polaroid camera, though I do remember seeing some in use at family reunions as a child. We had a 35mm Minolta; when I got my first digital camera in 2002, it was a Minolta. It still works, but it runs on AA’s, and keeping enough batteries charged for it is aggravating at times. Of course, Minolta’s not in the digital camera business anymore…
I got a Polaroid Swinger as a high school graduation present. I’d been the staff photographer for the high school newspaper (the Bengal Cry!) and wanted to pursue a career in photojournalism. My parents wanted to get me a “real” camera, but the Swinger was all they could afford.
I remember those One-Step commercials. Most Americans thought Mariette Hartley and James Garner were really married. They were cute commercials. I owned a One-Step in the Army, then invested in 35mm.
Actually, Polaroid stopped making SX-70 film back in the fall of 2005. It’s all the other instant films they’re discontinuing.
But fear not! These guys import a ‘Blend’ film from the Netherlands. I’ve yet to try it; I’ve got two outdated packs of the real thing in the fridge, but I may give the new stuff a whirl this summer.
I loved my SX-70, I had two of them. They inspired the creation of my VanGoghlaroids.
I guess I blew it - I’ve idly wanted to build a dim light camera using the 3000 ASA Polaroid black and white film, and a projection TV lens. They made the film really fast to make it easy to have a cheap small aperture lens and still use fast shutter speeds, and it was grainy as hell but since you’re not enlarging it the grain was acceptable. I even bought the surplus projection TV lens. It has an aspheric plastic rear element, an image size suitable for the film, and an amazing speed of f/0.7.
Oh, well.
I guess PC World didn’t know that, since the only illustration for their article was a sparkling pack of SX-70 film.