I absolutely love these. They’re amazing, in aesthetic and functional design. They were the first folding single lens reflex (SLR) camera and the first SLR instant camera. They made them in several different finishes, but the brushed chrome and tan leather was stunning

Polaroid is a sad story. They were awesome in the 70s though

Goes back way further than the 70's. First commercial one was in 1948.

I love mine. It gets a glance almost every time I walk by it!

Oh I know. A summer camp that I used to work at has a big collection of old cameras, lots of old Polaroids in it.

yes, sometimes a company can have almost whole market, and still lost. Blackberry, Nokia, Osborne, Kodak, Facit (calculators) just to mention a few.

IBM is another good example. They killed off their personal computer business for purely enterprise work.

I have one from 1948. It looks so damn cool.

yes they basically created the PC, and later exited the whole market, they also had a printer and laptop division, now all sold. I dont think they have any consumer products at all today, or do they?

This was an expensive camera. $200 when it came out in 1972.

Which would be over $1400 in 2022 dollars.

The SX-70 Sonar (1978) was also the first autofocus SLR.

I used to collect them. I had about 30 of them. I would pick them at thrift stores and garage sales. I don't think I ever paid more than $5.

For a long time they were pretty much useless because you couldn't buy film. When someone started making film again they became a hot fad and I sold every one I had on eBay for an average of $125.

I also had over 100 flashbars that I sold for $10 each.

it looks like Polaroid sells film for it online now, but it isn't commonly distributed at most stores

would that price have made it into "pro camera" territory by any means?

could you have bought a pro camera for that cost back then? since instant film isn't meant to be professional studio quality

Nikon F2 was $660 w normal lens in 1972. So not really.

There was Polaroid and later Fuji instant film that was studio quality. I used a lot of it.

Used these instant cameras for homemade porno snaps in late 70's with my then girlfriend. Had a whole album of them. Her dad found them and burned them ,we were both over 18 so not much he could do about it. haha

Wiki article states began at 1947-8, first.

Those are important in medicine because we took in the past, Polaroid images of each child at birth, plus hand and foot prints to specially ID newborns so they cannot be very easily mixed up. Those were affixed to the charts.

Nope. They sold the ThinkPad and ThinkCenter name to Lenovo and that was their last consumer product iirc

Yep. I have one. It’s all black with the fake leather

Same here. I keep one on display in my office

Yeah, but there was waste associated with each picture. There was paper you had to peel off of the print after you timed its developing, and there was a preservative chemical swab you had to wipe the picture with. I can still remember the smell.

Remember the Kodak Handle, a Polaroid clone? Kodak lost a patent infringement suit and had to refund the sales price of the camera and accessories made for it. A buddy of mine made some good cash buying them from yard sales and returning them. Too bad the sellers didn't know!

But it was top of the technology world for a while. That smell was like acetic acid or vinegar if I remember correctly).

Oh, yeah- that camera was one of my dad's prized possessions and the only thing he had that would have been considered a luxury item back then. I think it was a really early model. He had the flash setup and a box that would hold another photo so you could take a picture of it, making a copy.

My aunt had one of those. I loved that thing. Now I gotta dig through my moms old photos. I may have a print from it. Shit, it almost hurts to say that was 45 years ago and I remember it