Expired Polaroid Type 57 - Graflex Crown Graphic - Hillary

Following up yesterday's Impossible Color Film for SX70 photos of Hillary, I thought I'd share one of the large format instant photo's that I took during the same shoot. This was shot with my Graflex Crown Graphic on some expired Polaroid Type 57. Enjoy. 

Expired Polaroid Type 57 - Graflex Crown Graphic - Still Life

Slowly but surely I've been working my way through the 4x5 sheets of expired Polaroid Type 57 that I have. While I hate to see my stash of this scarce film slowly start to dwindle, I keep reminding myself that it's only going to degrade more and more the longer I hold onto it. If I truly want to shoot and enjoy this film, there's no better time than right now. 

Shot with a Graflex Crown Graphic these still life's were all taken at my parents house this past weekend. The place is full of things reminiscent to what you might find in my house... there's just more of it. It's pretty much made for shooting still life set-ups. Enjoy.

Expired Polaroid Type 57 - Graflex Crown Graphic - Asparagus

In keeping with the theme from my most recent post, I decided last night to take another food related photo. Again, this photo was taken with expired Polaroid Type 57 using a Graflex Crown Graphic. This film, far past it's better days, is quite difficult to properly meter and expose. Usually, it takes me two shots to get something I'm happy with... one initial exposure based off my meter reading, and a second exposure to adjust whatever went awry with the first. Considering that this is rare, hard to find film, I'm happy to say that I'm getting a little better at compensating my initial readings and that I got this photo on my first shot. Taken outside with available light, I metered this photo at f/8 - 1/250th and took a final exposure of about f/9 - 1/100th. 

Expired Polaroid Type 57 - Graflex Crown Graphic - Avocado

Admittedly, I've not been working on this blog nearly as much as I used to or as much as I'd like to be. The year long Roll-A-Week project that I'm currently doing (Coalesce52) has taken up a lot of my free time in terms of shooting, scanning, editing, and posting. Aside from that, I'm amidst a 30 day Paleo food plan (no sugar, no grain/gluten, no legumes, no dairy, no alcohol) which requires me to be in the kitchen quite a bit. Last night, thinking of how long it's been since I've posted here, I decided to take something that I've been working with a lot in the kitchen and photograph it in a simple, still life kind of way. 

Without further ado, here's the Avocado. Photograph taken on expired Polaroid Type 57 with a Graflex Crown Graphic using available window light (about f/4.7 at 1/10th).

Expired Polaroid Type 57 - Graflex Crown Graphic - Cassie

I just wanted to write a quick post this morning to share an image from a shoot I did this weekend with local Cleveland model Cassie. She's repped by a new local agency, Taxi MGMT, who seem to be growing quickly and have a lot of great talent in their ranks from what I can see. Although I didn't get to shoot as much film as I would have liked I was able to shoot a bit of Polaroid 664, which I'll post at a later time, and this shot using some expired Polaroid Type 57 in my Graflex Crown Graphic. I think I'm finally getting a handle on this film and the best approach for metering and exposing it. There's an interesting, almost pencil sketch, quality to this film that I kind of like. In any event, I'll continue shooting it until the sad day that I inevitably run out.

Expired Polaroid Type 57 - Graflex Crown Graphic

This past weekend was the first time in a long time that I got the chance to work with a new model. Hillary was nice enough to drive down from the Erie, PA area Saturday for a shoot. We shot a couple looks that morning with a variety of cameras and a few different film types. Down the road I hope to post a few images from my Mamiya 645j that I had loaded with Rollei Retro 100, and, perhaps an image or two from my Polaroid 250 using some original Polaroid 664.

Today's image, however, is more of a celebration for me personally as I've finally put to use once more my 4x5 Crown Graphic. It's a been a little frustrating to not have this camera out in recent weeks as it's become one of my favorite camera's to use, but, the disappearance of the readily available Fuji 4x5 instant films definitely cut into how often it sees the light of day. So finally, from my slowly dwindling supply of expired Polaroid Type 57, here's a new large format image. Despite the grainy, temperamental nature of this expired film, I really do enjoy using it and trying to get decent results from it. 

Maybe one of these day's I'll finally get around to developing some of the sheet film I've shot over the last couple months... or even start shooting more sheet film in place of the instant film supply I do have. At the very least, I could again shoot some large format color images...

Expired Polaroid Type 57 - Graflex Crown Graphic

You might remember, some time ago, that I mentioned purchasing two boxes of expired Polaroid Type 57. Well... it's taken just about a month, but, I finally have an image to show for it. Above is what I would consider my first successful shot on this 09 expired Polaroid Type 57 4x5 sheet film. By my calculations, this is the eighth attempt with this film - which to me just means I have 32 more good shots left in me.


Initially I thought the problem with this film was bad chemistry. Luckily, during Cleveland's Analog Pulse event, we did a large format walk with none other than Mat Marrash - a great large format photographer and co-host of the Film Photography Project's bi-monthly podcast. When Mat found out I was having trouble with my 57 he became determined to figure out why. What he found was that my film didn't appear to have any issues at all, but, it was in fact my Polaroid 545 back that was broken. Despite his best efforts, and many attempts at taking the back apart and reassembling, I eventually had to pick up another 545 off of Ebay.


All of that brings me to this week, and, up until this point I had probably wasted four sheets of film in learning that my film back was in fact never working. From there it only took one gross over-exposure, one bad pod with uneven chemistry, and then one gross under-exposure to eventually come up with this - Sheet number eight and my first successful (read useable) photo using this film.


It's not the best shot in the world, but I'm pretty happy to find this film in working order. There's definitely some grain and despite it's 3000 iso rating I'd venture to guess that it is actually closer to 2000 speed these days. Still, I'm shooting original large format Polaroid film. For a guy who really didn't even get a start in any analog photography until after the closing of the last polaroid factory... I'd say that's pretty cool.