A process in which finished photographs are produced within the camera device itself; the first major development in photography since the genre was invented.
The process works on the basis of developer substances in paste form, which are distributed over the imaged film after a photograph has been taken and act on the film by diffusion.
This method was invented by Edwin Herbert Land (1909-1991), who founded the Polaroid Corporation in 1937, and launched the first Polaroid Land camera in 1947.
This camera produced a black-and-white paper image one minute after the photograph had been taken.
The millionth instant camera was sold in 1956. The first Polaroid color camera was launched in 1963.
Polaroid declared bankruptcy at the end of 2001, as the technology has become obsolete, in large part due to the popularity of digital photography.