Polaroid: The Missing Manual - The Complete Creative Guide by Rhiannon Adam is a new title from Thames & Hudson. This highly accessible and intuitive book offers a complete overview of the tools and methods of instant photography. The first part of the book covers the technology of instant photography - including a chronological history of each camera/film format, user manuals, and buying guides. The second section, “Creative Techniques”, contains twenty-eight creative guides, introducing ways to take your instant photography further. These cover almost every method of instant image manipulation. The final part of the book features an extensive resources directory, containing an exhaustive index of every contemporary and historical instant film type, a store and suppliers guide, artists index, and large further reading section. The 240-page hardcover will be available from October, priced at £19.95.

Press Release

Polaroid: The Missing Manual
The Complete Creative Guide
By Rhiannon Adam

5 October 2017| £19.95 | Hardback | Extent: 240 pp.
Size: 23.0 x 17.7 cm | Illustrated Throughout | ISBN: 9780500544600

A highly accessible, complete course in Polaroid photography and its myriad potential applications – equally suitable for the beginner or expert photographer

The recent popularity of digital applications that emulate the Polaroid aesthetic – most notably, Instagram – have sparked an unprecedented interest in its vintage, analogue qualities. Equally relevant for the novice or the advanced user, Polaroid: The Missing Manual is a highly accessible and intuitive book, offering a complete overview of the tools and methods of instant photography.

An introduction charts the first widespread use of Polaroid, the company’s subsequent decline and instant photography’s rebirth through the establishment of the Impossible Project and their release of Polaroid compatible instant films. The first part of the book covers the technology of instant photography - including a chronological history of each camera/film format, user manuals, and buying guides. Part 1 is comprehensive, detailing everything from the very earliest Polaroid cameras of the 1940s through to the very latest developments, including newer Fuji Instax formats, to analogue/digital hybrids such as Impossible’s I-1 camera and Instant Lab. Also included are various technical tips and tricks – ranging from ways to reanimate defunct technology, to producing high quality scans.

The second section, “Creative Techniques”, contains twenty-eight creative guides, introducing ways to take your instant photography further. These cover almost every method of instant image manipulation. Each creative technique includes step-by-step photographic instructions, and a gallery showcasing the very best end results produced by more than fifty of the most prolific instant photographers working today.

The final part of the book features an extensive resources directory, containing an exhaustive index of every contemporary and historical instant film type, a store and suppliers guide, artists index, and large further reading section – making Polaroid: The Missing Manual the essential volume for exploring instant photography, well suited to technology aficionados, creative practitioners, and those interested in the pop culture phenomenon that is Polaroid.

Illustrated throughout in full colour, this book is the go-to guide to Polaroid photography. It gives photographers, art students and vintage camera enthusiasts of all ages the knowledge and skill to push the boundaries of what an instant photograph can be.

Rhiannon Adam is an established Polaroid photographer and a key figure in the instant photography community. She is an expert in the field, teaching workshops and short courses on Polaroid creative techniques. Her work is primarily concerned with myth, nostalgia and the passage of time, and has been exhibited and published worldwide, including in the New York Times, BBC, It’s Nice That, Vice, Le Monde, and Colors Magazine.

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