Over the past few years, one thing is for sure…Polaroids have totally made a comeback! I remember my parents buying a polaroid camera when I was in elementary school. I had a science project and we needed something that could take quick photos so we could add them to the project that same evening. Back in those days, before cell phones and snap chat, this was the quickest, most convenient way to take a photo! As a kid, I thought it was the coolest thing ever to hit the shutter on our polaroid camera and have a photo in your hand almost instantly.

Although technology has evolved by leaps and bounds since I was in Elementary school (let’s not even get into how many years ago that was!!) I think polaroid type cameras have come back into our day to day life BECAUSE there’s so much advanced technology right at our fingertips. I think having access to so many wonderful, fancy things has almost created a societal craving for a simpler time when the coolest thing you could do photography-wise was print out a fun little photo almost immediately after taking it.

I personally LOVE having tangible representations of the photos that I take. I don’t believe that photos are meant to live on computers and phones. Of course, our portable devices make it so much easier to enjoy our photos wherever we go, and I love that…but there’s just something so special about being able to hold a photo in your hand.

Anyway, you’ve most likely seen the Fuji Instax cameras or the Polaroid film sold by the Impossible Project. I own an Instax camera myself and while I love it, I’ve found something that I love even more! Enough to write an entire blog post about it!

The downsides to the Instax camera were: 1. It’s kind of clunky and not easy to carry around with me. 2. The photos are not always the greatest. I realize that’s part of it’s charm, however, as a professional photographer, I AT LEAST, want photos that are exposed halfway decently. Is that asking too much?!?

The Instax mini printer solves BOTH of those problems! You use your phone (via an app you can download from the App Store, or the Android equivalent of the App Store) to print out photos saved on your phone! If you have “nice” photos saved to your phone, you can print those too! I don’t have to carry the Instax camera or the printer anymore…I just wait til I get home and print the photos out! (Ps, while writing this post I discovered that there’s a newer version out…and it comes in GOLD!!)

I. LOVE. IT.

The photo quality is SO much better and I never feel like I’m wasting the film, which is not the cheapest (hint, buy it on Amazon or Walmart.com). I think this camera would make a wonderful gift! It would also be really fun to give or get as a bride or bridesmaid…think of all the fun, memorable moments at and leading up to a wedding (bridal showers, bachelorette parties, honeymooning, etc) that would make totally fun Instax moments?? AND…Mother’s Day is soon! Moms love photos, guys!

I swear this is not an advertisement for it…I just love mine so much and I thought you guys should all know about this amazing photo thing. Hope you all go and buy one! If you do, let me know what you love about it in the comments!!