Instant Photography in the Summer - A Basic Guide
Now that is much warmer weather is with us in the northern hemisphere, our customers have been inquiring about best practices for shooting Impossible film in hot or humid conditions. We have put together the following brief guidelines to help you to get the best out of Impossible instant photography.
Firstly and most importantly:
Store all unopened film packs somewhere cool, preferably in a fridge or insulated ice box.
Before using a cooled film pack in your camera, let it 'acclimate' to room temperature.
When shooting at temperatures of over 28°C (82°F) color photos will have a tendency to develop with a yellowish/ reddish tint. You can minimize this effect by letting the photo process in cooler surroundings, like an air-conditioned room or an insulated bag or beneath a cold beverage can.
While current Impossible photos are much more light resistant when processing compared to previous generations, care must still be taken to shield them, especially when the ambient light is bright.
Photos that are over-exposed to light as they eject from the camera (or during processing) will typically result in very light, low contrast images.
There is a simple way to perfectly protect your photos from light: the
Impossible Frog Tongue! Whether you have a standard 'box type’ 600 or SX-70 camera, an Image/Spectra camera or a folding SX-70 or SLR 680, you can buy an Impossible Frog Tongue to match. Once fitted to your camera, the Frog Tongue uncurls over the top of each photo as it ejects from the camera, shielding it from light.
As an alternative to a Frog Tongue, you can also use the film dark-slide (the black cover that ejects first when you insert a new film pack into your camera) to cover the photos immediately after they eject from your camera.
Learn more.Finally, Impossible films tend to be 'fast’ (sensitive to light). We recommend that you adjust the exposure wheel or slide on your Polaroid camera 1/3 to the dark setting when shooting in bright light conditions.
After shooting, keep your Impossible photos in your bag, out of direct sun and at a medium temperature.
To summarise, the best approach to shooting on hot and sunny days is to minimize your films exposure to any and all extremes of temperature or light!
Happy shooting!
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