Polaroid Two: Digital instant camera appears in the UK

By Rich Trenholm on 06 May 2009, 5:26pm

The Polaroid Two earns its name as the spiritual successor to the classic Polaroid camera. Invented by Edwin Land in 1947, the Polaroid instant camera allowed you to see the results as soon as you snapped your picture. Modern digital cameras have a screen for that, but we want more: we want prints! Heck, we want stickers!

We encountered the Polaroid PoGo Instant Digital Camera at CES earlier this year. It's now heading for our shores via Firebox, rebranded as the much snappier Polaroid Two. As in, it's the successor to the original wrist-shaking Polaroid instant camera.

It's not groundbreaking on the specs front, boasting 5 megapixels and a fixed-focus lens, with the option to switch between macro and landscape. But it does have a mahoosive 76mm (3-inch) screen, and -- oh yeah! -- it prints out your pictures.

We've used it and it's pretty cool: in less than a minute you have a slightly-bigger-than-business-card sticker at a magazine-quality resolution of 300dpi. It uses Zink, or 'zero ink', technology to bake crystals into the specially treated paper, which is dry to the touch as soon as it's printed. Pictures can then be stored on an SD card as normal.

The battery lasts for 15 prints, so don't go crazy. You can buy 30 sheets of Zink paper for £8, or 70 sheets for £18. The Polaroid Two comes with 10 sheets and can be pre-ordered for £230 from Firebox, with stock expected from 13 May.