Have you noticed that bright multi-coloured cardboard sleeve stuck on the wall of the dark room, in the corner just above the collection of instant photos? That’s the packaging from the first colour film made by the Impossible Project. (See related PhotoSoc post)
When Polaroid announced in 2008 that it would stop making films, fans mourned the end of long love affaires with their iconic instants. Many photographers searched high and low for the last remaining batches and bought up as many boxes as they could afford. This film hoarding behaviour drove up the prices; second-hand and even severely out-dated films were gradually changing hands for way more money than sense on eBay. With hindsight, it was a better financial investment than gold!
But blowing all their money on films was not enough – they were simply not ready to let it go! There were campaigns and petitions to ‘Save Polaroid’ at the time, with similar discussions and RIP messages posted in Flickr groups, mixed with rumours of a new project that might just save the day…
Entered The Impossible Project which took over an ex-Polaroid factory in Enschede in the Netherlands, bought some ex-Polaroid machinery, employed 10 ex-Polaroid staff and set out to reinvent a new generation of instant films for legacy Polaroid cameras. From then on, the films that can feed those millions of existing cameras went from global mass-produced products, to one down-sized factory serving a niche cult market.
In October, I visited this factory in the Netherlands and made some interviews, which were recently published on the Film Photography Project website. I spoke to Henk Minnen, Project Engineer, about up-coming new films, including 10×8 large format films currently in development, and interviewed one of the founders of the Impossible Project, André Bosman.
Listen to an edited version of the interviews
Find out more about the factory visit in my future post…
January 2nd, 2012 at 5:08 pm
Hey Viv, I absolutely loved listing to this interesting interview filled with your quirky asides and interjections! I look forward to your future posts! Do you have a website?
January 3rd, 2012 at 2:11 am
I do trust all with the concepts you’ve presented for your post. They are actually convincing and can undoubtedly work. Nonetheless, the posts are too brief for newbies. Could just you please lengthen them a bit from next time? Thanks for the post.