09. 28. 2009
Polaroid PoGo is Notalgic Fun with a Twist
Call me old-fashioned, but there was something about those old school Polaroid cameras that really made me smile. The anticipation of waiting for the photo to develop coupled with the various methods people had to make the picture develop were priceless. Were you a picture waver, a blower, a combination of the two or did you have your own method? With the advent of digital cameras, we no longer have that kind of "stop and smell the roses" type of fun, or do we?
The folks over at Polaroid have found a way to bring that trademark Polaroid fun into the digital era. Their latest camera, the Polaroid PoGo Instant Digital Camera, lets users print their photos on the spot. The Pogo combines a digital camera with a digital printer, the first camera to do so. The camera is a five megapixel point and shoot model with 4X digital zoom. The camera comes with a 3-inch LCD screen to preview your images as well as crop and edit as necessary.
Now we come to the fun part, the printer. Polaroid took the ZINK technology from its Polaroid PoGo Mobile Printer. Short for zero ink, the ZINK paper looks clear but is comprised of embedded yellow, magenta and cyan dye crystals that are activated using heat. The ZINK printer activates the paper and colorizes the ink producing your picture within 30 seconds. No fuss, muss, or unenvironmentally-friendly ink. You can add borders to the photos including the familiar white border from the old Instamatic Polaroid pics.
As much fun as snapping and printing photos can be there are, however, a few caveats. The PoGo doesn't have optical zoom so, pic quality is on the level of a really good cameraphone. The other downside is that the camera can only print 2x3-inch photos. It should be noted that the printed pics have an adhesive back which lets you stick them wherever you want, but still, I really want to print full-size photos. This is a really good start and I'm hoping they'll continue to develop the technology.
The PoGo is in stores for an affordable $200. It's definitely a fun walk down memory lane, but will that be enough to compete with the other feature cameras on the market?
Via Pcmag.com
Posted by sherri
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cameras
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