Polaroid SX-70 ... ?

Godfrey

Godfrey

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Anyone else here working with a Polaroid SX-70?

My uncle gave me his last March. It's about the twelfth SX-70 I've owned over the years, most of them given to me and given away a couple of years later. I'm shooting Impossible Project film in it.

The results are quirky and delightful.

I just received the IP scanning jig. It's a gizmo that has slots for four prints at a time, with a soft gel adhesive backing to lift them off a flatbed scanner glass in order to prevent Newton rings.

I've worked on scanning and copying these prints several different ways and this is so far the best setup I've seen! It's fast to load and unload, holds the prints perfectly, and makes scanning 16 prints a matter of a quick half hour session. Very very happy with it!

I'll add a scan or two to this thread when I finish rendering them. This batch of prints was made with the Silver Shade UV+ film ... I've got a stock of Silver Shade Cool, another pack of Silver Shade UV+, and a test pack of their new Color Shade Protection to experiment with.

Jazzed!
 
I have one! Not yet tried the impossible films, I have a few ones from the first series not sure which, I'll check. And one of the next days...
robert
polaroid-5.jpg
 
I'm hoping to be able to swap one for a flash. Though I dread the thought of film cost, it will be fun to try out.
 
I tried some of the earlier SX70 Impossible Project film with mine (the one that needed shielding from light as soon as it appeared out of the camera) - results were a little too experimental for my tastes! I hear their new Color Protection film is much better and doesn't need shielding during development. I will give it a try soon.
 
I have 2 still. Used to take 1 with me when I travelled the hard way during the 90's. It served me to give away photo's to people I shot with my SLR, as an immediate present and no need to feel bad back home about all the adresses I would never send any copies to...
So every once in a while I fold one out, I remember my trips to Pakistan, Burma without needing to get my slides out (which I do, but not all that often).

Nescio

@Ezzie: I do have the flash and the base plate, but the tiny piece to connect the whole shebang to the camara got lost somewehre someplace...
 
Lovely stuff!

The scanning fixture for Polaroid SX70 prints makes scanning a couple of packs of prints so much easier and faster.

​

In this first pass with the fixture, I scanned just the image area rather than the whole print. At 2400 ppi density, the original scan is 55 Mpixels in size and shows exquisite tonality and detailing even with my still-ancient Epson 2450 scanner. No Newton rings, woo hoo! I'm jazzed. 🙂

Yes, film for this camera is pretty pricey. I stocked up ... five packs of SilverShade cool, one SilverShade UV+, one of the new Color Shade Protection. That's 56 exposures at about $3 each. Too expensive to snap away haphazardly, but I need to do a bit of loose snapping about to get a feel for the camera and film responses.

So many neat cameras, so little time ...
 
I have a lovely first series one myself and have been trying to use it but alas the focussing wheel seems to have seized and nobody I have contacted still seems to be able to repair SX70s in Europe without costing more than the camera is worth...

The scanning rig sounds perfect btw-thanks for the tip!
 
gwg said:
I have a lovely first series one myself and have been trying to use it but alas the focussing wheel seems to have seized and nobody I have contacted still seems to be able to repair SX70s in Europe without costing more than the camera is worth...

The scanning rig sounds perfect btw-thanks for the tip!
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Contact the folks at The Impossible Project ... they told me they can recommend a service/repair facility for most places when I thought my camera was on the fritz.

http://www.the-impossible-project.com
 
gwg said:
Thank you Godfrey, great idea!

I wrote to them and got a response in under 5 minutes! They recommended a place in Amsterdam (http://vintage-instant.com/shop/viewItem.asp?idProduct=60) that I'll send it to. They're closed until after Christmas unfortunately, but I suppose another thing to look forward to in the next year!
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Excellent! That's great to hear. The IP folks have been very good to deal with ... when I had problems that I thought were my camera, they checked their records and said, "No, that was our fault. We're sending you film from a new batch as we think your problem was caused by a defect we found in that production run." Good customer service.
 
sepiareverb said:
I pull out the SX-70 Model Two every now and again. The Impossible films are challenging, but when all comes together they are really lovely.

withmyheadfullofblood-1.jpg
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Indeed! The films are quirky, the cameras are a little unpredictable ... it's amazing when it all hangs together. The unpredictability is actually a welcome refreshment from the bang on consistency of today's cameras. 🙂
 
I've got an SLR680 SE and an SX-70 that I use for all my instant purposes. I like the results I get, a lot of it is pretty cool. The new Color Protection film is pretty good, too. Definitely resembles old Polaroid at the cost of a half-hour developing time.

30_grave.jpg
 
I've seen one at this antigue store for 40 bucks but the viewfinder is all blacked out... I want to but it but scared to waste the money.
 
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