Although the vast majority of us now take for granted being able to carry super powerful cameras around in our pockets at all times, there’s still something joyful about taking a photograph and having it instantly print out, creating a physical artifact of a moment.
Over the last few years, Fujifilm’s Instax series of Polaroid-like cameras have managed to capture that joy in a number of ways, but their newest gadget melds the strengths of the Polaroid with the flexibility of an iPhone.
The Instax Share SP-1 is a printer that connects to your iPhone over Wi-Fi and then prints out any photo you send to it on Instax paper, just as if you took it with a real camera.
While Fujifilm’s Instax cameras allow you to capture a moment, there’s no digital photograph involved, meaning you only get one chance at getting a good shot. Likewise, the actual optics of the Fujifilm Instax cameras are pretty crummy. With the Instax Share, however, you can take a photo with your superior iPhone camera, load up the Instax Share app on your iPhone, and just beam it over to the printer, where the photo will be spit out on 2 x 3 Instax Film.
This seems like a great gadget for those who love having physical snapshots of friends and family, but want a higher quality photo than what an Instax camera can generally afford. Unfortunately, it’s not going to come cheap when it debuts in April: it will cost $200.