I’ve mentioned on numerous occasions about my digital workflow which has been the sole method I’ve managed to get my images out of my apartment and into the wider world. I started large format photography with the main intention of getting away from a computer, as shooting digital felt much like a busman’s holiday (I’m a web developer by trade).

And while a chunk of the process did indeed get me away from the computer, to produce a final image was very much office based – I would scan negatives on my Epson flatbed scanner, make the necessary adjustments in Lightroom and then the final print was a digital print using a large format Epson printer.

Today, I can proudly say that is no longer my workflow! I am now officially a darkroom printer.

I have been almost exclusively shooting 8×10 negatives for the past year as I realised that the likelihood of having my own dedicated darkroom any time in the near future was slim and many a photographer has gushed about the beauty of an 8×10 contact print. My pop-up darkroom has given me the opportunity to realise those 8×10 contact prints and beautiful and sharp they are too.

It has taken a little while to get to this stage and a little bit of creativity but I have a modest – very, very modest compared with previous “Show Us Your Darkrooms” – but functional pop-up darkroom. By day, my bathroom plays out its duty as a bathroom but by evening it’s my 8×10 contact-printing refuge.

My darkroom equipment consists of an LPL 3301D 35mm enlarger, that is precariously balanced on an Esky, which suffices purely as a controllable light source. This is plugged into an Ilford DT600 timer – a wonderful piece of equipment I picked up from eBay a year or so ago knowing eventually I would have a darkroom of some description. It harks back to days gone by of punched cards. Literally. It came with a card puncher and blank punched cards to store timing data that you can program into the timer. I use a sheet of 5mm glass to hold down the negative on top of the photographic paper.

To complete the outfit, I purchased an office stacked tray affair which I use for chemicals. I was unable to fine a three tray unit and so the stop bath sits in a tray of its own. The stacked trays saves considerable room that would normally be needed for a line of trays and it has been working very well. Developer in the top tray, fixer in the bottom, stop bath off to the side.

It takes less than 10 minutes for me to get the darkroom prepped to print and so not a chore in the slightest. Of course, given the opportunity for a larger dedicated space, I’d jump at it. For the time being it’s all I have but, most importantly, it works.

As I say, a modest set up which has been working very well for me and giving me a great opportunity to start honing my skills as a printer in a very limited environment. I foresee my Epson scanner starting to gather dust…

Spotted on Reddit, a rare Gowlandflex 4×5 twin lens reflex camera that was brought into Peace Cameras in Raleigh, North Carolina in the USA by it’s own. The image above, showing it towering over a what looks like a Hasselblad 500c, gives you a sense of perspective of the size of the thing.

More info about this and other Gowland cameras can be found at petergowland.com.

Gowlandflex with it’s current owner

Thanks kindly to napalmjerry at Reddit for sharing these images.

Visit alexbond.com.au for a very useful post from Alex Bond on using your Sekonic light meter with the zone system.

Read more…

In the colour darkroom

My darkroom is where I make colour and it is dark in every sense of the word. 

It’s a space that I climb into and seal out the light with Velcro and garden plastic.

When every inch is consumed by black, time unfolds and I begin to make. This is the beginning of the darkroom haptic, the negotiation, of what is flexible and what is not between object and body, time and chemistry. 

Over long sessions in my darkroom I test colour, form and time. Each final composition renders material vastly different from its physical state. Testing in colour could be likened to practicing scales on a musical instrument. Initially I base my starting point on tactile possibilities, stepping across time, I incrementally refine my colour selection. The tests I make in the darkroom define how I will shape my final score.

The cadence is set and the measure of endurance begins.

Time (not passed or wished for), is very present and experienced in steps and lengths by my reach. Over time, and in the blackness I choreograph the track for counting of the steps and the lengths that my body will need to reach.  Slowly the muscle retains a memory for the movements to the score. The score is written by light and time, from either delicate fingertip touches or by the force of my full body; an entanglement ensues.

In the jostle, time mostly balances chaos and order. 

What I make during my time in the dark questions perception by gently nudging at the elastic boundaries of the medium.  I embrace time to be autonomous, to suggest possibilities for the photograph from an understanding of the histories and technologies that are evolving and that have preceded. My time in the darkroom blends these with what I see.

Danica Chappell

Danica’s photographs are currently on exhibition at Caves Gallery, Melbourne

When did it all start? – Well, my first darkroom was an unused granny flat on my Aunt’s property. She was fab – let me convert the whole thing to a darkroom (Yes, the cool Aunty! Where else was I supposed to put the old massive CB7 Beseler??). Many years have passed since, and although I have not used the CB7 in a while, it still sits stored in that same room to this day.

Think Negative in Sydney is my darkroom and I have been in the current space, in Marrickville, for just over two years. Previously I set up the darkroom and studio space in Sydney’s Leichhardt and needed to expand. What I have now is very spacious.

For me, workflow and ease of use is everything. I cannot emphasise the importance of this. At Think Negative the darkroom is used almost daily and at least four full days a week. The current darkroom is very large. Four plus metres of sink and numerous enlargers occupy the darkroom. The space had to be big enough for demos, personal set-up, and communal set-up. The room is big enough to house/set-up a trestle table in the middle so that I can load the 20×24 film holder with ease when needed! No black curtains, just a walk through ‘s-bend’ light trap as an entrance/exit.  This also has an internal door installed for when loading film.

The sinks are designed to accommodate trays up to 20×24 inch (it’s the largest I make photographs, nothing larger). Archival washers also live in the sinks. One sink is a little narrower than the other. The narrow sink has a shelf in front as part of the make up of the bench so as to allow for the easy mixing of chemicals as well as for workshop participants to rest their notebooks on etc. The shelf is the exact width of my magnetic stirrer – again, workflow and ease of use. A power board sits neatly attached to the sidewall of the splash back.

All hot water is accessed via the small hotwater heater that I switch off to conserve energy within the first two hours of any session (ie. once heated we’re good for hours!) All plumbing to the sinks is external and multiple taps are situated in various areas. A third sink is just outside the darkroom in the work/studio area and this acts as a mixing sink as well as a viewing panel.

Shelving above the sink for all wet material (trays, reels, tanks etc) as well as for hanging large sheets of film for drying. At the end of the sink is a film dryer for roll film.

Safelights are a ‘bank’ of lights that I project upwards for a bright and ‘easy on the eyes’ environment. I have two of these and wouldn’t trade them for anything! I think I have the countries largest collection of unused Ilford safelight housings… I just don’t use them anymore.

All chemicals are stored below the sinks with various toners, restrainers, and other additives above sink within reach. Film is processed by hand or machine (depends what it is) and I rely on Jobo Expert drums for the sheet film. I have moved a Jobo ATL3 in there recently also.

Enlargers are all Durst. L1200s, Modular 70s, 138s etc. Proofing/Contact station, flashing station, and some enlargers dedicated to particular formats are located around the room. The main bench is large and long and holds the L1200s since they are heavy machines. I built this bench for the Leichhardt premises and until we had to move it I didn’t realise it weighs a ton! It holds the enlargers with ease and with enough space around and below to work comfortably.

Each ‘station’ has various idiosyncratic notes and ‘data’ taped to the panels. My thinking from day one was that if other people want to use my darkroom on a regular basis then let them (to a certain extent) make that station their own. The Durst’s are easy to use and precise. They never misalign. The modular 70s are like mini L1200s and the 138s are great for film as well as printing from glass plates. Easels, a mixture of four blade and RRB Photon Beards.

The finishing area is mostly taken up by the huge Ademco heat press. I have moved this thing three times (with the much appreciated help of Paul Dorahy). It’s big and solid steel. It now lives on its own set of ‘wheels’. I vouch to never lift that thing again. The finishing area allows for spotting, pressing and mounting. This area also accommodates the large metal squeegee panel and drying racks. All photographs are air dried on nylon wire screens. The sizes of the screens are designed to hold eight 8x10s comfortably or the 20x24s.

That’s about it! The rest of the studio is a filled with backdrop, gallery space, lighting etc and my morning saviour – the old Pavoni espresso machine.

Enrico Scotece, Think Negative

Epson provides a very flimsy film guide for 8×10 film scanning and to use it you directly place your film onto the glass platter, this results in serious newton rings on the scanned image rendering the finished scan unusable as the newton rings can look like massive finger prints across your image. To overcome newton rings one has to create a gap between the film and scanner glass, Epson does provide proper raised film holders but only for 35mm, 120mm and 4×5 film, for 8×10 film we have to devise our own film holder that lifts the film off the glass.

I’ve been in touch with photographer Ben Dolman, after discovering his blog during a search for Epson film guides online. He wrote a blog post about a DIY film guide for the Epson V700/750 (and presumably the new V800) scanners. I shall be making one of these myself and will let you know the results!

Also, be sure to check out his portfolio – Ben has some beautiful colour and black and white images.

More info…

Back of darkroom showing fan and flaps for x-ray film

My Darkroom by Amanda Tomlin

My current darkroom is only the second one I’ve ever had. The two were separated by 30 years.

Way back when I was thinner, sharper, prettier, and younger, so very much younger, the family moved from a comfortable middle class life in California, to an eighteenth century existence in rural France. I was 15 and an avid photographer. For my birthday, some 3 months after arriving, my parents gave me a Durst enlarger they got in Belgium for me. I tucked that first darkroom in a corner of the grain shed and relied on its distance from the door and my own shadow to block the light. I still have a couple of prints I made in there, and still have the enlarger though I do not use it.

Fast forward to a few years ago when I got back into film photography. Actually, I never left, I was just interested in printing at home. Sir did not want me to convert the downstairs toilet into my lair so I began researching other options. I ended up with an unused mobile x-ray darkroom, made for the US Army for field operations. It cost $150 plus $200 shipping and arrived in a large military-green box.

I picked up a Beseler 45MT enlarger—free!—from an online source. Slowly I assembled the bits and pieces and with my son’s help assembled the darkroom in my garage. The frame is hollow aluminum tubing covered in thick black plastic and held together with Velcro hook and loop tape. It has a built in safelight and fan, but no running water. It is very small inside—just over a meter in each direction and under 2m tall—but I manage to cram it all inside. It is meant to have a walk-in tunnel leading to a parting closed by Velcro. Just inside is a curtain that extends 7/8 of the way across the width of the interior. In the interest of maintaining access to my washing machine, I have forgone  the tunnel and instead endeavor to keep the outer door closed to the floor (seldom accomplished—it’s a tight fit).

The entrance side of the darkroom. The parting in the plastic is the entrance

This is not a darkroom for any kind of shared encounter: it’s a solo show. Over the years I have changed out various pieces of equipment. I now use an f-stop timer, which is very handy, although, to be honest, I am always looking for the simplest way to the best print. Or at least the adequate print.

I develop film in there, make emulsion, hang up carbon tissue to dry, store packages I don’t want Sir to see, have a stash of candy, and yes, print. In real life it is much more cluttered than my idealized drawing implies and more than once someone has bumped into the soft sides and caused an avalanche within. I am not particularly organized and have lost negatives in there for weeks on end (in one case a negative–a very important negative of course–went AWOL for over 2 years, and turned up hiding in a contact print frame).

Interior of the lair

When I put this little room together some 8 years ago, I feared I might not use it and some few years hence I would tire of it. Not so, I am happy to say. Long live film! And my cozy, stinky, little room.

Amanda Tomlin

Amanda’s Flickr Photostream

Amanda Tomlin is also Editor in Chief of Looking Glass Magazine

I love my darkroom door with the Dali Lama enhancing the entrance (handcrafted from a 20 x 24 contact negative by David Roberts).

I love my darkroom – When I am working on my own it provides me with solitude and a sense of excitement when the outcome is successful.

I love my darkroom when I am teaching and sharing the wonderful handcraft of photography. Watching students find that sense of excitement in creating a photograph that they made with their hands.
I love my darkroom when Chris Reid (Blanco Negro) teaches fine art black and white printing – the laughter blending with shared knowledge.

I love my darkroom when David Tatnall’s magic in teaching pinhole rubs off onto the students and they discover the mysterious ways light creates wonderful pinhole negatives.

I love my darkroom when it is pristine ready for use and even when it cluttered after use.

My De Vere and L P L  –  4 x 5 enlargers are great tools in projection and contact printing.  All pre-loved and loved for what they can create.

I love my darkroom during The View Camera Gathering – such chaos, Chris Reid processing some 50 or more 4 x 5 an 8 x 10 sheets of film for 25 passionate view camera gatherers cramming in and out of the darkroom door.

I love my darkroom – just in case I did not mention it before.

How blessed am I – doing every day of my life what I love most. 

I just love being in my darkroom and love sharing my darkroom.

I just love my darkroom.

Ellie Young is Australia’s pre-eminent alternative process photographer and teacher. She runs Gold Street Studios with Alan Young in Trentham East, Victoria.

It doesn’t look very exciting – a cardboard box about 5in (13cm) tall, covered in leatherette, with a small round opening at the front. You might have some trouble working out what it was for if you didn’t know. But the Brownie might be the most important camera ever made, writes the BBC’s Stephen Dowling.

Read more at the BBC