Evolution
Friday I was listening to NPR, and the announcer was talking about a music artist’s new album just out. I thought, WHAT! an album?! What was he really saying? Albums per se have been gone for years, but then it didn’t seem just right to say the artist’s new cd, or new i-tune upload; the wrapping nomenclature just doesn’t apply or sound very exciting, but ‘album’ is obsolete, except as an art form. Somebody needs to come up with a fresh and exciting way to say it, because the music is still here.
Then yesterday, this appears on my desktop, under the heading of more Yipes:
Poloroid Obscura! So, best you hurry to find Polaroid film or any remaining stocks out there. One of you mentioned last week you were doing an assignment using Polaroid film this quarter— unfortunately, can’t remember who it was or exactly the shoot… but, saw this today from Beantown and thought you might find it of interest.
It is a continuing part of the ever-changing dialogue we are in that regards how photography (actually, all communications) is changing and how the old is quickly making way for the new like never before.
I can remember how important Polaroids were just a few short years ago as a film medium to test the actual content of whatever was in the shoot or to check lighting setups in a shoot; you would even build the amount of Polaroid film you thought you’d use into the cost of a project as a line item.
Now take a look at this. You photographers had best hurry along to pick up the last bit of Polaroid film around out there and shoot a bit to at least be able to say you were ‘exposed’ to it!
There is a message in here: Stay relevant and on the edge, or become an art form. It never is about technology for the sake of technology, but technology as culture. Lest we forget, it is the edge that always defines, so the balance must be respected. You can’t use yesterday’s tools to define tomorrow’s solutions.
Goodbye Polaroid!
Hank.
PS: As you might be more interested, here is the link to the very interesting story from the obituary of Dr. Land that appeared in the NY Times on March, 1992.
My first camera was a red Polaroid Zip. Of course, I was around for 8-track tapes too.
As a supplement, here’s a link to a blog detailing the branding of Polaroid. So elegantly simple, yet still powerful…but now Polaroid means nothing but cheap electronics.
i read somewhere that Polaroid actually went out of business in 2001, and that what exists now is more of a holding company that is parceling out the different parts of the old Polaroid to make some money back. This means the factories are actually for sale, so a group of investors can still come in and buy the rights to make/sell polaroid film. all hope is not lost.
And… they just announced a “digital instant mobile printer” so us digi-party-paparazzi types can still embarrass on the spot!
I’m just proud that Portfolio Center actually teaches evolution… having a class called “intelligent design” would be too easy.
I once saw Meadowlark Lemon of the Harlem globetrotters in a hotel in KY when I was young. My mom had just gotten the first Polaroid and I pointed it a him and then adjusted the lens. He said “Take the picture, kid” under his breath, out of my folks’ earshot. I remember that the photo came out and developed in a few minutes, and there he was staring impatiently at me, not smiling.