Just after New Years Day 2024 I received a DM through instagram from the Polaroid marketing team requesting my email address. My heart raced a little bit. When I told my girlfriend, she asked “how is it that Polaroid knows who you are?” First, thank you for that vote of confidence. Second, I have no freaking idea. Of course I sent them my email address, and a day later they asked if I would be interested in helping them with a photo project. It did take me a few nanoseconds to think about it and then responded YES!
This was the brief. In conjunction with the launch of their limited edition collaboration with Pantone and the 2024 Color of the Year film, Peach Fuzz, they wanted me to shoot a batch of the film focusing on subjects of the same Peach Fuzz color, or that reflect the ideas behind that color – a warm and cozy shade that symbolizes our desire for togetherness with others or for enjoying a moment of stillness and the feeling of sanctuary this creates.
There was one hitch. Polaroid would like me to deliver the photos by the end of January. If everything went as planned, that timetable would be tight, but totally feasible. But of course nothing goes as planned. What’s the expression? No game plan survives first contact with the opposing team? Due to a shipping glitch, the film was delayed several weeks.
I spend time on both U.S. coasts in Los Angeles and New York City. In January I was in NYC. A great location for a photo project. But I was due to leave New York a few days before the month. If the film had been delayed just a little longer, it would have arrived in NYC just after I shifted my base back to LA.
Luckily, ten packs, instead of the originally suggested eight, arrived with four days remaining. I’ve had terrible experiences lately traveling with film. X-ray machines have made a mess of my film. So I didn’t want to risk such a project by moving the film with me to LA. It all had to be shot in NYC.
That meant I basically had a weekend to take as many photos as possible. Demonstrating an efficiency I rarely exhibit, I had spent the previous two weekend scouting short potentials. Early Saturday morning on my last weekend, I popped out of bed early, ready to get started. But rain had moved in and now I had no sun. I’m not a studio shooter. I find all my subjects on the streets. I had to modify my game plan last minute.
I spent two fast full days ducking, dodging, and in some cases, leveraging cold rainy weather. In the end, I think the lack of strong harsh sun softened all my photos, which I think worked really well with the frame color. Photo colors were pretty well saturated. The I-2 camera did a nice job with auto exposure with slight under exposure compensation. And my photos had a slight moody vibe that captured a cold wet New York City winter weekend pretty much as I had experienced it.
Prior to this project I ordered several packs of the Peach Fuzz film to be delivered at my LA home. I started thinking of those packs as insurance. I could use them when I get to LA to capture a few more shots if I didn’t have what I wanted from my NYC shoot. However, as soon as I landed in LA, the skies opened and poured flood level rain for days. So there were no shooting opportunities after that first, and only weekend.
In the original brief, Polaroid was hoping I could get three to five photos. I’m sure you know how a shooting expedition can go. Some days, I’m excited if I have a 20% hit rate, meaning a few photos per pack where I’m pleased with color, composition, exposure, focus, and subject. I don’t know if it was the compression, the pressure, the film, the circumstances, the subject, the camera, just plain luck, or all of those, but I end up with forty photos I was happy with. I struggled mightily to edit my collection down to nine images I believed were solid, and that I was proud of. I submitted these nine to Polaroid.
How will Polaroid and/or Pantone use these photos? I don’t know. My hope is they’ll include them as a part of marketing and/or promotional material that’ll expose my photography to a larger audience. A boy can dream.
No matter what they do with the photos, the experience itself was well worth it. I think the dedicated concentration on a project focused my attention and effort in a way that elevated or improved my photographic eye. I might be saying something totally obvious to an experienced or professional photographer. But I’m an amateur. This was my first project. But it definitely will not be the last.
I have always had a list of subjects of interest, and I take phone photos of subjects to capture later on Polaroid film. But now I need to restructure my shooting approach to think in terms of specific projects.
Thank you Polaroid. You did me a great favor, no matter how you use, or don’t use the photos. I loved the process, am proud of the results, and gained invaluable personal insight. Thank you Polaroid.