aellman Loc: Boston MA

I used to love the darkroom too. Then I discovered digital. >Alan

spaceytracey Loc: East Glacier Park, MT

I agree. Everyone should experience working w/film both shooting & in the darkroom.

Bill_de Loc: US

It's kind of funny. As we get older we think that younger folks should have the same experiences we had in the past. But in reality, they are moving forward experiencing thing we never will. Why look back when you can look ahead. Should they learn how to use a slide rule, drive a standard shift car, etc.? There are folks who enjoy stepping back to see what things used to be like. That's fine. I doubt it's for everybody or even the majority.

When I was a kid somebody at the dinner table said something about before tv. When I said, 'you mean you didn't always have tv, my sister (8 years older) thought that was the funniest thing anybody ever said. Years later at Thanksgiving dinner there was a discussion about when we only black and white tv. My sister's daughter said, 'you mean tv wasn't always in color?'. I looked at my sister, she looked at me, and we both burst out laughing. But nobody wanted to go back to gathering around the kitchen table to listen to stories on the radio as my parents did way back when. Memories can be shared, but don't need to be experienced by everyone.

IMHO

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burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Amen!

So many people don’t remember what it is like to be young. The things our parents were in awe of are things we just assume. May it be ever thus...

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

I remember very well what it was like to be young. I have worked in a darkroom since age 13 (when I developed in my bedroom closet before joining a local camera club and having access to a real darkroom), but my most memorable time was working in the large PIO darkroom in DaNang, RVN in 68/69 - I was 22 and met the great Life Magazine photographer, David Douglas Duncan, whose image I still have hanging in my present darkroom. I wouldn’t trade that experience for anything.

Darkroom317 Loc: Mishawaka, IN

A lot of young people are working with film. I am 30 and in grad school for an MFA in photography. I started photography with film at 13 and didn't shoot digital until I was 19. That was also the year that I set up my darkroom. I will say that it is a rabbit hole once you get started.

My current MFA work is film based and altered using mordancage, a process I never saw myself using.

E.L.. Shapiro Loc: Ottawa, Ontario Canada

My cautionary attitude and disdain for chemical fumes do not stem from small cans, envelopes, and bottles of photo chemicals- never had the pleasure! In my first darkroom job, we mixed all of our black and white chemistry from scratch. We purchased all the components in large quantities- developing agents, accelerators, restrainers, preservatives, balanced alkaline- we cut 99.9% Glacial Acetic Acid into the stock solution and working stop baths, stocked giant sacks of sodium thiosulphate (Hypo) and made many gallons of stock and works solution at the beginning of each production week.

Each Monday, we processed several hundred sheets of 4x5 cut film form weddings, in 4-up - 4x5 hangers in
3/ 1/2 gallon tanks and made many hundreds of proofs on Tuesday. In the print darkroom, it was not unusual t produce 300+ 8x10 and mixed sized photographs for wedding albums per day. On another day we would print over 1,000 8x10 theatrical glossies. Ever mix Nelson's Gold Toner?- the smell is enough to kill a skunk! We printed all our work, in-house, up to 30x40 prints.

In my shop, we had an in-house color lab with processing facilities for C-41 and E-6. We used 2 dip and dunk processors. For prints, we ran 2 Kodak S-Printer for proofs, 4- enlargers, and 2 roller-transport print processors. The chemistry for theses machines came in large cubi-trainers. Between the developer and the bleach/fix, there were enough carcinogens to grow tumors on a tombstone- let alone in a human being! The final stabilizer was made with formaldhde- the processor room smelled like the prep room of a funeral home! We were no allowed to drain the run-off from our machines into the sewer system- we reclaimed the silver and sent the waste to a special disposal company. We mixed 25 gallons in each of our replenishment tanks.

I did enjoy custom color and black and white printing. As for color film processing, it is a very standardized process with little room for creativity. If your C-41 process goes out of control- there is hell to pay in printing.

E-6 can be the push and pull processed for certain controlled effects. You can push it a stop or two with a sacrifice in gran structure and color accuracy. A 1-stop routine push will deliver cleaner white on some Ektachrome types. 1 stop overexposure and a pull process will reduce contrast- great for preserving shadow detail in reproducing artwork like paintings on transparency films.

Now y'all know why I don't miss the darkroom. Give me a computer, my big Epson printer, and a load of pigments and I am a happy fellow!

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

I’m with you EL - I hate the smell of formaldehyde (which was once common, but now well known to be dangerous). In my 2nd/advanced year Biology class in HS, we had to dissect a fetal pig, which was preserved in formaldehyde, and I will never forget that smell which we breathed for hours at a time. If I were you, with your experiences, I’d never want to be in another darkroom.

Darkroom317 Loc: Mishawaka, IN

99.9% Glacial Acetic acid is a component of the mordancage chemistry I am working with. It is certainly the nastiest thing I've used. I take a good amount precautions with it but the smell is still powerful even with a respirator. I started using it in our group darkroom when students weren't around but I have since moved outside with it. One good thing that I found is for what I am doing I dilute the final chemical mixture with water so it is a little less toxic than the normal concentration. Still nasty stuff though, my negatives used to have a overwhelming vinegar smell afterwards but washing took care of it.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Dave Duncan did awesome work. I loved his coverage of the 1968 Democrat convention. His wartime coverage is more well-known, though.

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

I’m going to go a bit off topic here and add this photo of David Douglas Duncan, taken at the siege of Khe Sanh:

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

In the 1980s, as a small part of my 70-hour/week AV production job, I processed thousands of rolls of slides in an E6 sink line over about 8 years. Then, for the same company, I held various jobs in our school portrait lab.

We had 33 custom built optical printers, six Kodak S-printers, two custom built printers for cut negs, a 10” x10” enlarger, five APAC contact printers, two Hills cine processors for 100’ rolls of C41, a Refrema dip&dunk for sheet film, 40 home-built printers for small black-and-white and color products, four 32’/ minute x 3-10” strand Pako paper processors...

We mixed C41 and RA4 (EP2 before it) in 1100 gallon drums. We bought tractor trailer loads of 40” by 5600’ master rolls of Kodak portrait papers, and slit them down to 11”, 10”, 8”, 5”, and several smaller widths (cut to 250’ or 500’ lengths). We bought 135, 120/220, 35mm long roll, 46mm long roll, and 70mm long roll Kodak portrait films in half-truck load lots. So we had lots of volume!

Shortly after we shut down film processing operations in 2007, two long-time (25 and 35 years of service) employees died of the same cancer.

I replaced 12 dedicated low volume specialty large format optical printers —and one color technician — with a single Epson 9600 44” wide printer, in 2003.

Eventually we sent the volume from four optical labs through one digital lab, and closed the other three.

No, I don’t miss darkrooms! Digital bits beat chemical atoms 20 years ago. I was glad to get away from the stench of chemicals.

E.L.. Shapiro Loc: Ottawa, Ontario Canada

Yes! Thank goodness I did not work in a huge color lab- My in-house operation was strictly for my studio operations. The lab did not serve a large nation-wide school operation nor did we take in outsourced work from other photographers. I employed 4 technicians and did most of the coustom printng myself. Just keeping the roller-transport machines clean, in control, and operative was a full time job! The EP2 chemistry damaged the rollers- seems Kodak forget to tell us that and then came out with an RT version which requred a degree in advanced chemistry to maintain replenishment! We switched to Hunt chemistry- it was cleaner working and easier to maintan. We also found Fuji paper to be more stable. Fujichrome required less filtration than Ektachrome too!

In 2008 we started the transition to digital. The only thing I miss is the 8x10 Enlarger- that was one massive machine!

E.L.. Shapiro Loc: Ottawa, Ontario Canada

I never venture into the Mordançage effect- sounded interesting! It was more economical to use the full-strength Glacia Acetic Acid and dilute it down to a stock solution and further dilute it to a working solution than to buy large quantities of prepared stop bath. It does smell like vinegar but I told my rookie technicians not to sprinkle it on their French fries (a Canadain habit) or use it to make pickles because even in its diluted form, it was not edible! I also warned them to always add the acid to water- not visa-versa, or serious injury would occur.

We used rapid-fixer, which contains Sulphuric Acid, then Hypo-Clearing-Agent and a good wash- our negatives did not have a bad smell.

flyboy61 Loc: The Great American Desert

Agree totally! I can do more with my Digital camera and simple, one-lung photo processor than I ever could do in the darkroom. Color processing...the days North of the Arctic Circle, developing slide film using a bucket of snow and another of hot water for temp. controls are thankfully gone forever!
For years, I had a skin condition on my hands, and contact with the solutions kept it in control. It would reappear every time I went home on leave. It's gone now, But...I do still miss the darkroom and printing.
I mention it to my Good Lady Wife, and she just gives me "the Look" and says;"WHY?"
I can do more, and less expen$ively with my digital camera and computer, with Costco or Walgreen printing, and on a fixed income, that is a great boon! But...still...