Polaroid photography.

ContentsIntroduction.

Branding History.

Featured Artist.

Polaroid Today.

Products & Packaging.

What’s Good: Formats.

What’s Good: Processes.

The invention of modern instant cameras is generally credited to American scientist Edwin Land in 1948.In February 2008, Polaroid announced it would discontinue production of film, shut down three factories and lay off 450 workers. Sales of chemical film by all makers have dropped by at least 25% per year in the first decade of the 21st century.

Introduction.

SX-70 film was recently discontinued but had a strong following from artists who used it for

image manipulation.The original purpose of instant cameras was motivated by Jennifer Land's question to her

father "Why can't I see them now?"With the advent of digital photography, much of

the instant camera's consumer appeal has been transferred to the digital cameras.

Polaroid packaging when it initially started. This was at the point where they were competing against the Kodak packaging. The typeface used here proved to not be effective as the ‘a’ and the ‘o’ were too similar looking, and people were pronouncing the brand name incorrectly.

Typeface changed to News Gothic to enable clearer readability for the user and give the brand more distinction against other competitors.

1968 Polaroid Colorpack Film packaging. Due to lack of budget at the time, the quality of the print reproduction was poor so to amend this, the use of the silhouette image to display which model was inside the packaging, was a silhouette illustration. This same image was also featured in newspapers, where the print quality was also significantly poorer back then.

Branding History.

The coloured, geometric stripes and squares that are used as a

distinguishing feature of the Polaroid branding have been

taken from the component design of the original, older

Polaroid cameras and manipulated into a more

contemporary design style.

The idea was for the branding and packaging to

remain simple, using small pt size for any text and lots of blank space to create emphasis on the design features (this contrasted massively to design at the time

where sales managers were keen to cover all packaging with

as much content as possible).

The design also created a repeated pattern when the boxes

were stacked on the shelves, another aesthetic additional

aspect to the branding.

Polaroid sunglasses 1962. This design was so strong as product identity that it eventually became almost generic as a flag or sym-bol for sunglasses throughout Europe

Design by Paul Giambarba, Design Director Bill Field, 1968.Evolution of Polaroid brandincolour stripes

Paul Giambarba, Polaroid Square Shooter 2, 1971.

Branding History.

The colour edition and the black and white edition help the user to

distinguish easily which type of film they are purchasing purely

through the colour scheme.

With the introduction of the square format film in 1973, the

well-known rainbow stripesused within the branding, was

manipulated into different sized squares to communicate the new

film format.

The Polaroid logo and brand identity as we know it today.

This photo series entitled ‘Ruined Polaroids’ by Miller was taken on a partially broken SX-70 Polaroid camera. Miller explained that these beautifully random effects were caused by the film getting stuck in the camera’s internal gears, causing over exposing and unpredictable chemical reactions.

William Miller

Featured Artist.

Polaroid Instagram CameraPolaroid Instagram camera coming in 2014.A new digital camera that allows you to add Instagram filters before printing out the image from a Polaroid-style printer.

Polaroid Today.

The ImpossibleProject

In October 2008 The Impossible Project saved the last Polaroid production plant for integral instant film and started to invent and produce totally new instant

film materials for traditional Polaroid cameras. In 2010 Impossible saved analog instant photography from

extinction by releasing various, brandnew and unique instant films.

Silver Shade Film

Colour Shade Film

In April 2010 Impossible released the first line of a new, monochrome film. This unique new monochrome system contains 29 new layers and 13 new chemicals.

In July 2010 Impossible released a brand new colour film - not even the most optimistic experts believed in the re-invention of the highly complex instant colour system.

Products & Packaging.

Existing products and packaging design by the Impossible Project.

Sustainable Product Packaging

All stock included is made of recycled/recyclable cardboard whilst also not containing any form of adhesives to hold the package together. Each section is detachable dependent on how many cd’s would be packaged.

This re-brand of the Antidote software packaging significantly reduces the amount of materials and stock used in current design, and also creates a more user-friendly experience for the customer.

What is Good:formats.

Editorial DesignThis publication displays an

interesting, clean layout using a range of grids to allow for plenty

of white space throughout the content and an unusual image layout, consistently spreading the content across the centre

and dividing the page up.

Clever use of a front cover interacting with the content and creating a more unusual cover

design, allowing the publication to stand out and be more original

as well as being appropriate to content.

This creates a more tactile aspect to the overall design and

the use of the orange colour creates a contrast against the

black and white colour scheme, a recurring aspect I keep coming

across in design I like recently.

Coptic Stitch Binding

Spot Varnish

alternative and creative ways of using this binding and the kinds of publications that use this method

spot varnish to communicate a sense of quality within design

What is Good:processes.

Foil Blocking

Layered Stock

using different colours layered on top of each

other and using die-cutting to allow other

layers to show through

as an aspect of an illustration or pattern

design and use of foil ing to allow one specific

asepct stand out