Holga Blog

You may have noticed HolgaBlog looking a bit different this week!  Polaroid Week 2010 is finally upon us (well it is in approx 12 hours!).  If you haven’t participated in a ‘Roid Week before, never fear, here’s the lowdown:

‘Roid Week was started back in 2006 to celebrate all-things-Polaroid.The organisers wanted people throughout the world to get out their cameras and shoot as much as possible through the week in celebration of Dr Land’s amazing invention.

Organised  mainly through their Flickr Group Page which gives further information:

We started POLAROID WEEK to celebrate instant film. We also started it as a project — to see what new and interesting things we could do with instant film; and to challenge ourselves to produce some really great work.

We do this twice a year: in the Spring and the Fall (according to the Western Hemisphere).

Below are the posting rules:

# 1: Give us your best possible work.

# 2: You get only (2) TWO photos a day. See Rule #1. (PS: In Flickr-world, a day = 24 hours. The Flickr clock resets itself at 8 pm EST)

#3: It’s five days, Mon – Fri. We realize a week is actually seven days, so please don’t send emails correcting us. We chose Mon – Fri because it’s easier for us to manage as Administrators & Moderators.

#4: Though we call it “Polaroid Week” any instant film is fine.

#5: Only photos you HAVE NOT posted on Flickr before are welcome. Give us something new. We delete all photos posted before the start date.

#6: DIGITAL PHOTOS that have Polaroids in them will be deleted. If you don’t have a scanner, you can take a digital photo of your polaroid, but crop out everything but the instant photo, please.

#7: No Pola droids! This is a FILM ONLY group, good people.

#8: If you do not like these rules, or want them changed — then this isn’t the group for you. Please do not join and then complain about them.

#9: If you do not play by these rules, then you and your photos will be removed from the pool without any notification or explanation.

I know, I know. We’re big meanies. But, we’ve been doing this for a while now, and we want to keep it simple and fun for everybody.

Be sure to check out some of the past pools for inspiration.

This year has an added twist however, the kind people at The Impossible Project are giving some film away.  Every day the organisers will pick two photos from that days additions to the Flickr pool and the photographers responsible will win a pack of PX600 film.  If there was ever an incentive to shoot those last few packs of Polaroid film you have been stashing, this is it!
We are doing our little part during this week with new Polaroid articles every single day, including:

• Tests on late 1970′s peelapart film. Will it still work?
• A review of the Holgaroid
• How to make a homemade Holgaroid
• A historical look at the evolution of the Land Camera
• HolgaJen takes us through using the SX70 with ATZ film for the first time.
• A Holgaroid featured Photographer of the month
• Flickr Friday-Holgaroid edition

Plus a whole heap more!

To keep you interested for now, here’s some of our ‘vintage’ Polaroid articles:

• Why you should own at least two instant cameras
• Review of Impossible Project’s PX100
• The Impossible Backlash
• The Polaroid 20×24
• SX-70 electronic mod
• The resurgence of instant film
• The Polaroid House

You can follow Polaroid Week on Twitter and Flickr.