Amanda's Cameras  ᥫ᭡

polaroid highlander model 80
type: folding rollfilm instant camera
released: 1954
film: 30 rollfilm (discontinued 1979)

polaroid sx-70
type: folding slr instant camera
released: 1972
film: sx-70 integral film; compatible with 600 integral film using mint flashbar (nd compensation mode)

polaroid sx-70 onestep
type: box-style instant camera
released: 1977
film: sx-70 integral film; compatible with 600 integral film using mint flashbar (nd compensation mode)

polaroid impulse af
type: box-style with built-in flash and sonar autofocus
released: 1988
film: 600 integral film

polaroid 600 onestep flash close-up
type: box-style with built-in flash and close-up lens
released: 1993
film: 600 integral film

polaroid now
type: rechargeable box-style with built-in flash and autofocus
released: 2020
film: i-type integral film and 600 integral film

the 1954 Polaroid Highlander Model 80 (top left) belonged to my late grandfather who inspired my love of polaroid and film photography. it is my main heirloom from my beloved late grandparents. unfortunately, the polaroid 30 series rollfilm was discontinued in 1979, 14 years before i was born in 1993, so i most likely would have never had a chance to actually use the camera myself. my grandfather was born in 1932, making him an early adopter of polaroid. this was the second model of the polaroid instant camera. the first model, the Polaroid Land Camera Model 95, was released in November 1948.

i can imagine how excited my grandparents must have been to buy the camera, one of the first instant cameras! my mother, their first child, was born in 1953, so she would have been a baby when they first got the camera. when i was growing up, my grandparents were always taking pictures, especially my grandfather. they took pictures of our family, the family pets, and friends who came to visit. they took pictures of the birds they watched and the camellia and azalea flowers they tended every year. they would display the polaroids on their walls and on the refrigerator.

i'm a millennial who grew up during the 1990s and 2000s, which was the transition to the digital camera era, before the smartphone era became dominant in the 2010s. i was a quiet and introverted child. i definitely could have been described as an "emo kid." like most moody teenagers, i didn't appreciate my grandparents taking photos of me. however, looking back on it, some of my fondest childhood memories were at my grandparents' house full of Polaroids, asking questions, and hearing their stories. years later, i realized that i adopted the same ritual they practiced, of taking polaroids of the most important people, pets, and places in my life.

here's a polaroid of me at my grandparents' house from around 2006 when i was 13 years old. i'm wearing a t-shirt of my favorite band, nine inch nails' album pretty hate machine (1989). i had just discovered their music the year before through their comeback album with_teeth (2005). if you look at the background, you can see my grandparents' walls covered with polaroids and mementos. never did i expect this memory and this photo would mean so much to me 20 years later.

Canon AE-1
type: film slr
released: 1976
film: 35mm

Nikon D60
type: digital slr
released: 2008
film: none

Hello Kitty x Retrospekt
type: point-and-shoot
released: 2024
film: 35mm

more camera stories coming soon!