Exposure settings With Polaroid Cameras.

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

This is a discussion that began in my "Photos From Fort Wayne" thread. Pál_K responded to one of my Polaroid photos, saying he had never gotten good results with the Polaroid films made now; his pictures always looked washed out and dull in color. I've noticed that with a lot of Polaroid photos posted online and even many of them on Polaroid's own website. I wrote a long response, detailing why I think a lot of Polaroids come out dull and washed out, and how I set exposure for mine. Someone else a few weeks ago asked me about setting exposure for Polaroid, but I got busy and forgot to write up an answer; hopefully he'll find this useful too. I decided to start a new thread with my original response to Pál_K's comment, and a followup post I made after that.

Pál_K had also asked me if I had the Polaroid camera modified by MINT that allows manual shutter speed selection, and my answer to that is in the post below, too.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

I am enjoying these photos even though I normally don’t like to see buildings being torn down.

Also: the color is just amazing. Although I have new packs of “Polaroid” (Impossible) film, I haven’t used them yet. The last time I used such film was about five or more years ago; I heard that it was improved, but what I’m seeing here is amazing. The colors I was getting were washed out and had limited range. For instant photos I’ve been playing with Fuji instax for a few years - better quality than my Polaroid photos, but still not the equal of this.

My Polaroid cameras, excluding 100-series pack film cameras, are an original SX-70, an SLR 690, and a Spectra 1200. The only control over exposure I have is the exposure dial which I think gives +/- 1 stop.

Chris, do you have one of those MiNT Polaroids that allow selection of shutter speeds? Either way, you have really mastered how to get the very best from this film.

I don't have the Mint camera. The manual shutter control on it is actually a worthless feature. There are two reasons: One is that when you use the manual shutter option on that camera, the lens aperture is stuck wide open at f8. The lens vignettes a good amount at f8 and is less sharp than when stopped down. The second reason is that the manual shutter control only allows setting in one stop increments. The Polaroid film has NO exposure latitude. NONE. Even a 1/4 stop change is noticeable. A 1/2 stop change on Polaroid looks like a one stop change on a digital camera or regular e-6 slide film.

The current Polaroid film does have a very limited dynamic range; contrast is very high, but interestingly the blacks are not that deep and the whites are not that bright. This gives high contrast midtones and a lot of tonal compression and detail loss in the very dark and very light tones.

I have an SX-70 that was converted to use 600 film. I've found that most people overexpose the current Polaroid films. My camera often gives better results set to give less than normal exposure. The examples on Polaroid's website and the shots I see others post online look washed out and flat because of the overexposure. Less exposure keeps highlight details from blowing out and increases color saturation a lot.

Polaroid's website recommends giving 1/2 stop less exposure in bright sun and normal exposure in softer light. I find that sometimes is true and sometimes I get best exposure giving 1/2 stop less than Polaroid's recommendations. If the scene is mostly dark tones, that is especially true. If the scene is mostly white, like the one below, I have the hardest time with exposure.


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You need to give more than normal exposure with white scenes. This one looked best with 3/4 stop over normal. Given that the normal setting really overexposes slightly in my experience, I was really giving a little more than one stop over.

The lighten darken control on the SX-70 cameras has three marks on each side of the normal setting. Each mark represents a 1/2 stop change toward over or under exposure and allows you to set as much as 1.5 stops of change in either direction. The +3/4 stop exposure I gave the photo of my house was done by setting the exposure control to a setting halfway between the first and second marks on the 'lighten' side. Although I have gotten good at guessing what exposure setting to use, I still bracket exposures just to be sure, and this practice has saved many images. It is wasteful, and expensive. If I were an average person buying a Polaroid camera to do family snapshot stuff, I'd be pissed because the films today just plain don't give perfect results without a lot of exposure bracketing and part of the issue is that I think the films are faster than they claim (which is why most shots are overexposed unless you dial in some darkening). The old Polaroid films back in the 90s gave good results with normal exposure much more often and they had a wider tonal range.

Polaroid actually admits on their website that the current SX-70 film is faster than the original stuff, so you have to dial in about 2/3 stop less exposure! Why the Hell they did that is beyond comprehension. Like I said, I suspect that the 600 film is faster than claimed too, just because so much of what I see online is overexposed and my own experience shows that I get better results most of the time giving less than normal exposure unless the subject is very light toned.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Chris - that post is gold. Thank you. Polaroid should pay you to have a web site that explains how to get the best results from their film.

So, being familiar with the old original Polaroid, I was happy with the results most of the time. This new film baffled me when I started using it a few years ago. Apparently I was not underexposing it enough. The white house photo at +3/4 stop is not something I would have thought of, as it seems counterintuitive - but obviously you’re correct as the result speaks for itself.

So you are saying that what a person needs to know for various subjects is how the meter is going to control the exposure, how the film is going to react, and then knowing how to override it properly. A technique which is both science and art!

With an autoexposure camera it is normal to have to increase exposure for a white scene, since the meter will give an exposure that will render the scene a middle gray tone. The problem with Polaroid is the unusual tonal curve of the film. With slide film or a digital camera, you would normally give 2 stops more exposure than the meter indicates for such a scene. This is enough exposure to make the house and snow look white, but not so much exposure that you lose detail and texture.

With Polaroid, a 2 stop increase would leave the whites completely blown out. The other issue with Polaroid and white tones is that exposure latitude with a mostly white scene is even less than it normally is, probably because of the film's inherently high contrast and its abrupt loss of detail in highlight tones that are even slightly overexposed. With scenes like this, I'll start at plus 1/2 stop, then plus 3/4 stop, then plus 1 stop. Usually the plus 1/2 or plus 3/4 stop version will be best, but it depends on the brightness of the white tones in the scene and the nature of the light. Hard sunlight requires less exposure increase than overcast light.

So, the problem is that everything you and I know about determining exposure for normal film or for digital is totally wrong for Polaroid! That, coupled with the fact that the Polaroid's metering system is primitive by today's standards (its not even a TTL meter!); and offers autoexposure only with only an exposure compensation dial to give you some control; means that experience is important...but so is luck!

 

[Pál_K]

Looking at some of my photos for fall foliage from the last few years, I see now that they are all overexposed. Apparently I was reluctant to bracket - what I would do is walk around, make the photo, put it in my pocket, and look at them only when I got home. I should’ve stayed, wait for a couple minutes, then make another photo with adjusted exposure if required. We still have some fall color leaves this year that haven’t blown away - if there’s no rain and a bit of sunlight, I’m going to try this again!

 

[Retro-Grouch]

Thanks for this thread, Chris! It's packed with good info, and a valuable service to all members who shoot instant film.

 

[Ong]

As a few have mentioned here regarding the current generation of Polaroid Originals film being rated around ISO 160, another point that could be brought up is the degredation of the light sensor and dirt build up over the sesor glass interally over the years.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

As a few have mentioned here regarding the current generation of Polaroid Originals film being rated around ISO 160, another point that could be brought up is the degredation of the light sensor and dirt build up over the sesor glass interally over the years.

My camera was overhauled by Retrospekt and converted to use 600 film. TheSX-70 film is rated at 160 (the old SX-70 film was 100, if I remember right) but Polaroid claims that the current 600 film is rated at 640, just like the old stuff was. I suspect that it is really faster.

 

[Pál_K]

How fortunate it is that Polaroid provided at least a dial with a reasonable range to adjust exposure. Fuji instax has a simple “lighten”, “darken”, and on the Neo 90 a “darken+”. There’s no fine tuning as with Polaroid.

Recently I’ve been using the darken control on my Fuji SQ6 and it helps a lot. The bad aspect is that when you adjust for lighten or darken, you are forced into a mid-focus distance - you can’t also select landscape (infinity) focus. The Neo 90 keeps focus separate from exposure control - so I’m glad for that … but then I’ve got small prints.

When I go back to my Polaroids I’m going to adjust to darken the image as suggested by Chris.