Polavision - Instant super 8?

Post by **jchanbr** » Tue Dec 31, 2002 12:21 am

Hello,

I was visiting Ebay and have seen these rares movies to sell. Somebody already tried to shoot in Polavision super 8? How was the results?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 27511&rd=1

Regards,

Julio

Post by **David M. Leugers** » Tue Dec 31, 2002 4:47 pm

While I have never shot any film in the Polavision process, neither has hardly anyone else.

This process was very eagerly awaited and received a lot of attention from the media (mostly film making magazines) but it was a major failure. The limits of the system and the inconsistent results along with the expense made it an easy victim to the first camcorders arriving on the market shortly thereafter. I was saving my money up to buy a system when it came out, until I read about the poor results and dark projection. Not being able to effectively edit the footage was the final blow for me. There has not been any film available to shoot for over twenty years. Totally obsolete and merely a collectors item now I'm afraid.

Post by **tfunch24** » Tue Dec 31, 2002 9:26 pm

Instant Super 8? Interesting.

What were the limitations of the format? How bad was the picture (compared to those 12-pound dinosaurs that JVC and Sony provided us with back in the late 1970s?)

Tom

Post by **BolexPlusX** » Tue Dec 31, 2002 9:43 pm

When I was studying for my MBA Polavision was presented as a case study on just how much timing can hurt you. It seems it was presented to the public almost simultaneously with the early videocam systems. (Ouch!!)

From what I know of it it is not super-8 at all but a unique format entirely. The film was contained in a cartridge and shot in a camera that Eumig specially developed for Polaroid. The cartridge was then placed in a television looking thingy that processed it and then rear projected it on a small screen.

I believe the film was never intended to be removed from the original cartridge, and there was no provision for editing.

I've never met anybody that used it, although I've read the image quality was sub par. I conjecture they intended to add mag sound, but the system never got that far.

Somebody must have bought it, you see it on E-bay regularly.

mike · Post by **mike** » Wed Jan 01, 2003 5:01 am

Polavision was the brain child of Edward Land, head of Polaroid. After much sucess of the Land camera, Land directed the company to develop an instant movie film. The result was the Polavision camera, using phototape, which was only useable in the polavision camera, and only able to be devloped in a specail viewer. The camera was aimed at the home movie viewer, who could take instant pictures of his or her family. However, the camera was a failure, due to the declining super 8 market and soon to be video market. The film was a super 8 guage. Stockholders sued Polaroid for the polavision disaster. But all was not lost as Polaroid used the polavision instant film devloping process for their instant cameras a few years later.