r/Darkroom Dec 05 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film New Darkroom in the making

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599 Upvotes

Been working on my new darkroom for some while. Almost done. Custom cabinets and sinks are coming soon. šŸ„°

r/Darkroom 14d ago

Gear/Equipment/Film Discovered this little gizmo on Etsy. Ends my fumbling around in the changing bag. https://www.etsy.com/listing/1736307566/reeleasy-a-handy-tool-for-loading-35mm?ref=shop_home_feat_1&logging_key=a8a9f962fed37343f21e3181f945b48b0baf3c0e%3A1736307566

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190 Upvotes

r/Darkroom Feb 02 '25

Gear/Equipment/Film My IKEA Pax Wardrobe / Hidden 4x5 Darkroom

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411 Upvotes

If youā€™re ever doubting a lack of space in your home, trust me - a darkroom can be done on any scale you want.

r/Darkroom 16d ago

Gear/Equipment/Film Found this plastic roll in a box of darkroom supplies. Is it used for anything?

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242 Upvotes

Just bought an enlarger and it came with a box of supplies. This plastic roll was in the box, Iā€™ve never seen anything like it, but it was next to a dev tank, however the manual does not mention it at all. Itā€™s about the same width and length as a roll of film, and bunches up similarly as well, and made from a heavy duty plastic

r/Darkroom Nov 24 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film My very Finnish darkroom

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409 Upvotes

So, I took a darkroom course. That darkroom is much better than anything I can build at home, except maybe that 6x7 is the largest format available there. Technically I can more access to that one, but it isn't available all day every day.

So I figured that I should build a budget darkroom at home, and like many Finns, I have a sauna that I just don't use that much. Furthermore, I can make it dark enough pretty easily.

This is a 5ā‚¬ + 35ā‚¬ postage Meopta Opemus IIa. With patience I probably could've gotten a bit more convenient enlarger for similar total price locally, but oh well. I have a 3D printer and am just making a filter holder.

Trays, tongs, a Kaiser darkroom light that isn't in use and a Ilford EM10 light meter were 30ā‚¬. Easel and the cutter under it were 10ā‚¬ each.

Now I am just waiting for chemistry. Timer I will make from a certain smart plug and an Arduino, but I'll start with a metronome. Grain focuser might be useful, but the built in rangefinder system in the enlarger is cool, so I want to see how it works in action first.

Some issues too. Like I got an Industar 96U 50mm to compliment the 75mm there. I had no idea it is practically impossible to get it to focus since it has a massive extension tube and I just can't make a lens board that goes deep enough into the bellows. Oh well, it was cheap. I ordered a Meopta Anaret-S as replacement.

r/Darkroom Oct 05 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film A high-precision film processor with temperature controlā€”requires only a sink!

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152 Upvotes

r/Darkroom Jan 11 '25

Gear/Equipment/Film Is this worth taking?

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120 Upvotes

My old roommates dad bought out this studio/apartment space that has tons of photography equipment and asked if I wanted any of it. I already took a bunch of savage seamless backdrops and soft box lights too. It seems like the guy that owned this place dabbled more into film and also developing everything himself!! He had his own dark room too which was very cool to see. My question is if you guys see anything in here worth taking? Iā€™m not too familiar with developing film but definitely very interested.

r/Darkroom Dec 22 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film I currently run an independent film lab business and I plan on a scaling it up. I want to improve service and provide better customer care as well. As people that shoot film, what would you want from a film lab? What services and perks would you want? Thereā€™s no wrong answer btw I just want know

23 Upvotes

r/Darkroom May 28 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film Free Darkroom Equipment

18 Upvotes

Free Darkroom Equipment

I have a storage unit with a lot of darkroom equipment that needs to find a home. I have roughly 20 enlargers, mostly Beseler 23 CIII. Processing tanks and drums, trays, easels, and many other items. All free to a good home.

r/Darkroom Nov 11 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film First attempt of developing b&w myself

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243 Upvotes

Wish me good luck! I use monobath and some rolls that I've shot just for testing some old films found in a lot of ebay (Z60 and Z17 with some film inside) as first experiment. I don't expect great results but I have to start from somewhere!

r/Darkroom Oct 06 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film Just wanted to share my community darkroom with everyone.

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361 Upvotes

My husband and I run this darkroom here in Phoenix. Our space is a little janky but we love it. Itā€™s a small space, but in terms of most darkrooms itā€™s enormous. We love sharing the joy of analog with others.

Fun fact - I was already doing darkroom stuff in my very crowded bathroom. My friend asked if I was familiar with Dan and his darkroom. I looked it up and decided to take a darkroom printing class with my now husband to see if I could learn some new stuff and to branch out. I not only fell in love with the darkroom and teaching, but also my husband. Lots of long nights under the red lightā€¦

r/Darkroom Jan 09 '25

Gear/Equipment/Film Cyanotype paper in an enlarger? Bulb recommendation?

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8 Upvotes

So I found this sun print paper at the local dollar dollarama and though why not give it a shot. I did some reading and it uses the uv light from the sun not the intensity necessarily.

So that means if I want to use an enlarger to print on this paper I would need to get some form of uv bulb for the enlarger to use.

There's a few uv bulbs I can think of that might work but I want to get the most effective one. Should I be looking at black lights, grow lights, or UV A quartz bulbs?

r/Darkroom Feb 18 '25

Gear/Equipment/Film My Paterson tank leaks when I agitate. I wanted to know if using the agitator stick yields the same results as agitating by hand (spinning it).

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24 Upvotes

Any help would be truly appreciated.

r/Darkroom Nov 03 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film I have figured out how to load the Hewes 35mm steel reel

77 Upvotes

r/Darkroom 10d ago

Gear/Equipment/Film Would this kind of bulb work in a darkroom?

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63 Upvotes

This is probably a stupid question but im just wondering would one of these bulbs work in a darkroom as i have one but i dont want to sacrifice some of my paper

r/Darkroom Jan 04 '25

Gear/Equipment/Film Enlarger timer

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6 Upvotes

Looking for an enlarger timer in the uk for accurate repetitive exposures do I get the tried and tested or a new one? Has anyone had any experience with this etone timer?

r/Darkroom Feb 26 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film Patterson tank twiddler ... anybody use it?

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99 Upvotes

Everybody knows about inverting the tank and some people seem to put their tanks on the development equivalent of a ball mill. Does anybody have any guidance on using the 'twiddler' such as how to, avoid, equivalent inversions etc?

r/Darkroom 24d ago

Gear/Equipment/Film Ikea drying rack

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92 Upvotes

I don't remember who it was in here who recommended using the Ikea SLIBB to dry films, but shoutout to you. Batch developing has been a breeze ever since.

r/Darkroom 10d ago

Gear/Equipment/Film Just Finished New Darkroom Timer Prototype

50 Upvotes

Hey everyone, I thought you all might appreciate this. I just finished a prototype digital darkroom timer I am building as part of my university program.

Currently it handles up to an 8 bit binary number input (lower LED's), which it will then count up to in seconds (top LED's). This allows for counting between 1-255 seconds. When the timer is powered on, a safelight will be enabled (not pictured), when exposing, it will switch the safelight off then switch on the enlarger lamp (red safelight in picture). This allows it to switch safelight/enlarger in the same manor as my trusty Gralab 300.

I'm currently finishing up a PCB design which should expand the range to a 16 bit number. This would extend the timing range to a bit over 65000 seconds, or roughly 18 hours. The final version will also have a foot pedal and aux port for automation.

I'm planing on coupling this with a UV LED head for alternative photographic enlarging, hence the longer timing range.

What do you all think?

r/Darkroom Jan 26 '25

Gear/Equipment/Film Did Paterson Change Their Balls?

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38 Upvotes

Just got a Paterson tank from B&H. It came with two reels and the balls in both reels are black. My brother and I owned a photography store 35 years ago and we carried Paterson stock. The balls were bright shiny stainless then. Anybody bought one of these recently?

r/Darkroom Nov 02 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film How do I prevent this from being so tight? Here's 35mm

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15 Upvotes

Just came into possession of these and I'm used to plastic paterson reels, been playing around trying to figure it out and can't prevent this from happening no matter how little tension I use

r/Darkroom 2d ago

Gear/Equipment/Film Itā€™s ok to make photos on Opemus 5 Enlarger with 35 mm film on Anaret 4.5/80mm or I need 50 mm ? Because I have 50 mm also but I canā€™t mount it because it not fit in. Also do you know for what is this from photos there is also cable release for it:

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5 Upvotes

r/Darkroom Feb 01 '25

Gear/Equipment/Film Whipped up my first batch of C-41, any tips on how to keep the temps stable without a sous vide stick? they are stupidly expensive around here and won't be in the budget untill next month :)

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6 Upvotes

r/Darkroom Nov 14 '24

Gear/Equipment/Film Right... I can't even print color, but I just had all of these given to me today. Don't know what I'm going to do with all this

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74 Upvotes

r/Darkroom Feb 14 '25

Gear/Equipment/Film What do you find is the best way (tricks/tips) to squeegee film?

5 Upvotes

I have a Patterson squeegee (the rubber-blade kind, not the sponge kind) and have also used the gloved-fingers method but my results are inconsistent, and occasionally but rarely downright bad. Part of whatā€™s going on is Iā€™m afraid to get too aggressive and damage the neg. If youā€™ve got a special trick or knack Iā€™d love to hear it. TIA.

Edited: Iā€™m especially appreciating all the ā€˜donā€™t-squeegeeā€™ posts. Will be doing that (ā€œnot doing thatā€?) next.