Home developing and prining: how to get started?

DadaKopf

As the title suggests, I'm thinking of getting in to B&W developing and printing. My friend has an enlarger (adaptable for colour, I think) and I just don't know where to start in terms of what accessories and chemicals (and makes) to get.

I'd love to print colour (not a huge fan of B&W) but B&W is a start.

So: I presume I need a neg cannister, some beakers, thermometer(s), two or three baths, a red light, paper, fun stuff.

I just don't know where to start. And as for colour printing - oy.

Some help, please.

DadaKopf

Oh, and can someone tell me a little about colour printing and these colour analyser thingies.

And how much it should cost to get me all started with this B&W business.

norma

Advance warning - long post!!!

Hi, Dadakopf!
Seems you and I are in the same boat right now. I'm collecting pieces to put a darkroom together. I already process my B&W film at home, but up until now I've been using a rental darkroom to make my colour and B&W prints. I'm going back home to Ireland this summer, so I'm planning on building a home darkroom then.

For processing the film, you'll need:
Processing tank & reels.
Scissors.
Graduated Jugs.
Amber Glass or Brown Plastic Storage Containers for chemicals.
Thermometer.
Timer.
Funnels.
Film hanging clips, or food bag clips, or clothes pegs.
Developer.
Stop bath (optional – you could just use water).
Fixer.
PhotoFlo, or similar.
Archival Film Sleeve Pages.
(Some pop open 35mm cannisters using a bottle opener or the like, but I just cut the film outside the cannister when I get to the end. I gave up on struggling with the cannister in the dark and, besides, the tiny piece of film inside the cannister isn't exposed anyway, so why go to all that bother to get it out?)

For printing, you’ll need:
Enlarger.
Filters for B&W, or Dichroic enlarger.
Safelight (red is OK for B&W, but I recommend an amber OC for colour printing).
Papersafe (optional).
Negative Carriers.
Lens.
Grain Focuser.
Easels.
Trays.
Print Washer (or you could use a tray, preferably with a siphon).
Timers (one for enlarger, the other for processing)
Developer.
Stop Bath.
Fixer.
(Either Kodak or Ilford chemicals would be good)
Hypo Clear (for archival processing).
Graduated jugs, storage bottles & funnels.
Tongs.
Thermomter.
Paper (of course).
Dodging / Burning tools (can be home-made).
Print Drying Racks or Heated Print Dryers.

For colour printing, you will need a dichroic enlarger. A condenser or diffusion can be used for B&W, but not colour; a dichroic can do both.
A condenser head produces contrastier prints, but it also shows up dust more. A diffusion enlarger makes a less “snappy” prints, but dust is less of a problem. There are also cold head enlargers, with a cooler light source and quicker printing times. If you use these types of enlarger, you will need a set of filters to adjust the contrast of B&W prints (you get them free with paper sometimes), although newer enlargers sometimes have the filters built in (like the Beseler Printmaker 67 VC). Beseler or Omega are good brands.
A dichroic enlarger has a diffused light source and more advanced colour filtration for colour printing. By dialing in the appropriate colour filtration, you can adjust the contrast for B&W prints. So, if you want to do both colour and B&W printing, a dichroic enlarger would be the way to go. Omega is the only brand I’ve used, so that’s what I’m getting. Make sure the enlarger you buy will handle the largest film size you anticipate printing. The cheaper ones only do 35mm, mid-range ones usually do up to 6X7 or so but, if you get into 4X5, there is a significant jump in price. (You will need different lenses for each film size you print.) Also, if you want to do colour printing and live in an area where the power supply isn’t consistent, you may want to invest in a voltage stabiliser. Otherwise, each time the power varies, your colour balance may be thrown off, making printing a nightmare.

To process colour negative paper, you will need to get an RA-4 kit, or buy the chemicals separately: Developer, Stop Bath (not required, may use same stop as for B&W paper), Bleach-Fix.
To process chrome paper (to print from slides), you will need to get the Ilford P-30 kit.
You may want to use a rotary processor instead of trays to process colour prints, as the temperature control is more critical.

When using the colour filters, you are dealing with cyan, magenta and yellow filtration. Usually, you will only work with two of those, say magenta & yellow. Your colour paper will have a starting filtration printed on the box. Dial that in, and do your first tests at that. Adjust for density first because longer exposures give a warmer colour balance, so there’s no point messing with the colour until the density is right. Once you have the density to your liking, then start to balance the colour. Remember, you’re dealing with negative paper so, for example, adding more yellow to the filtration reduces yellow in the print, and vice versa. Likewise with magenta and cyan. (Unless you’re printing slides onto chrome paper, then the opposite is true). A colour print viewing filter kit (made by Kodak) is useful for getting the colour balance correct.

As for cost, that’s like asking how much money you would need to buy a new car: it really depends. I’m buying everything used – so many people are going digital now that there are good bargains to be had.

Norma.

FinoBlad

as u can see from normas post there is a lot involved.....
perhaps you should consider renting a darkroom or joining one on the clubs [i think you were a bit hard on them in a recent post tho] and using theirs first until you learn everything about developing and printing.
Then you are ready to buiild your own.

norma

Finoblad makes a very good point. Using the rental darkroom gave me a better idea of what I'd like and not like to have in my own darkroom. Also, learning the processes takes time, and it was invaluable for me to have people on hand to answer questions until I got the hang of it myself. If you haven't already, I strongly recommend that you get classes before attempting to do this on your own. Otherwise, you're going to end up spending a lot of time and money trying to figure it out for yourself, and probably end up so frustrated you'll hate it anyway.