Brand-name famous for instant film and cameras, whose popularity spanned from the 1960s through the 90s, until it was shadowed by digital photography.
After
two rounds of chapter 11 bankruptcy, in 2009 Polaroid exited the film market, despite the niche market that still exists. Remaining packs of Polaroid film, including expired packs,
fetch insane amounts of money on
eBay.
In the meantime, the corpse of the Polaroid Corporation is being raped by Lady
Gaga. The company re-entered the instant film market in
2010; although initially announced to be the return of 600 film, the end-result was really the Fujifilm Instax camera and film in drag.
Most older "pack film" cameras can still be used; they accept Fuji's FP-100C color, and/or FP-3000b black and white films.
New film for the "integral film" cameras has been re-invented and released by The Impossible Project, but is still under
heavy-development.
Don't bother with Polaroid film that expired before 2004... either the chemicals
will be dried-up, or the battery
will be a dud.
