Motherboard

A Lot Like Actually

In June of 2008, Polaroid shuttered its SX-90 instant film manufacturing facility in Enschede, Netherlands, citing the global shift toward digital technology. Of course. Almost immediately after, Austrian entrepreneur Florian Kaps teamed up with Dutch scientist and 28-year Polaroid employee, Andre Bosman, to rescue the factory and its instant film manufacturing equipment. Setting themselves a one year goal, they set out to reengineer Polaroid’s legendary and complex film. The Impossible Project was born.

With a Polaroid instant camera in the pocket of every pea coat in Williamsburg, it couldn’t come soon enough. Indeed, even Polaroid itself, or the company now using the Polaroid name, The Global Summit Group, is restarting production of some instant analog cameras, with none other than Lady Gaga fronting as ‘creative director.’.

And look at that analog watch: time’s up! Motherboard recently spoke with both Kaps and Bosman to see how things are developing in advance of their February re-launch of instant analog film.

I heard that Polaroids actually have a negative, and that you had to reverse engineer how to make them. Is that true?
Andre Bosman: All Instant pictures have a negative. The specific negative used by Polaroid was no longer available and restarting the production of this negative would have taken more than two years. This is caused by the fact that the production of this particular color dye molecule needed for the Polaroid Negative was discontinued years ago already and these dye molecules need to age or mature, like wine.

This meant that we had no other option then to work with other color dye molecules, which already have passed their aging cycle. Different colour dye molecules also means designing a new principle of attaching these molecules to the silver halide, which makes up the light sensitive mechanism in the negative.

Long story short: for the negative it is not reverse engineering, but starting from scratch. Likewise for the receiving sheet (often called positive, which is actually a wrong name, but easier to understand). The chemicals that are spread between the negative and receiving sheet are also new. Which is obvious, when the negative and receiving sheet are new.

All other materials do fall into the category of reverse engineering. Knowing how they worked in the past, we are creating new materials from new base materials.

What have been the major challenges in making the new film?
FK: To name a few, we had to reinvent a new negative, a new positive, new reagent, new foils, we had to find a solution for the battery, et cetera et cetera…
AB: The major challenge is that all these new materials need to work together as a team. However, since we are creating them simultaneously, we are testing [them] one by one separately. No [chance] upfront to test them together!

This means we have to [test them] technically — imagining how the interactions will play out. This is a challenge which is next to impossible to do. There are an immense number of competing and interactive reactions, chemically as well as physically. On top of that, photographic components are, by nature, very sensitive and instable. Without time to do full-blown shelf-life testing, we need to appraise which processes will occur before the picture is taken, which processes occur during picture taking and actual development, and which processes will occur after the picture has developed.

Is the new Polaroid film going to take advantage of technology improvements since the original was created?
FK: Instant film by Impossible as a brand new film developed from the scratch, not at all congruent with the Original Polaroid recipe—but it’s going to be produced on the same old machinery as in the ‘70s, so you can’t really [speak] of technology improvement there, as this is the only way to produce it. The new film will have a new, very unique character as it will be a completely new film, combined with the iconic characteristics of the traditional Polaroid film, like frame, format, smell …
AB: Starting from scratch with all new materials, we have the benefit of technology that has advanced since the early instant films. One good example is variation in calliper [thickness] of base materials. Today’s standard accuracy in calliper of common materials is better then the accuracy of special materials, 30 to 40 years ago.

It is not all hallelujah however. Many chemicals and processes that were okay to use years ago have now been banned. Environmental and safety legislation are way stricter these days.

I’ve read that the film being released will be different from Polaroid’s classic film, improved in some way. How so, and why? It seems like the swell of Polaroid fandom is interested in Polaroid analog’s very specific aesthetic.
AB: With the use of new colour dye molecules, comes a new characteristic of the finished image. So by design color saturation and pastel tints will look different from the original Polaroid’s. Having said that, one should realize that there were very different colour characteristics between Polaroid film formats as well. Polaroid’s younger T600 film differed tremendously from early type SX-70 film. Many customers prefer the SX-70 colours and its ability to be manipulated over the younger and improved T600 film. We aim to get closer to the SX-70 film for both the features of “color characteristic” and “manipulation.”

How do you think the iPhone Polaroid photo application has driven up demand for actual real-life Polaroid analog film and cameras?
FK: It’s not only the iPhone Polaroid photo application but e.g. also programs like poladroid that prove how vivid people’s fascination for the instant film aesthetics actually is. Also the demand in the last original Polaroid products has been increasing dramatically over the last two years (as we can watch in our shop, www.polapremium.com), so yes, demand for the actual “real-thing” is rising, for many reasons.

Recently Lady Gaga became the [“creative director”] of Polaroid. Huh?
AB: It really came as a surprise that she was introduced as new creative director. Everybody believing in analog photography is highly welcome, but we have to very clearly state that The Impossible Project is the one and only company in the whole milky way that is capable of producing Analog Instant Film for Polaroid cameras. This fact is accepted and acknowledged by Polaroid.

Do you think the film’s release will have impacts beyond Polaroid’s very dedicated fan base?
FK: Sure it would be desirably to see the fascination and usage grow. We’ll see. But we are certainly aware of the fact that our product will of course never become a mass product (as instant photography used to be in the ’70s) but be a nice product for lovers, freaks and digital rebels.

Say this is wildly successful, how does the Impossible Project plan on reinvesting its earnings?
FK: Honestly we haven’t thought about this yet — we’re currently too busy to revive instant photography and to get some new film for those millions of hungry Polaroid cameras out there.

Will prices for Integral Instant be on par with historic Polaroid film prices? Or cheaper? Can it get cheaper?
FK: I can’t tell you yet how much one Impossible film pack is going to cost as this will depend on the final production costs, but our goal is to keep the price at least at the minimum of the average price (ca. 20 USD) per pack if not less.

Have you considered how this approach could work for resurrecting other discontinued technologies?
FK: Well, our approach already led to the amazing fact that the current Polaroid licensee aims to re-produce some new instant cameras (as they saw the hype and customer’s demand that we stirred, they couldn’t resist but to jump on the bandwagon, although Polaroid decided in 2008 to totally take their hands off the analog photography business) as well as to order film from us — which is stunning. And who know what will follow in which other fields of technology.