Polaroid T57 1972

[John Conway]

I don't know about this one. Picked up a box of T57 with a 1972 expiration, very cheap, but this one doesn't sound good. The print coater tubes are good. Still wet and smell fine. but the unopened film boxes are making a scary sound. I noticed the sound when I opened the outer box. It sounds like a bag of flower seeds when I shake the boxes. I'm thinking maybe the pods dried up and turned to powder. Well, I will know soon. As soon as I finish my tea Im going to open it up.Just the fact that this box of Polaroid has remained unopened for forty years is cool. If I get some strange prints out of this box it will be amazing. For anyone wondering "why", just for the fun of it.

[John Conway]

Good news! I opened one of the boxes. I was right but also wrong. The sound was a sandy substance in a little bag. Four bags to be exact. Four little bags of silica packed with the film. And the film has that great smell, like the smell I remember when I walked into an old camera shop.

[John Conway]

Couldn't wait to try a few sheets. The results were very pleasing. The contrast is low but I am warming up to the uniqueness of the low contrast, slightly brownish tint of the forty year old Polaroid prints. Oh, I decided to warm up the pods before processing, as a fellow member recommended, and it helped. I plan on doing some portraiture with this stuff.