C41
Kodak Portra 400
Kodak Portra 400 is a professional C-41 color negative film known for flexible exposure latitude, natural skin tones, and fine grain.
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The Polaroid Cool Cam 2 is a fixed-focus 600-format integral instant camera introduced in 1989 as a direct follow-on to the original Cool Cam (1986). It retains the same core electronics as the broader 600-series platform - automatic exposure, built-in flash, and battery-from-pack power - while offering subtle industrial-design refinements over the first Cool Cam, including a slightly reshaped grip area and updated colorway options. Like its predecessor, the Cool Cam 2 was aimed at younger consumers and sold primarily on visual appeal and low price rather than photographic capability. It is functionally indistinguishable from most other fixed-focus 600-series bodies of the late 1980s.
Reference
Recommended film stocks for the — format your camera takes.
C41
Kodak Portra 400 is a professional C-41 color negative film known for flexible exposure latitude, natural skin tones, and fine grain.
View profile →BW
Kodak Tri-X 400 is a classic black-and-white film known for strong tonality, visible grain, and documentary character.
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About this camera
A refined second-generation Cool Cam in 600 format, carrying the same pop-color philosophy into the early 1990s.
| Field | Value |
|---|
| Format | Polaroid 600 integral instant film |
| Lens | Fixed; ~100mm equivalent |
| Focus | Fixed (~1.2 m to infinity) |
| Shutter | Auto electronic leaf; ~4s - 1/200s |
| Meter | Silicon photodiode, auto |
| Flash | Built-in electronic flash, automatic |
| ISO | 600 (film-in-pack, fixed) |
| Battery | In every film pack |
| Years | ~1989 - ~early 1990s |
By 1989, Polaroid's 600-series lineup had matured into a tiered structure: premium sonar-autofocus bodies at the top (660 AF, 680 SLR), mid-tier flash-with-autofocus models, and at the bottom a proliferating range of fixed-focus shells differentiated primarily by their shells and colorways. The Cool Cam had proven that bold color and youth-oriented marketing moved units, so Polaroid followed it with the Cool Cam 2 - a revised body with updated styling that kept the spirit of the original without changing the fundamental photographic engine.
The Cool Cam 2 coexisted with several peer fixed-focus 600 bodies during its production run, including the Spirit 600 series and the One Step Express. Polaroid produced 600-series cameras in extraordinary volume during this era; the Cool Cam 2 was one of dozens of branded variants that shared tooling, electronics, and film. Production is believed to have wound down in the early 1990s as Polaroid consolidated its lower-tier lineup, though the exact discontinuation date is not verified.
The Cool Cam 2 is a minor entry in the 600-series timeline but a useful document of Polaroid's late-1980s commercial strategy. Where the original Cool Cam introduced the idea of selling instant cameras by colorway and personality, the Cool Cam 2 confirmed that the model was commercially viable enough to iterate on. Together, the Cool Cam and Cool Cam 2 form a micro-series within the vast 600-series family, a deliberate brand identity rather than a hardware revision.
For historians of industrial design, the camera sits at the intersection of 1980s consumer-electronics aesthetics - primary colors, hard plastic, high-gloss surfaces - and the maturation of instant photography as a mass-market commodity. The underlying technology changed very little between 1981 and 1995; what changed was the packaging, and the Cool Cam 2 is a clean example of that shift.
Polaroid Cool Cam 2
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