In February 2008, Polaroid announced that it was no longer going to manufacture instant film, shutting down three factories and basically killing off the instant film market. (While Fuji still manufactures some instant film, Polaroid has always been the big player.)
The announcement was greeted with shock and anger from a small but vocal group of polaroid enthusiasts. Shortly after the announcement, a group called “The Impossible Project” announced that it was taking over a Polaroid factory in the Netherlands and reverse engineering Polaroid Film to sell, starting in 2010.
Interest in the project has grown over the last few months, so much so that the Summit Group—the licensee of the Polaroid Brand— has announced it will resume manufacturing of a number of Polaroid Cameras. They are even commissioning the Impossible Group to produce a run of Polaroid Branded Film. So if you through out your Polaroid One in despair six months ago, never fear! You can now buy a new one. And if you held on to your old Polaroid hoping, your hopes are about to be answered.
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1 Comment at "Instant Film is Dead! Long Live Instant Film!"
Wired just published a story about the Impossible Project: http://www.wired.co.uk/wired-magazine/archive/2009/12/features/the-impossible-project-reviving-instant-photography.aspx?page=all.
I like to think they got their inspiration from this here post. And did a lot of research in a very short amount of time….
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