Polaroid · ISO 640 B&W negative
Polaroid Spectra B&W
Impossible Project reintroduced black and white film for Polaroid Spectra cameras in June 2014, several years after their first Spectra emulsion (the PZ 600 Silver Shade, a B&W) landed in 2010 and was later pulled. The pre-release announcement promised improved tonal range and faster development than the earlier monochrome Spectra packs. The format matched the standard Spectra frame at 9.2 by 7.3 centimeters and rated nominally at ISO 640 to stay compatible with the camera meters.
Calling it black and white is generous in the strict sense. Most batches read closer to a warm sepia or graphite, with a slight cyan cast in the deep shadows that some shooters love and others fight. A UV-blocking layer added in a later revision produced cleaner whites and stopped the highlights from drifting warm under sky. Development runs roughly five to ten minutes face-down, faster than the color Spectra and closer to traditional integral B&W behavior.
The look is honest about being an instant film. Contrast curves are gentler than 600 B&W, grain is structural and visible in the midtones, and the dynamic range sits roughly five to six stops in good light. Compared with Fujifilm Instax Wide black and white packs, the Spectra B&W is softer and more atmospheric, less crisp and less neutral. Press photographers would have hated it. Portrait shooters and abstract street workers found it useful precisely because of that softness.
Polaroid Originals discontinued the format in October 2019 alongside Spectra Color, citing a persistent ejection jam in the aging cameras that no amount of motor swapping or roller shimming would consistently fix. Six months of testing did not produce a workable fix.
Reciprocity exponent is 1.0. Zone Light Meter applies the long-exposure correction past one second; on this film the correction is zero. Most Spectra cameras lack a true long-exposure mode anyway, so the reciprocity behavior is mostly theoretical. On a Spectra Pro with the time setting and a tripod, the metered shutter time is the shot time.
How the app handles this stock
- Box speed: ISO 640. Picker exposes pull/push chips so you can shoot it at any speed you want and the meter follows.
- Reciprocity: No reciprocity correction needed; metered time is the shot time.
- Expired film: if you load an old roll, set the expiry year and storage in the app and the ISO scales for you. B&W negative decay rates are baked in.