A Polaroid back is a specialist film holder accessory named after the Polaroid Corporation, the pioneering American company founded by Edwin Land that developed and commercialised instant photography, designed to attach to the back of a medium format camera body or slide into the film holder position of a large format camera in place of the standard film back or sheet film holder, allowing the photographer to make exposures on instant picture material rather than conventional film. The ability to produce a finished, developed photographic print within minutes of exposure made the Polaroid back an invaluable professional tool for previewing and confirming lighting, composition, exposure, and colour balance before committing to the final exposure on conventional film.
The Polaroid back was developed in direct response to the practical needs of professional photographers working in medium and large format photography, where the cost of film and processing, the time required to receive developed results from a commercial laboratory, and the logistical complexity of reshooting a subject after discovering a technical problem with the original exposure made a rapid on-site preview capability extremely valuable. By loading the Polaroid back with instant film, making a test exposure under the actual shooting conditions, and processing the resulting print in the seconds or minutes immediately following the exposure, the photographer could evaluate the real world result of their lighting setup, lens choice, filtration, and exposure settings with confidence before committing the final, definitive exposures to conventional film.
Polaroid backs were manufactured in versions compatible with the most widely used professional medium format camera systems, including Hasselblad, Mamiya, Rollei, and Bronica, as well as universal designs intended for use with large format cameras via a standard film holder interface. The Polaroid back replaced the camera's standard film magazine or back, accepting the same light path through the lens and shutter as the conventional film back and producing an instant print of the same format and framing as the final film image - typically either the full square or rectangular format of the camera system in question, or a slightly smaller format dictated by the dimensions of the available instant film material.
The instant films used in Polaroid backs included both black and white and colour peel-apart materials, in which the exposed film pack was pulled through the back after exposure to initiate the development process, and the finished print peeled apart from the negative layer after the appropriate development time - typically between thirty seconds and three minutes depending on the film type and ambient temperature. The resulting print provided an immediately usable reference image that could be assessed on the spot, marked up with notes, handed to the client for approval, or used as a reference guide for the retouching or digital post-production of the final image.
The widespread adoption of digital capture and the ability to review digital images immediately on the camera's LCD screen or a connected laptop computer largely replicated the instant preview function that the Polaroid back had served for professional photographers, and the commercial viability of instant film materials for professional preview use declined significantly as digital technology matured. Polaroid discontinued its professional instant film products in the early 2000s, ending the practical availability of new Polaroid back compatible materials for most systems, though Fujifilm's FP-100C and related peel-apart instant films continued to provide a compatible alternative for some time thereafter. The enduring interest in instant photography as an aesthetic and creative medium has sustained a small but dedicated market for compatible instant film materials and the cameras and backs designed to use them.