NEW TRICKS

First attempt with a new toy.

11 Likes, 0 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "First attempt with a new toy."

My friend Sean Patrick posted a Polaroid Impulse on an online market place a little while back. I saw it and felt a spark. So I sent him a message asking him if the camera worked. He replied back that the he’d just send me the camera and if it worked, I could just send him some money. If it didn’t I’d just have a 70s era vintage Polaroid to put on display. I did not hesitate in my response. I replied back with “send me that camera!” and then I started looking up film sources. You see that part up there where I mention feeling a spark? I saw that camera and thought about all the artsy photography crap I could do with it and felt inspired. That was all before I saw how much film was going to cost.

Fun fact: The vintage Polaroids like the Impulse do not have batteries. The battery is built into a package of film. That’s partly why the film for this camera is so expensive. The other part is just because ….film. This is a digital world (and I’m a digital girl). Film is just pricey.

Then I got real nervous. Michael said something about how I better be sure to know what I’m photographing, which didn’t make me feel any better. I ordered the wrong film (film for the new Polaroids DO NOT work with the old ones). I was already making mistakes and sabotaging myself and that was before I even loaded the correct film and took a picture. I was suddenly paralyzed with fear of taking a terrible picture and wasting film. This was a really stupid purchase and I can’t be an artsy photographer. I stewed over this for a few days. Saturday morning, we went to watch the Cabbage play soccer. After her game, we were all trying to figure out what other sports she could try. Every thing we suggested, softball, basketball, swimming, the Cabbage would shrug her shoulders and say something about how she wouldn’t be able to hit the ball, shoot the ball and she’s not a great swimmer. She didn’t want to do it if she wasn’t already good at it. She didn’t even want to try it.

That evening as I sipped on my gin and tonic, I thought about not doing something unless I was already good at it. I bought a scooter with the assumption that I would just know how to ride. I did not, as it turned out, know how to ride a scooter. I came close to running into three different parked cars before I parked my scooter into the garage, marched into the house and flopped down on our bed in tears. Chris came in and sat down next to me and placed his hand on my knee. I told him that I think I just made a terrible mistake. He told me to wait until I had a proper helmet and could practice. I got a helmet and I practiced. I practiced, practiced, practiced. I passed the test for my motorcycle license on the first try. My scooter is way more expensive than the film I purchased for that camera. The consequences of failure on the scooter is a lot more costly than taking a bad picture.

I got up and positioned my gin tea cup and saucer on the kitchen table and I grabbed the Polaroid. And… I took a not so great picture. It’s blurry and weird, but kind of creepy in a way that I like. I learned something about this camera that I didn’t expect. I’ve never shot a gun, but I have heard people talk about recoil. This camera has a recoil that I wasn’t prepared for. That’s part of the reason the image turned out blurry. The other reason is the manual focus. The subject needs to be at least four to ten feet away, which goes against my usuall method of getting up close and personal. Distance. I need distance. This camera is going to teach me that.

This camera is going to teach me a lot things.