Instant Photography
インスタント写真 / 1948– / Technique / Photographic Techniques
Polaroid made the picture appear on the spot. The white-bordered square, the soft color of chemical development and the fact that only one copy exists became a language of intimacy that outlived digital and carries on in Instax.
At a glance
Visual cues
- The white-bordered square
- Tender drifting color
- The wait for development
- One-of-a-kind materiality
Best used for
- Keepsakes handed over on the spot at a shop counter or an event
- Production records kept as evidence that cannot be retouched
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Dictionary entry
- Type
- Handwrite date and name in the white margin below
- Composition
- Compose for the square and keep it to one or two people
- Material
- Build the development wait into the event and leave color drift alone
- Caution
- The style collapses into a white frame added in software, and the core of it, handing someone the only copy that exists, is lost.
- Further study
- Edwin Land's SX-70 / Warhol's Polaroids / Fujifilm's Instax
Related entries
- Lomography (ロモグラフィー)Shared effects: Play / Nostalgia.Compare Instant Photography and Lomography
- Snapshot Aesthetic (スナップショット美学)Shared effects: Intimacy / Nostalgia.Compare Instant Photography and Snapshot Aesthetic
More from Photographic Techniques
Continue through styles in the same Photographic Techniques family, prioritised by shared effects.
- Stereograph (ステレオ写真)Shared effects: Play / Nostalgia.
- Cyanotype (サイアノタイプ)Shared effects: Nostalgia.
- Photomontage (フォトモンタージュ)Shared effects: Play.
Browse all Photographic Techniques entries
Cite this entry
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- https://indexstyle.org/styles/instant-photography
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