Impossible Color

The Impossible Project held true to their commitment to bring a stable color film reminiscent of classic Polaroid 600 film. Coming soon to the line up, PX680 Color Shade. Better temperature range and more light safe. The secret film testers announced and posted their images via Flickr (this is the main PX680 group) and blogs. Lots of samples of beautiful, rich and colorful images. With this announcement came an opportunity for Impossible Pioneer card holders to purchase some of the beta 2 version of the film, of which I ordered two packs (knew I should have made it three). I believe the First Flush edition of this film will be out by early May (maybe sooner) with a Spectra version out in early Summer.

I have only shot through one pack of film so far. My first three shots were duds though. I use a ND filter over the lens of my SX-70 Sonar and what I discovered was that I think this film isn't quite as fast as 600 (or at least in beta form). I normally have to dial the exposure wheel all the way to dark, but when I did that the shots came out very underexposed. If I had been a little patient and waited to see the results I could have corrected instead of firing off another in excitement, oh well. Then at some point I took another, but forgot I had removed the ND filter and so it was way overexposed. Definitely some minor grumbling going on at first. However, what I did learn is that there is some room to play with the exposure which is a good thing to know now.

Once I quit screwing around and took some shots with good light I was pretty happy with the results. Has a little bit of a learning curve to it, but if you're good with the other flavors then this should be similar to get used to, if not easier. Other then giving it a brief cover on eject for the first 7-10 secs, the film holds up really well in shaded areas and indoors, so need to cover. Bright sun, then its advised to cover. Also gives you some creative control to flash the film as well. There is a definite warmth, almost golden quality to this film and fair amount of texture, detailed but still rough. Yellow creamy whites and more intensity in color, but muted just enough that it feels vintage still. The beta batch has some white speckles in the image area that is the result of the hand mixing process for the test film. The First Flush edition should remove most of that according to Impossible.

Pretty happy and amazed with the quality of the film. If its looking and behaving this well already, then the next editions will be fantastic. I'm looking forward to the next batch and just in time for Summer. Congrats to the Impossible team for making it happen.

PX70 FF

A mini review with some of the shots I've done with my first two packs of Impossible's new PX70 Color Shade First Flush edition. They did something different this time around when they announced the film. You could buy it in 3 packs, but at the price of two since its new and still some what of a beta flavor as far as color/exposure and all that goes. I think that was a really smart thing for them to do. Especially since its so new and unpredictable in some ways. Plus, its almost like a thank you to the customers for helping to test this out early on. The temp issue seems to be fine, light exposure is still an issue though. Had to accept that for the time being and make regular use of a light shield. I have to admit, I feel like I got a better handle on this film, much quicker, then I did with the PX100 FF. My first pack of PX70 was mostly about what to expect (and not a lot of great shots either), so by the time I got to the second pack I felt like I was finally getting shots that I really liked and was able to replicate somewhat. I found that with my SX-70 Sonar OneStep, I needed to either over or underexpose by half a wheel turn on the exposure dial. It seemed to be the only way to get more color to come thru or something with some darks to it. Like the PX100, it is on the lower contrast side and in general has a blue-green hue. You can coax it out though in other ways. Some are using warming filters on the camera to boost color and contrast. However, Impossible states that this film can take several days to finish developing. Most of mine I've waited 2-5 days before scanning. I do notice a gradual change in the overall color and density. It does tend to improve over time. Plus some of the darker areas take awhile and can look a little splotchy, some refer to it as lizard skin. Impossible has already announced the new version of PX70 at Photokina and should be on the market sometime in October. The samples looked nice, more color and contrast, but still with that nice old vintage quality to it. I'm looking forward to trying the new batch when its out. I do like the quality though of this edition. I think thats one of things I enjoy about the Impossible films in general is the variety of quality/experience with each edition.

Light shield flipped up, but I still like how it turned it out.

Check out the ever growing and complete set of my PX70 shots on Flickr.

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., originally uploaded by LeandroF.

Did some head shots for my friend Julia a couple of weeks ago. This was one of the shots for me. I think I had the portrait kit on. Impressed by the sharpness of the film.

Polaroid 340 camera, Fuji Instant C100 film.

New Old Roads

365 2.0/362, originally uploaded by LeandroF.

An actual small town moment. I pulled over to take this picture, the climbing road perspective and crossing power lines caught my eye. Its a side road that doesn't usually get much traffic. I put my hazards on, stepped out and waited a couple of minutes for a utility truck to pass, took the shot (could have sworn that I had framed it better), got back in and just then a car pulled along side. Was expecting a hey watch out or something like that. It was an older man asking if I needed help. Smiled and told him no thanks, was just taking a picture and he proceeded to tell me that I could go over the hill and make a left to get to some great viewpoints. Thought, wow, how nice. I hardly recall any moments like that, and I grew up here.

Polaroid 340 camera, Fuji Instant C100 film.