Our 'How to' series of videos is designed to give you the confidence to take the first steps in your black and white film photography journey. This video filmed in one of our darkrooms here at ILFORD Photo will hopefully help you to make your first darkroom print. We'd love to hear how you go on in the comments below:)
I've always wondered how photos were print before the invention of digital cameras, and now that I've seen this, I can only appreciate the amount of work film photographers put in their photos. Thanks for the video!
Darkroom work is a lot of fun too. Very satisfying. When you see an image gradually appear on the paper as it's sitting in the developing solution, it's like magic. Almost surreal.
@@AlexStalin-ph2do in that time we did have analog cameraa. They don't record an image as whole frame, but scan the image as horizontal lines with CRT, CRT is sensitive to light and can record what is lighter and what is darker, so if you move the CRT in one line you can make a black and white image line (yes one pixel line) repeat this process every line you'll get a whole frame. Note: analog broadcast camera doesn't have horizontal resolution as the CRT record *everything* in it's horizontal lines, but they have vertical resolution.
How old are you? When I was growing up, CVS and Walgreens had their own film development lab. Though now CVS has no more lab and Walgreens have a digital lab instead of a film lab. I was born in the late 1980s.
15 years old and I just made my first print in my home darkroom with the help of this brilliant video! I don't think I can go back to digital, that first sight of the image appearing on the paper is just magical and it should never be a lost art.
Love to see this... I have a Minolta that I've been shooting with for about 10 years that I still have film I've never seen from. I'm an expert in Lightroom for what I do with my other devices, but I definitely want to take it back.
@@Ilfordphoto I'm afraid I went over to the digital dark side a few years ago. I've recently been very tempted but a subsequent house move has meant no darkroom and I'm still pondering it as a big commitment. I had considered shooting film and printing digitally- don't shoot me!
This video along with developing black and white film are probably the best ones I've seen here. Excellent video production, well thought out, no obnoxious music, easy to follow along with the captions and just plain easy to watch.
I miss this! I took Photography in High School and we had a dark room. So fun. I think a year or two after I graduated, it became a digital photography class, sad.
As someone thinking about taking the plunge into print making, this video comes at the perfect time! I really enjoy how comprehensive your instructional videos are.
OMG!... I watched both development and printing videos. I remember that at school, back in the '90s, I took the optional photography course and we used ILFORD films, it's really a beautiful memory. I really enjoyed the whole process, from shooting the picture, to development, to the projector, to the chemical baths, up to the final result. Film is something magical, completly different to digital: no display, no histogram, no photoshop, no instant gratification; I feel lucky to have had that experience.
Congratulations on this video. What a memory!!! I spent hours and hours learning the art of negative development, and then the circulation... and the very good circulation was rare... But what a time...
This is one the best made videos related to photography I have come across until now. Right from the start till end the presentation of the information was fantastic and explanation crystal clear. Thanks so much!
My grandmother was a photographer and showed me how to do this when I was very young. She’s in the trenches of dementia right now and can no longer do what she used to love. I’m learning so that her art will live on, even if she can’t do it.
In the 90's I took Commercial photography in college. I then setup my own darkroom at home. I had so much fun processing my own film and prints. I jumped full force into the digital age buying my first digital camera in 1999, a whole megapixal. I went through several camera upgrades over the years, but have lost some of the satisfaction in digital that I once had using film. I would love to share this process again with my kids. I am getting back into film photography and will use Indie Film Lab for processing for the time being.
Wow - amazing how much work and care goes into analogue photography and how much work has been lifted off our shoulders with digital photography, at a cost of authenticity and style though. Nothing like analogue photos.
I wonder how many people in this day and age realise whats involved in making one print. I'm maybe older school than this, and would have different grades of paper rather than multigrade. Very well made video in less than ideal lighting I guess.
there is a documentary about andsel adams and shows him in his darkroom. (I am novice photographer using 35mm 1979 olympus camera. ) and i have always just dropped the film off. these documentaries really make me want to have my own darkroom so i can control the finished product.
@@chasestewart8619 Mate it is relatively easy once you've been shown once or twice and you know what equipment and chemicals to buy. It's a shame that there's so few colleges that run courses that include the use of film and printing. The other thing is the people with the skills to teach it are a disappearing breed, I know that once I've gone from my college/course whoever takes over will not continue with teaching using film, they'll take the cop out option of using digital.
I remember being in photography school when my teacher showed off the first digital camera I ever saw. It was the size of 2 bricks side by side and had a screen the size of a postage stamp. That was probably 1998.
I loved being in the darkroom at college doing black and white prints, I’ve done colour too but nothing better than watching your print appear on the paper and see the final result, started to get back into it going to make my own little darkroom film will always be better than digital for me
I'm just now getting into medium format film photography, and also just now learning about Ilford. I'm an instant fan. The amount of love you guys share for photography has made me even more excited and confident to get really into doing my own developing and printing!
This finally makes sense to me! I found my dad's old enlarger in my grandparents' loft yesterday. Aside from knowing it was something to do with film photography, I had no idea what it was. Googling just confused me more, but everything clicked with this video. THANKS!
I have had the privilege of growing up through both analogue and digital camera era. I used to sell cameras back in the early 2000s and was an avid (hobbyist) photographer, although I've never had the opportunity to do my own dark room developing. Now I'm older with children. I just bought a 35mm half frame film camera for my daughter. I'll be damned if she doesn't even get to experience the fun of loading a film into a camera. When she watched this video she was amazed at the magic of the image coming onto the paper. Thank you Ilford for the video!
Love from AFGHANISTAN It was greattttt I like it After 14 years I watched , it brought back my memories of printing in past I miss this way of printing I'll start again Thanks
I took a film photography class in high school & i miss doing this so much! having access to a dark room to use whenever was awesome and I took it for granted !
This made me so nostalgic… the same process that I first learned almost fifty years ago… still works, and creates images that last and don’t disappear into the cyberspace. Love it!
I really enjoy making my images, I wouldn’t dream of letting anyone else develop them, I always cut my own mounts and even have a passion for making top quality frames with a multitude of woods. But none of that compares to the magic of the darkroom. Adams, Weston, Penn and Koudelka are all primarily known for their work in the darkroom, unfortunately most people just see the image and miss the magic. Great video, thank you.
If you are broke like me plus a pair of scissors to cut the paper for test prints and then you sell those test prints as cool bookmakers to friends and family so you can buy more paper ,chemicals and film. P.S. broke guys tip: if you don't have money to buy all three chemicals you can just use water at 20C for stop bath but you need it to let the paper in there for a second or two more. Btw any other person born in or after 2000 that still shoots 35mm or medium format?
Just too add a note for posterity. As an apprentice in the 80s we where taught to run 30 10 x 8 inch prints through the chemicals at once by rotating the paper from the bottom to the top. We would time them and as the top one reached the density’s we would flip it in to the fixer. We cauld do batch runs of a single image of seven hundred in a day. This was in the days when catalogues needed prints for their reps to take on the road of new dresses to shops. And kept us busy spring and autumn.
Wow. That sounds intense. I bet it took your eyes a while to adjust after spending all day in the dark. Although after speaking to some of our production team they say it can be relaxing to work under safelight conditions.
What a cool job it must have been back in the days. Developing dreams, travels, loves, families, special moments, all through science and practice. I love photography because it's the perfect blend between pure rational technological science and and emotional artistry
The 'How to' series is fantastic and has got me inspired to print in the darkroom again. I'm currently using a public darkroom I can hire, but I'd like to build and be printing in my own darkroom within the next 12 months. These videos really help in making progress. Thank you!
@@Ilfordphoto I'm using a local darkroom in Oxford called Fusion Arts darkroom: www.artsjobs.org.uk/arts-news/post/fusion-arts-darkroom-open-for-bookings/ It's been really helpful being able to get back into printing my b&w negatives.
I take photography in school, it's my first year and this process is so much fun to do! i absolutely love working in the dark room and just seeing the picture develop right before your eyes is such a beautiful thing. I've only been in Photography 1 for about a month now and I've learned so much about it that it makes me fall in love with photography more and more.
Really glad to hear that Jayden, we agree that there's nothing quite like the magic of printing in the darkroom. If you are taking photography at school then it may be worth mentioning our student competition to your tutor www.ilfordphoto.com/studentcomp2018
I came across this movie and brought me back in my student days about 30 years ago. The long hours in my darkroom. About 7 years ago while fixing the house I through all of it.
My college still had a dark room for the X-ray diagnosis program. Figure out, back then when using film, they were taking an X-ray in the operation room during surgery, then went 20min to develop. Imagine the surgeon wasn't happy if the image wasn't well exposed
We agree Mark. We can hopefully show people the basic steps to get them to have a go, but after that its hard to share the experience. We are just in the process of releasing some new videos that we hope will go a little way to doing this ruclips.net/video/b-keDPtVnGA/видео.html
When I build my photography studio in the near future, I would love to make a dark room workshop. I have always been interested in dark room mainly because of Ansel Adams, alongside his landscape photos.
In 1950 I was 3 years old. My next door neighbour, Mr Murry, was into photography and he showed me how he developed and printed his photos. Watching the photograph magically appear on the paper, in what I thought at the time was a dish of water, started a life long love of photography.
Nice, back in the day I worked in professional photography, worked in darkrooms for over a decade, b/w, color and transparency processing. Black and white involved dodging and burning, using card with holes in it or pieces paper stuck on a metal rod, all those dodge and burn Photoshop techniques were done by hand. Airbrushing a background out is easy in Photoshop, we had to use an actual airbrush and spray onto an actual print.
Memories of my college photography class. I have an itch to pick up a vintage 35mm pentax and start this kind of photography as a hobby. But sadly no darkrooms anywhere!
Hi Andrew - We are in the process of updating our darkroom finder on ilfordphoto.com Obviously many are shut at the moment but we hope that we'll have a good selection on here in future.
Hello, thought i would get back to you guys,!! I have finally set up my darkroom in my sons old bedroom, Invested in a leitz V35 enlarger, with 40mm lens, also a RH Designs Timer 3, all sourced from Second hand darkroom supplies. I currently use Ilford Pan F and pull process as far as 6 asa developing with Ilford Perceptol and Ilford Fp4 pull processing as far as 12 asa .I use Ilford Warm tone MG Pearl paper and I am printing stunning pin sharp prints. I am enjoying the whole darkroom process and trying out different techniques such as dodging and burning and split grade printing from your how to videos. Cheers Jonathan
I'd love to see some of those extreme pulls! 6 and 12 asa are pretty low. Are you on social media? Please share some of your prints and shots with us. #ilfordpanf #ilfordfp4
Hi, thanks for commenting on my post, I would be happy to send some prints to you, as i don`t do social media, I think they would look better in the flesh, Let me know if you would be interested ?
I started printing in my bathroom in February... And the prints actually come out pretty good... Of course I've made some mistakes... But it's fun learning...
Learning is definitely the fun part, and I think the more time you spend in the darkroom, the more likely you are to go back to older prints and re-print them slightly differently as you find what works best for you and your negatives.
Did this as a teenager in the 70's (also tried colour film/prints but that was expensive). It was great fun at that time. But today some 40 years later I much prefer to use my 42 mpix Sony A7R3 + Epson XP15000 photo printer. There is just not enough time (and money) in my life to play around with grainy b/w photos. The final print quality I get is also insanely better that what I could achieve in the old days (and you don't have to mess around with chemicals). That being said... I understand why some people may like to try this. And the video is very well made.
Disagree all around. You can get an enlarger and all the developing kit you need off auctions or Craigslist for under $200 if not less, and a nice SLR + prime lens is about $100 or so. You can make a heck of a lot of prints from many rolls of film for well under $1000, and that Sony A7 is something like twice that. That film camera and enlarger will keep you going for decades while you'll be replacing the Sony and the printer for a newer model in a few years. I'm still using cameras made 60 years ago and they work great, and give great results. The analogue look and digital look are quite different - it's of course up to the viewer which you prefer but for me I like both the images I take and the process more with analogue methods than I do with the DSLR I previously used. YMMV.
Comparing digital prints and darkroom prints, one is not better than the other. Traditional darkroom prints have a really nice look about them which is different to digital prints and some people really like that particular look and may prefer it over the digital route. And as for grainy b & w prints, yes you can have a fair amount of grain in some images as a result of a number of factors. And once again, some people really like grain. It's an individual thing. It's also possibly to have fine grained b & w prints. For example, the finished print in the video didn't really look particularly grainy to me. And by shooting medium speed film stocks in larger sizes (eg medium format and large format) you can produce extremely fine grained prints. In such cases, the grain would be just about invisible - even with big prints.
Thanks for sharing that, glad you enjoyed the video even if it wasn't what you were looking for initially. If you fancy trying your hand at shooting black and white film then there are lots of other videos on our channel to help you get started.
Usually, you can find a public one nearby; you can rent them for like an hour and it should only be a few dollars. Sometimes they give you the chemicals and supplies, sometimes you need your own, depends on the place.
Amy Rigsby; Photography clubs, schools, etc. Also just ask around, like minded folk tend to be generous and share. The first enlarger I used was an older student (rich kid) at school. Also you'll get hints and tips and where to save money and where not to.
Add the cost of plumbing, a good water temp control valve. A very good voltage regulator, if not the light could vary from the enlarger. You need safety lights. You need a short timer for enlarging and a long timer for negative development. The size of the trays vary depending on the size of the prints you make. Enlarging paper is expensive, really expensive. Now you need a good, solid bench for the enlarger. The enlarger must be rock solid so as to not shake during enlargement. And then sinks for the chemical trays, should be stainless steel. Oh, I forgot you need a GOOD water filtration system. Clean water is very important. Ventilation. Plenty of it. Need to keep from breathing in the fumes from the chemicals. Plus there is many little items you need. Too many to list here but they do cost a bit. So you have several thousand dollars, then by all means build a darkroom. Better yet stick with digital.
Just got my hands on a old enlarger that should be capable of 6x6 negative. (Depends on if it works at all) I do have a camera that shoot 6x9negative. Would i be able to enlarge it in my enlarger but just loose some of the frame on the longer length? Best regards Alfons
Your video is very informative for those considering traditional B&W print photography. Back in the good old days the actual print developing process could not be filmed but instead was simulated by using the sepia tone process which is not light sensitive. This made it possible to film the darkroom scene with cinema lighting and an appropriate filter to look like the orange illumination of a typical darkroom. I'm curious if this ILFORD video used modern super sensitive digital camera equipment to record the actual chemical development process and not a simulation.
My Dad had a darkroom when I was very young - I can still remember the smell of the chemicals now! I didn't realise just how much went into it. All I remember is Dad had a lot of equipment in a tiny room xD
It's it usual to expose the contract sheets in sections to judge the correct exposure time and then repeat the process with your enlargement? Surely you'll have a pretty good idea by now and could try for a good first enlargement?
There is no reason that you couldn't try your first print after this step if you wanted to. Also, as you get more experience you find it easier to judge from the test strips.
I develop my own Black and White but alas don't have the set up for printing. I would love to one day. I really enjoy everything about film photography and the way that, in a fast paced world, one can free oneself from the frantic nature of our lives in the 21st Century.
Nice overview of the process. I used a spotmeter to measure the amount of light in the brightest and darkest parts that still needed details. It calculated the exposure time, and told me if I should use soft/medium/hard paper for optimal contrast. Of course the paper wasn't hard, it's just related to the contrast conversion (as far as I can remember, Ilford used numbers). It was actually a simple version of the zone system. It all ended when digital camera's became available.
I love these videos, and find them very informative. The only thing I would suggest is leaving the text on screen for a bit longer - especially when more info is included.
Great video- but say i do a test strip on a 30x24 size paper and find that 6 sec looks great BUT id like to make my final print on a paper size 50x40 - then 6 sec dosent apply anymore does it ??? - that i dont understand - how do i do that - thanks
4:56 - "again not letting the tongs touch the next solution" - but why? Fixing solution is always contaminated with a little of stop solution (because there's a stop solution on the print!).
We want to minimize that contamination as much as possible. We also know that not everybody uses fresh tongs for each step and we wouldn't want any contamination moving backwards down the steps.
This was super easy to follow and very thorough!! Can you review the other equipment needed? Pre-solution, how is the image pushed from the negative onto the paper and what equipment would you need to do this at home?
The image isn't really 'pushed.' The negative is projected on to the paper with the light from the enlarger. This creates a latent image on the paper (an image that is temporarily invisible.) Developer is then used to make the image visible.
does anyone know what music they use for not only this video but the rest of their film tutorials or the name of the song because it’s great and i love it
Hi Adrian, 5 second increments so you move your card every 5 seconds. Have a look at our Making a basic contact sheet video where it shows it a bit clearer. ruclips.net/video/E03MP5nWJPs/видео.html
When I've done them, I always left the enlarger light on the whole time, and moved the card a bit every five seconds. I also would use a strip, rather than a whole sheet to save money on paper, but the last time I did prints, I was a newspaper photographer and getting a show-worthy print wasn't the goal.
Hi Elliott You don't want your tongs to touch the next solution and then take the chemistry backwards, contaminating the previous tray. e.g. stop to dev or fix to stop. Moving the other way is fine.
Would like some advice!!! How can I make a dark room? My dad used to do developing in his tiny bathroom in pitch darkness back in the day. I don’t have a spare room in my place I could use. Maybe the bathroom??? Hahaha
Niceley done. So many videos on here are inaccurate, too long and don't explain things properly. This is an excellent resource for beginners. There are slight differences to the way I print, but that's fine, I'm sure chefs do things slightly differently.
I did this in highschool and man, later thinking about it I wish most public and private high-schools had an old film photography class. At least for my area, that is.
Guidelines for disposing of chemistry vary greatly between countries and regions so we'd always advise contacting your local authority to see what is available www.ilfordphoto.com/faqs/ilford-photochemistry-faqs/
Hi Graceille, do you mean the paper? Leaving RC paper in the wash for extreme lengths of time can cause eventual damage to it but it would take a while.
Yes, fixer is easy and the tech sheets will state times for both films and paper. With developer it depend on which developer you use and we would normally recommend using a specific film or paper developer to get the best results.
AMAZING! I just p/u a Omega Enlarger B22 for $5 bucks from the thrift store. Was $10, but they had it since last week, and let me have it for $5.00... I'm excited and a bit nervous.
im a student studying film and absoluteley addicted to the process of creating a print. I love every second of it. But something I'm having trouble with is understanding the use of filters. I never know in what situation I should use what number filter.
Hi Daniel. Filters can be confusing. Most normal negs don't require anything other than a grade 2, and many people choose to split grade print which you can find more information on here www.ilfordphoto.com/split-grade-printing/ . A good option if you are able to is to print the same negative as grade 00 - 5 so you can see the difference between the softer and harder grades. We will look at putting a simple guide together in the future and adding it to our website.
Did my first prints this past weekend. Had contrast a bit high until I used the filtration settings on the Ilford Datasheet vs those on Omega’s instruction manual for my color head, a Chromega B 66. Ilford, I thought fix times were closer to 1 minute for Rapid Fixer or Ilford Hypam diluted 1:4 and 2 minutes with 1:9 dilution?
how much money does it take to get a "budget-level" or entry-level darkroom going? Let's assume I already have the space and tables required. So developing the film and and then this setup shown in the video as well.
Developing film is pretty cheap. Some thing like this kit www.ilfordphoto.com/catalog/product/view/id/1657/s/ilford-paterson-film-starter-kit/category/70/ has everything you need to get started (except the dark room. Printing is more expensive and the biggest cost is usually the enlarger but there are often 2nd hand bargains to be had or Intrepid do a great one which is perfect for starting out.
@@Ilfordphoto There are many cases of people buying second hand enlargers for dirt cheap. Yes, sometimes they can be expensive. And at other times, enlargers are given away for free.
I recently bought an enlarger and it came with three boxes of Ilford 8x11 paper, 2.1m 3.1m and 4.1m ilfospeed . whats the difference and do i need to treat it differently? I have printed one picture, my first print ever, of my dog and it still works, I have nearly 300 sheets.
These are just single grade papers rather than Multigrade so you'd expect the same print to look different on each paper. Softer on the grade 2 to harder on grade 4. Its also worth having a look at the technical sheets attached to the products on our website as there give more detailed information www.ilfordphoto.com/ilfospeed-rc-deluxe-pearl-grade-3
Thank you so much for Making this awesome video... But whats the use of VARIAC... And what is its various setting means.. I am doing a project plzz help
Our 'How to' series of videos is designed to give you the confidence to take the first steps in your black and white film photography journey. This video filmed in one of our darkrooms here at ILFORD Photo will hopefully help you to make your first darkroom print. We'd love to hear how you go on in the comments below:)
Amazing series, love your work and company!
At 5:18 the exposure time should be 5 second start from right to left ? I thought its like photography the longer the expose the lighter
The man who invented photography must have shit his pants when he seen the first decent image pop out lol
I know I did.
This made me laugh out loud 😂😂
I've always wondered how photos were print before the invention of digital cameras, and now that I've seen this, I can only appreciate the amount of work film photographers put in their photos. Thanks for the video!
What about brodcasting in the 50s and 60s ?
Darkroom work is a lot of fun too. Very satisfying. When you see an image gradually appear on the paper as it's sitting in the developing solution, it's like magic. Almost surreal.
@@AlexStalin-ph2do in that time we did have analog cameraa. They don't record an image as whole frame, but scan the image as horizontal lines with CRT, CRT is sensitive to light and can record what is lighter and what is darker, so if you move the CRT in one line you can make a black and white image line (yes one pixel line) repeat this process every line you'll get a whole frame.
Note: analog broadcast camera doesn't have horizontal resolution as the CRT record *everything* in it's horizontal lines, but they have vertical resolution.
NTSC (broadcast standard in US and Japan) has 486 horizontal line
How old are you? When I was growing up, CVS and Walgreens had their own film development lab. Though now CVS has no more lab and Walgreens have a digital lab instead of a film lab. I was born in the late 1980s.
15 years old and I just made my first print in my home darkroom with the help of this brilliant video! I don't think I can go back to digital, that first sight of the image appearing on the paper is just magical and it should never be a lost art.
Lost your generation is lost well done look at Robert Frank
Where did you get the enlarger from
@@davesuals It got it on eBay! Most of my equipment was from there. If your patient you can find some good deals.
Love to see this... I have a Minolta that I've been shooting with for about 10 years that I still have film I've never seen from. I'm an expert in Lightroom for what I do with my other devices, but I definitely want to take it back.
Just got a Cadet II from eBay yesterday
Oh that brought back so many good memories of hours spent in the darkroom: alchemy, magic!
Thanks for watching Derek. Glad you enjoyed it. Do you shoot much film?
@@Ilfordphoto I'm afraid I went over to the digital dark side a few years ago. I've recently been very tempted but a subsequent house move has meant no darkroom and I'm still pondering it as a big commitment. I had considered shooting film and printing digitally- don't shoot me!
This video along with developing black and white film are probably the best ones I've seen here. Excellent video production, well thought out, no obnoxious music, easy to follow along with the captions and just plain easy to watch.
I miss this! I took Photography in High School and we had a dark room. So fun. I think a year or two after I graduated, it became a digital photography class, sad.
It's easier than ever to go back to it:)
@@Ilfordphoto I bought a Nikon F100. Not quite ready for a dark room, but it's a start!
@@Ilfordphoto easier than ever? Looks like I have to invest a few thousand bucks on equipment for my dark room
@@kurtfelix1412 There's loads of equipment out there either second hand or in some cases being given away, you just have to keep an eye out.
Same! I had my own darkroom in college when I worked for the college newspaper in the '90s. I miss this so much!
As someone thinking about taking the plunge into print making, this video comes at the perfect time! I really enjoy how comprehensive your instructional videos are.
That's good to hear. Let us know how you get on.
OMG!... I watched both development and printing videos. I remember that at school, back in the '90s, I took the optional photography course and we used ILFORD films, it's really a beautiful memory. I really enjoyed the whole process, from shooting the picture, to development, to the projector, to the chemical baths, up to the final result. Film is something magical, completly different to digital: no display, no histogram, no photoshop, no instant gratification; I feel lucky to have had that experience.
Congratulations on this video. What a memory!!! I spent hours and hours learning the art of negative development, and then the circulation... and the very good circulation was rare... But what a time...
You should give film photography and darkroom printing another go, you obviously miss it:)
The ending is a great idea!
Meh, I'd have prefered the print to have been framed, mounted and displayed on a wall.
Mike Edwards your pretty starved
@@raribusta330 Very true, unfortunately.
This is one the best made videos related to photography I have come across until now. Right from the start till end the presentation of the information was fantastic and explanation crystal clear. Thanks so much!
My grandmother was a photographer and showed me how to do this when I was very young. She’s in the trenches of dementia right now and can no longer do what she used to love. I’m learning so that her art will live on, even if she can’t do it.
In the 90's I took Commercial photography in college. I then setup my own darkroom at home. I had so much fun processing my own film and prints. I jumped full force into the digital age buying my first digital camera in 1999, a whole megapixal. I went through several camera upgrades over the years, but have lost some of the satisfaction in digital that I once had using film. I would love to share this process again with my kids. I am getting back into film photography and will use Indie Film Lab for processing for the time being.
Wow - amazing how much work and care goes into analogue photography and how much work has been lifted off our shoulders with digital photography, at a cost of authenticity and style though. Nothing like analogue photos.
I wonder how many people in this day and age realise whats involved in making one print.
I'm maybe older school than this, and would have different grades of paper rather than multigrade.
Very well made video in less than ideal lighting I guess.
I started at the age of 24. I'm now 30 still loving the magic!
there is a documentary about andsel adams and shows him in his darkroom. (I am novice photographer using 35mm 1979 olympus camera. ) and i have always just dropped the film off. these documentaries really make me want to have my own darkroom so i can control the finished product.
@@chasestewart8619 Mate it is relatively easy once you've been shown once or twice and you know what equipment and chemicals to buy. It's a shame that there's so few colleges that run courses that include the use of film and printing. The other thing is the people with the skills to teach it are a disappearing breed, I know that once I've gone from my college/course whoever takes over will not continue with teaching using film, they'll take the cop out option of using digital.
I remember being in photography school when my teacher showed off the first digital camera I ever saw. It was the size of 2 bricks side by side and had a screen the size of a postage stamp. That was probably 1998.
@@chasestewart8619 Is that the one that shows him drying his prints in the microwave?
I loved being in the darkroom at college doing black and white prints, I’ve done colour too but nothing better than watching your print appear on the paper and see the final result, started to get back into it going to make my own little darkroom film will always be better than digital for me
We couldn't agree more. The magic of printing in the darkroom never goes away no matter how many times we do it.
I'm just now getting into medium format film photography, and also just now learning about Ilford. I'm an instant fan. The amount of love you guys share for photography has made me even more excited and confident to get really into doing my own developing and printing!
This finally makes sense to me! I found my dad's old enlarger in my grandparents' loft yesterday. Aside from knowing it was something to do with film photography, I had no idea what it was. Googling just confused me more, but everything clicked with this video. THANKS!
That's fantastic to hear. Enjoy learning to print :)
I have had the privilege of growing up through both analogue and digital camera era. I used to sell cameras back in the early 2000s and was an avid (hobbyist) photographer, although I've never had the opportunity to do my own dark room developing. Now I'm older with children. I just bought a 35mm half frame film camera for my daughter. I'll be damned if she doesn't even get to experience the fun of loading a film into a camera.
When she watched this video she was amazed at the magic of the image coming onto the paper. Thank you Ilford for the video!
Love from AFGHANISTAN
It was greattttt
I like it
After 14 years I watched , it brought back my memories of printing in past
I miss this way of printing I'll start again
Thanks
You should definitely have another go at darkroom printing. You can black most rooms our with some black card and tape:)
I took a film photography class in high school & i miss doing this so much! having access to a dark room to use whenever was awesome and I took it for granted !
I love this hobby. it's so.. relaxing .. (nice background song, it reflects my feeling when I'm in the darkroom.)
This made me so nostalgic… the same process that I first learned almost fifty years ago… still works, and creates images that last and don’t disappear into the cyberspace. Love it!
Facts I will always love this type of work when it comes to photography! These type of picture have more meaning to them then the modern digital era!
I really enjoy making my images, I wouldn’t dream of letting anyone else develop them, I always cut my own mounts and even have a passion for making top quality frames with a multitude of woods. But none of that compares to the magic of the darkroom. Adams, Weston, Penn and Koudelka are all primarily known for their work in the darkroom, unfortunately most people just see the image and miss the magic.
Great video, thank you.
If you are broke like me plus a pair of scissors to cut the paper for test prints and then you sell those test prints as cool bookmakers to friends and family so you can buy more paper ,chemicals and film. P.S. broke guys tip: if you don't have money to buy all three chemicals you can just use water at 20C for stop bath but you need it to let the paper in there for a second or two more. Btw any other person born in or after 2000 that still shoots 35mm or medium format?
Love the bookmark idea Ricky! And yes there are loads of younger people shooting film. 35mm is the most popular but 120 format isn't far behind:)
hi! yep I shoot film and Im in high school
@@Nicky-fi6jy no one cares
why only born after 2000 ??
@@RobBob555 why spread negativity man the world is a so much better place without it
Just too add a note for posterity. As an apprentice in the 80s we where taught to run 30 10 x 8 inch prints through the chemicals at once by rotating the paper from the bottom to the top. We would time them and as the top one reached the density’s we would flip it in to the fixer. We cauld do batch runs of a single image of seven hundred in a day. This was in the days when catalogues needed prints for their reps to take on the road of new dresses to shops. And kept us busy spring and autumn.
Wow. That sounds intense. I bet it took your eyes a while to adjust after spending all day in the dark. Although after speaking to some of our production team they say it can be relaxing to work under safelight conditions.
What a cool job it must have been back in the days.
Developing dreams, travels, loves, families, special moments, all through science and practice.
I love photography because it's the perfect blend between pure rational technological science and and emotional artistry
I agree. I wonder if you became immune to seeing all of those precious memories appear or if it was always special
The 'How to' series is fantastic and has got me inspired to print in the darkroom again. I'm currently using a public darkroom I can hire, but I'd like to build and be printing in my own darkroom within the next 12 months. These videos really help in making progress. Thank you!
Thanks so much for watching. We're really glad that we've inspired you to get back in the darkroom. Which public darkroom are you currently using?
@@Ilfordphoto I'm using a local darkroom in Oxford called Fusion Arts darkroom: www.artsjobs.org.uk/arts-news/post/fusion-arts-darkroom-open-for-bookings/
It's been really helpful being able to get back into printing my b&w negatives.
I take photography in school, it's my first year and this process is so much fun to do! i absolutely love working in the dark room and just seeing the picture develop right before your eyes is such a beautiful thing. I've only been in Photography 1 for about a month now and I've learned so much about it that it makes me fall in love with photography more and more.
Really glad to hear that Jayden, we agree that there's nothing quite like the magic of printing in the darkroom. If you are taking photography at school then it may be worth mentioning our student competition to your tutor www.ilfordphoto.com/studentcomp2018
I came across this movie and brought me back in my student days about 30 years ago. The long hours in my darkroom. About 7 years ago while fixing the house I through all of it.
Just set up my darkroom, paper and chemicals arriving today, can`t wait, told you i was hooked, !!
That's so exciting. You do realise that it gets more addictive the longer you spend in the darkroom?
@@Ilfordphoto Yep,!!!
I will find it totally liberating
My college still had a dark room for the X-ray diagnosis program. Figure out, back then when using film, they were taking an X-ray in the operation room during surgery, then went 20min to develop. Imagine the surgeon wasn't happy if the image wasn't well exposed
I really gotta get into this stuff. Only one way to truly get the incredible fidelity out of a black and white negative!
You should definitely give it a go! Depending on where you live, there may be a community darkroom nearby that you can learn at too.
@@Ilfordphoto I live in a capital city so there definitely should be one around! This art is one I find to be absolutely magical.
A great video, but I’m not sure if even the best videos can get across just how creative and how much fun the darkroom is.
We agree Mark. We can hopefully show people the basic steps to get them to have a go, but after that its hard to share the experience. We are just in the process of releasing some new videos that we hope will go a little way to doing this ruclips.net/video/b-keDPtVnGA/видео.html
When I build my photography studio in the near future, I would love to make a dark room workshop. I have always been interested in dark room mainly because of Ansel Adams, alongside his landscape photos.
In 1950 I was 3 years old. My next door neighbour, Mr Murry, was into photography and he showed me how he developed and printed his photos. Watching the photograph magically appear on the paper, in what I thought at the time was a dish of water, started a life long love of photography.
That’s what I remember doing, maybe a little bit different here and there but essentially you nailed it!
Do you not fancy giving it a another try? I bet there is a darkroom not too far away....
Incredible tutorial!
Thanks you. We hope that you found it useful
Very well explained. Thank you!
Glad you found it helpful. Enjoy your time in the darkroom
Nice, back in the day I worked in professional photography, worked in darkrooms for over a decade, b/w, color and transparency processing. Black and white involved dodging and burning, using card with holes in it or pieces paper stuck on a metal rod, all those dodge and burn Photoshop techniques were done by hand. Airbrushing a background out is easy in Photoshop, we had to use an actual airbrush and spray onto an actual print.
Nice touch at the end with the Ilford Photo sheet!
Thank you :)
Thank you so much for making this video! I just finished by first enlargements and they turned out great.
That's fantasic. Well done.
Amazing technique and great job making it easy to grasp.
Thanks Zohair. Glad you enjoyed it.
Memories of my college photography class. I have an itch to pick up a vintage 35mm pentax and start this kind of photography as a hobby. But sadly no darkrooms anywhere!
Hi Andrew - We are in the process of updating our darkroom finder on ilfordphoto.com Obviously many are shut at the moment but we hope that we'll have a good selection on here in future.
Hello, thought i would get back to you guys,!! I have finally set up my darkroom in my sons old bedroom, Invested in a leitz V35 enlarger, with 40mm lens, also a RH Designs Timer 3, all sourced from Second hand darkroom supplies. I currently use Ilford Pan F and pull process as far as 6 asa developing with Ilford Perceptol and Ilford Fp4 pull processing as far as 12 asa .I use Ilford Warm tone MG Pearl paper and I am printing stunning pin sharp prints. I am enjoying the whole darkroom process and trying out different techniques such as dodging and burning and split grade printing from your how to videos. Cheers Jonathan
I'd love to see some of those extreme pulls! 6 and 12 asa are pretty low. Are you on social media? Please share some of your prints and shots with us. #ilfordpanf #ilfordfp4
Hi, thanks for commenting on my post, I would be happy to send some prints to you, as i don`t do social media, I think they would look better in the flesh, Let me know if you would be interested ?
@@jonathanbaxter4366 I'd hate for them to just be sat in our office, it's a waste of a print but thank you for the offer.
@@Ilfordphoto Hi, I could try emailing them over if that helps, I could take them on my phone, it will give you an idea of how they look?
Or if you have whats app that would be quicker?
I started printing in my bathroom in February... And the prints actually come out pretty good... Of course I've made some mistakes... But it's fun learning...
Learning is definitely the fun part, and I think the more time you spend in the darkroom, the more likely you are to go back to older prints and re-print them slightly differently as you find what works best for you and your negatives.
@@Ilfordphoto yes... My thoughts also...
Did this as a teenager in the 70's (also tried colour film/prints but that was expensive). It was great fun at that time. But today some 40 years later I much prefer to use my 42 mpix Sony A7R3 + Epson XP15000 photo printer. There is just not enough time (and money) in my life to play around with grainy b/w photos. The final print quality I get is also insanely better that what I could achieve in the old days (and you don't have to mess around with chemicals).
That being said... I understand why some people may like to try this. And the video is very well made.
Disagree all around. You can get an enlarger and all the developing kit you need off auctions or Craigslist for under $200 if not less, and a nice SLR + prime lens is about $100 or so. You can make a heck of a lot of prints from many rolls of film for well under $1000, and that Sony A7 is something like twice that. That film camera and enlarger will keep you going for decades while you'll be replacing the Sony and the printer for a newer model in a few years. I'm still using cameras made 60 years ago and they work great, and give great results. The analogue look and digital look are quite different - it's of course up to the viewer which you prefer but for me I like both the images I take and the process more with analogue methods than I do with the DSLR I previously used. YMMV.
Still doing it 50 years now they are a richer print than digital
Comparing digital prints and darkroom prints, one is not better than the other. Traditional darkroom prints have a really nice look about them which is different to digital prints and some people really like that particular look and may prefer it over the digital route. And as for grainy b & w prints, yes you can have a fair amount of grain in some images as a result of a number of factors. And once again, some people really like grain. It's an individual thing. It's also possibly to have fine grained b & w prints. For example, the finished print in the video didn't really look particularly grainy to me. And by shooting medium speed film stocks in larger sizes (eg medium format and large format) you can produce extremely fine grained prints. In such cases, the grain would be just about invisible - even with big prints.
It´s magical.. No other word can describe properly this...
And it stays magical no matter how often you do it!
I didnt know it took that long .. I now give the developers credit for all the work they do.
Im in to cinema but came across this, the music made me stay but I actually became interested in this craft the longer I watched.
Thanks for sharing that, glad you enjoyed the video even if it wasn't what you were looking for initially. If you fancy trying your hand at shooting black and white film then there are lots of other videos on our channel to help you get started.
hi I am jardel and I am from Brazil, Thanks a lot it took a several videos to satisfied me. This one it is very explainable!
Ugh I need funds for a darkroom
You and me both:) Although I am lucky and can use some of the ones on site here:)
I have extra enlarger and trays tank stuff is cheap now I have been doing B&W film for 50 years love it
Usually, you can find a public one nearby; you can rent them for like an hour and it should only be a few dollars. Sometimes they give you the chemicals and supplies, sometimes you need your own, depends on the place.
Amy Rigsby; Photography clubs, schools, etc. Also just ask around, like minded folk tend to be generous and share. The first enlarger I used was an older student (rich kid) at school. Also you'll get hints and tips and where to save money and where not to.
Add the cost of plumbing, a good water temp control valve. A very good voltage regulator, if not the light could vary from the enlarger. You need safety lights. You need a short timer for enlarging and a long timer for negative development. The size of the trays vary depending on the size of the prints you make. Enlarging paper is expensive, really expensive. Now you need a good, solid bench for the enlarger. The enlarger must be rock solid so as to not shake during enlargement. And then sinks for the chemical trays, should be stainless steel.
Oh, I forgot you need a GOOD water filtration system. Clean water is very important. Ventilation. Plenty of it. Need to keep from breathing in the fumes from the chemicals.
Plus there is many little items you need. Too many to list here but they do cost a bit.
So you have several thousand dollars, then by all means build a darkroom.
Better yet stick with digital.
Just got my hands on a old enlarger that should be capable of 6x6 negative. (Depends on if it works at all) I do have a camera that shoot 6x9negative. Would i be able to enlarge it in my enlarger but just loose some of the frame on the longer length?
Best regards Alfons
I loved darkroom in highschool. I'm not sure if they offer it anymore. what great memories in art class
Some closed but we're seeing more re-open which is fantastic. There are also more community darkroom opening each year
Your video is very informative for those considering traditional B&W print photography. Back in the good old days the actual print developing process could not be filmed but instead was simulated by using the sepia tone process which is not light sensitive. This made it possible to film the darkroom scene with cinema lighting and an appropriate filter to look like the orange illumination of a typical darkroom. I'm curious if this ILFORD video used modern super sensitive digital camera equipment to record the actual chemical development process and not a simulation.
That's really interesting Bill. This video was filmed in one of our 'in house' darkrooms with a standard digital camera I think. :)
My Dad had a darkroom when I was very young - I can still remember the smell of the chemicals now! I didn't realise just how much went into it. All I remember is Dad had a lot of equipment in a tiny room xD
|Have you ever had a go at darkroom printing yourself?
Thanks for the video, I'm just getting started. I learnt photography with film but never got to use a darkroom, becoming bored with digital now.
Thank you. Excellent video. Very informative.
Them were the days remember doing that very rewarding job
Do you not print in the darkroom now Roger?
Analog 📷📷 are awesome 😍
Excellent films but that trippy music had me seriously chilled, dude.
Do you have to develop the film before printing them or do you just do it with the normal film?
I'm not sure what you mean by normal film? You will need a negative to make a print
ILFORD Photo I don’t either tbh lol
Thank you for this! Just found your channel and I love it (and your films)
This is freakishly amazing!!!!!
It's it usual to expose the contract sheets in sections to judge the correct exposure time and then repeat the process with your enlargement? Surely you'll have a pretty good idea by now and could try for a good first enlargement?
There is no reason that you couldn't try your first print after this step if you wanted to. Also, as you get more experience you find it easier to judge from the test strips.
@@Ilfordphoto Thanks for your response. I'm really looking to getting into a darkroom soon...
I develop my own Black and White but alas don't have the set up for printing. I would love to one day. I really enjoy everything about film photography and the way that, in a fast paced world, one can free oneself from the frantic nature of our lives in the 21st Century.
Very educational, I've been enlighten
Thanks Daniella, that's what we hoped for when we produced these videos
Anyone know the name of this song? So relaxing.
Afraid not, sorry
Is it just me or is the music in this video such a BOP
Jes pani sai app nai photo saff kiya us pani ko konsa water bolty hai,...plz btana sir
Nice overview of the process.
I used a spotmeter to measure the amount of light in the brightest and darkest parts that still needed details. It calculated the exposure time, and told me if I should use soft/medium/hard paper for optimal contrast. Of course the paper wasn't hard, it's just related to the contrast conversion (as far as I can remember, Ilford used numbers). It was actually a simple version of the zone system.
It all ended when digital camera's became available.
I love these videos, and find them very informative. The only thing I would suggest is leaving the text on screen for a bit longer - especially when more info is included.
Thanks Ramsay. It is so hard to get the balance right, we'll take this on board:)
Great film folks!
Great video- but say i do a test strip on a 30x24 size paper and find that 6 sec looks great BUT id like to make my final print on a paper size 50x40 - then 6 sec dosent apply anymore does it ??? - that i dont understand - how do i do that - thanks
Is any of the liquid reusable and how should it be disposed?
4:56 - "again not letting the tongs touch the next solution" - but why? Fixing solution is always contaminated with a little of stop solution (because there's a stop solution on the print!).
We want to minimize that contamination as much as possible. We also know that not everybody uses fresh tongs for each step and we wouldn't want any contamination moving backwards down the steps.
This was super easy to follow and very thorough!! Can you review the other equipment needed? Pre-solution, how is the image pushed from the negative onto the paper and what equipment would you need to do this at home?
The image isn't really 'pushed.' The negative is projected on to the paper with the light from the enlarger. This creates a latent image on the paper (an image that is temporarily invisible.) Developer is then used to make the image visible.
...I love these little wonder...😊
What enlarger is this? I'm looking to purchase now I have finally mastered developing my films so I actually have negatives to work with! Thanks!
does anyone know what music they use for not only this video but the rest of their film tutorials or the name of the song because it’s great and i love it
So you need this at 3:05 to print, which machine is this ?
Enlarger
I'm confused, when doing the text exposure, you do each one at 5 seconds? Or 5 second increments? How does timing that work?
Hi Adrian, 5 second increments so you move your card every 5 seconds. Have a look at our Making a basic contact sheet video where it shows it a bit clearer. ruclips.net/video/E03MP5nWJPs/видео.html
When I've done them, I always left the enlarger light on the whole time, and moved the card a bit every five seconds. I also would use a strip, rather than a whole sheet to save money on paper, but the last time I did prints, I was a newspaper photographer and getting a show-worthy print wasn't the goal.
@@scottplumer3668 Yes, people often develop their own technique and what works for them. All are good:)
How would your tongs touching another bath contaminate it? Isn’t the paper already wet with the previous solution? Or does it come out dry?
Hi Elliott You don't want your tongs to touch the next solution and then take the chemistry backwards, contaminating the previous tray. e.g. stop to dev or fix to stop. Moving the other way is fine.
ILFORD Photo Ohhhhh okay everything just made sense. Great video, and thank you for the insight!
Where's his gloves? Such a skill, I did a photography module at college in my foundation media degree. Absolutely loved it.
Would like some advice!!! How can I make a dark room? My dad used to do developing in his tiny bathroom in pitch darkness back in the day. I don’t have a spare room in my place I could use. Maybe the bathroom??? Hahaha
Niceley done. So many videos on here are inaccurate, too long and don't explain things properly. This is an excellent resource for beginners. There are slight differences to the way I print, but that's fine, I'm sure chefs do things slightly differently.
Amazing, to the point and straight forward!
I did this in highschool and man, later thinking about it I wish most public and private high-schools had an old film photography class. At least for my area, that is.
can use black light for darkroom ?
What do you do with your chemistry after you're done?
Guidelines for disposing of chemistry vary greatly between countries and regions so we'd always advise contacting your local authority to see what is available www.ilfordphoto.com/faqs/ilford-photochemistry-faqs/
If the film was immersed in the water more than the time needed, what will be the effect of it to the processing sequence of the film?
Hi Graceille, do you mean the paper? Leaving RC paper in the wash for extreme lengths of time can cause eventual damage to it but it would take a while.
How much did you spend on all of the equipment/materials?
Is it possible to use the same developer and fixer for both paper and film?
Yes, fixer is easy and the tech sheets will state times for both films and paper. With developer it depend on which developer you use and we would normally recommend using a specific film or paper developer to get the best results.
Thank you for your respond ... so which is your recommended developer for both processing paper and film? I would like to purchase it
AMAZING! I just p/u a Omega Enlarger B22 for $5 bucks from the thrift store. Was $10, but they had it since last week, and let me have it for $5.00... I'm excited and a bit nervous.
You got a great deal on a great enlarger Love mine. Enjoy your new and wonderfully creative hobby.
im a student studying film and absoluteley addicted to the process of creating a print. I love every second of it. But something I'm having trouble with is understanding the use of filters. I never know in what situation I should use what number filter.
Hi Daniel. Filters can be confusing. Most normal negs don't require anything other than a grade 2, and many people choose to split grade print which you can find more information on here www.ilfordphoto.com/split-grade-printing/ . A good option if you are able to is to print the same negative as grade 00 - 5 so you can see the difference between the softer and harder grades. We will look at putting a simple guide together in the future and adding it to our website.
Did my first prints this past weekend. Had contrast a bit high until I used the filtration settings on the Ilford Datasheet vs those on Omega’s instruction manual for my color head, a Chromega B 66.
Ilford, I thought fix times were closer to 1 minute for Rapid Fixer or Ilford Hypam diluted 1:4 and 2 minutes with 1:9 dilution?
Oh wow. We always recommend 2 minutes fixing just to be safe:)
how much money does it take to get a "budget-level" or entry-level darkroom going? Let's assume I already have the space and tables required. So developing the film and and then this setup shown in the video as well.
Developing film is pretty cheap. Some thing like this kit www.ilfordphoto.com/catalog/product/view/id/1657/s/ilford-paterson-film-starter-kit/category/70/ has everything you need to get started (except the dark room. Printing is more expensive and the biggest cost is usually the enlarger but there are often 2nd hand bargains to be had or Intrepid do a great one which is perfect for starting out.
@@Ilfordphoto There are many cases of people buying second hand enlargers for dirt cheap. Yes, sometimes they can be expensive. And at other times, enlargers are given away for free.
I recently bought an enlarger and it came with three boxes of Ilford 8x11 paper, 2.1m 3.1m and 4.1m ilfospeed . whats the difference and do i need to treat it differently? I have printed one picture, my first print ever, of my dog and it still works, I have nearly 300 sheets.
These are just single grade papers rather than Multigrade so you'd expect the same print to look different on each paper. Softer on the grade 2 to harder on grade 4. Its also worth having a look at the technical sheets attached to the products on our website as there give more detailed information www.ilfordphoto.com/ilfospeed-rc-deluxe-pearl-grade-3
Thank you so much for Making this awesome video... But whats the use of VARIAC... And what is its various setting means.. I am doing a project plzz help