It’s the 50th anniversary of the Polaroid SX-70 Land Camera and to celebrate, Retrospekt has released a 50th Anniversary Edition Gold SX-70 Instant Film Camera. It’s an extravagant collector’s item that’s fully functional, built from original components from vintage Polaroid SX-70 cameras. The original chrome plating, however, has been stripped and replaced with 24-karat gold plating.
This is a very short run of only 50 cameras total – makes sense – and each camera features fully refurbished internals. New genuine leather coverings have also been applied and embossed with the anniversary emblem and individual unit numbers. As all of the parts are genuine components straight from vintage cameras, some of them may even be as old as the original release in 1972.
The original Polaroid SX-70 folding single reflex Land camera was released in 1972. Based on the chemical formulas developed by Edwin H. Land, the SX-70 automatically ejected each photograph and they developed fully within 10 minutes. It was the world’s first instant film camera for consumers and by the mid-1970s, more than 700,000 units had been sold. Production ended in 1981 but it’s remained a popular camera on the used market ever since.
In its day, it was a pretty revolutionary camera and sold for the princely sum of $180. With 50 years of inflation, that equates to $1,278 in today’s money. This means that the original camera when new, sold for more than the limited edition 24K gold-plated version sells for today. Sounds like a bit of a bargain now, huh?
There’s no word on how many have been sold so far, which means there are no hints as to how many are still remaining. I have to admit, if I had a grand burning a hole in my pocket, this is something that I think would be pretty cool to own.
The 24K gold plated 50th Anniversary Edition Polaroid SX-70 is available to buy now for $999. To find out more about the camera and how it’s been reassembled, head on over to the Retrospekt website.
[via Digital Camera World]
FIND THIS INTERESTING? SHARE IT WITH YOUR FRIENDS!