polaroid transfer ~ a digital return to yesteryear?

cottage garbage ~ Chaffeys Lock • Ontario, Canada • click to embiggen

Back in the Analog Days I used to really enjoy making Polaroid image transfer prints. I made mine from pictures made with a 4×5 view camera using Polaroid film.

The process was relatively simple - after making the picture, leave the film packet in the holder (do not process). Prepare paper for transfer by tray soaking in warm water and then, on a smooth flat surface, squeegee off the surface water (Arches heavyweight watercolor paper was my favorite substrate). Pull the film from the holder to begin processing. After 10-15 seconds, peel apart and place negative face down on substrate and immediately apply pressure with a photo print roller. After a minute or two (test to determine time that suits your taste), peel negative from substrate and there you have it.

Taking the process one step further, after the print had dried, I would use a combination of Marshall Photo Oils and Coloring Pencils to work on an area of the print I wished to highlight. Hand coloring in this manner gave the image a more hand made / illustrated appearance.

The finished image area was small as dictated by the size of the Polaroid film but I liked to place that small image area centered on a large sheet of paper (11×14-ish). Paper which would be finished with torn edges made by ripping it using a metal straight edge in order to leave a relatively straight yet rough edge. IMO, and to my eye and sensibilities, the transfer process look with selective hand coloring working together with the look and feel of slightly warm tinted and textured fine art watercolor paper created a beautiful print.

As part of my recent screwing around, picture making wise, I have figured out how to get a Polaroid transfer look to my digital pictures. I can even approximate a hand colored look to a selected area of the picture. But, to be honest, this replicated look is just not the same as the real thing. So ...

.... Fuji now offers a 4×5 instant peel-apart film and holder. If I want to go the whole handmade route of my past transfer image making, that product would be a way to go. And, believe it or not, I still have my print roller, print squeegee and Marshall oils and pencils.

However, I do like the idea of creating the transfer look - minus the transfer process border - using some of my existing pictures, printing them digitally on a nice textured matte surface printing paper. Then I would go to work with the oils and pencils. I believe that the finished look would be very much like, perhaps nearly identical, to the analog print making process.

This process would have 4 distinct advantages - 1) image size could be whatever I want it to be, although I would keep it smallish (6-8 inch longest side dimension), 2) an edition of multiple "original" prints (low number 5-8) is possible and easier to produce than with the analog process, 4) applying marshall oils is a touchy (literally and figuratively) process and there is no undo once the oil is applied - if you mess it up, it's all the way back to making a new negative and print (very time consuming), not so with digital printing, 4) I have quite a few existing pictures which would make good transfer style images, allowing me to jump right into the process.

While I would like to pursue this process, it will be a while until I can do so. At this time, I have little too much going on to have the time to devote to it.