Broken Bells – Mongrel Heart

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

A few weeks back my sister brought down her (beautifully designed) Polaroid SX-70 camera for us to play with. She bought it at a thrift store for $5 years ago and now if you try to find one on ebay it will cost over $100 (and over $300 new). I imagine this is partly due to The Impossible Project, an interesting group that saved the last Polaroid production plant (in the Netherlands) and has been recreating Polaroid film from scratch. Some of their first batches are a bit quirky but they seem to be refining their process.

When my sister first brought the camera down, we tried out their PX 100 Silver Shade film. I haven’t scanned those photos yet, but they were a mixed bunch. Since we had one of the first batches of this film, the backing was a bit leaky. Supposedly they have figured that out and are fixing it for the next batch.

This last time she came down, we played with the Fade to Black film, which I was really excited experiment with. So far I have only taken a few photos with it, but the basic idea is that the film turns completely black within 24 hours after you take the photo, unless you remove the backing and stop the process. I imagined it would be a gradual process, however after taking these two photos, we noticed the film went almost black within an hour or so. Both of these photos of the polaroids were taken around 5-10 minutes into the development. Supposedly if you let them go completely black and then leave them in a sunny place for a few weeks, part of the image will come back. Depending on how they tun out, I might post those results.

P.S. Please excuse (what we think are) the roller marks on the photos. They seem to show up more in some photos and less in others. Maybe that’s why the camera only cost $5.