Polaroid Grey Label and Lady Gaga at CES

I wrote about Gaga's appointment as creative director back in May, and it looks like she lived up to her title, not just as a celebrity spokesperson, but as a legit part of the creative team. Gaga and Polaroid debuted 3 new products at the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas this past week.

GL 20: Camera Sunglasses

Gaga got the idea for this initially on her Fame Ball tour, where she made glasses out of iPod screens for her set on stage. Now her idea has become functional. These glasses take photo and video, and it registers them into a USB that is the earpiece of the sunglasses. The earpiece (USB) comes out and can be connected to comp or you can use the bluetooth capability to connect it to your devices.

This is rather innovative in the way that it is bridging together fashion and technology. Gaga calls the product 'innovative and also cultural'. I guess we will have to wait and see if the glasses take on cultural iconography.

GL 10: Mobile Printer

When asked what the camera of the future was (presumably by her Polaroid creative consorts), Gaga held up her cell phone. I guess this ticked them off a bit seeing as how their brand is built on a camera which she is suggesting now be replaced by a phone no less. But she has a point. How many of us actually carry around digital cameras (even to special events)? Most of us rely heavily on our camera phones, which take pretty good photos these days as evidenced by the number of mobile uploads on facebook and the twitpic overflow.

So the idea is to integrate the cell phone camera into the polaroid family, and it seems they have found a way to do so. This could possess even more utility when you think about how many times we have actually printed our digital content. I'd venture to say, not often, because it's just too much of a hassle in most cases.

All you have to do is set up the bluetooth on your phone to connect to the printer. The printer produces 3 x 4 prints, and you have the option of the polaroid trade dress or full bleed.

Unfortunately, the printer is NOT compatible with the iPhone, but it does work with all phones with bluetooth capability.

GL 30: New Polaroid Camera

Last but definitely not least, they unvelied THE camera. Gaga described it as sexy, sleek, and hearty. It takes regular instant polaroids, and has a zink printer (zero ink) which is in the actual camera and the printer and makes this fantastically eco-friendly. Each cartridge holds 10 photos, and the photos register both digitally and as a regular polaroid. Pretty freaking awesome, and should be out by Christmas.

***In the future, they are working on a forward camera that is also digital and will link to all social media outlets, yikes.

Steven Klein and Postphotography

Sonesson poses the question, "But is there really a world after photography?"

Many of today's emerging photographers have offered a response to this question, and Sonesson offers his own explanation as well:

"The postphotographic world can only exist in the same sense in which we have long lived in a world after painting: a world in which the meaning of painting has been modified by the advent of photography. But now the meaning of photography and painting alike are in the process of being thoroughly changed by the emergence of computer-pictures....But the computer may also be an instrument of creation: it is not only one of several possible means for mechanical reproduction, but it is also a means for digital production. And this is where we enter the domain of postphotography."

Enter Steven Klein:

On his website, he offers a response to the notion of these categories that can not be interpreted in isolation, and why there is a necessity to define them based on their predecessors:

"There is a desire to link photography with painting. My background is painting and I feel there is no connection between the two. It is as if the camera is linked to a sin, producing a bastard art form that we feel we must link to the past in order to give it credentials. I don't want those credentials. I have no need to apologize for photography."

Many of you may be familiar with his work in fashion photography, particularly in W magazine (which is where I first became acquainted with his work). I found an interesting article on his website that I thought captured the discussion quite nicely:

"For some time now photography has existed in an expanded field that includes fashion, advertising, music, cinema and virtually every other aspect of the culture we live and breath every day. And while there are those who denounce this as a contamination of its ability to report accurately on the world we live in, there are others for whom this very impurity is a saving aesthetic grace. Steven Klein might be one such photographer and X-STaTIC Pro=CeSS, his collaboration with Madonna, is just such a cross-fertilization of talent, medium and genre."

In my opinion, like every art form, and not even limited to art but life in general, things naturally evolve and change, and those who take advantage of this in the appropriate ways and contexts can benefit immensely. I thought Steven Klein was one photographer who was a great example of an artist who is delving into evolving techniques in his art and is not afraid to blend ideas and see what works. With that I will leave you with one last quote that illustrates his involvement with this:

"To this end many of the still images of X-STaTIC Pro=CeSS have been animated with CGI, just as the moving images are often edited in such a way that they appear to be composed of sequenced stills. In doing so he has created a strange hybrid that is neither one nor the other yet draws on both."