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Big day today in getting my darkroom finished

Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

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Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

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A few months back I decided I wanted to take my film photography another step further by having my own darkroom in Malaysia. (I'm having one built at my home in Thailand as we speak)

 

I'm converting the maids bedroom into a darkroom (we don't have a live in maid). My initial plan was the have just a basic light and timer and do my own 8x10 contact prints but today changed all that.

This morning I went to see an old friend of mine Mr Ng who through FB contacted me saying he had an enlarger for sale. He told me that he could sell me his Meopta color enlarger........... so I went to see it and it's in great working order, it only comes with a 105 lens but I'm thinking I can use it for contact prints until such time as I can get an 80mm lens for printing 6x6 negs.

 

I got chatting with Mr Ng and I mentioned to him that eventually I want to get a 4x5 enlarger. He said come and see this. He has a fantastic looking Durst 4x5 enlarger with all the trimmings.......... I say that, Mr Ng said he needs to round everything up to make sure all is there and if so I can have it for $1100 bucks.

The color Meopta has built in filters, I have no idea really how to use it but I will have a lot of fun trying it all out.

Here is a picture of me starting the painting of the old maids bedroom...........

Pictures to follow........

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Michael Hiles

Michael Hiles

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Congratulation - you will certainly have some very satisfying fun.

 

If you will do B&W on Multigrade paper, get some Ilford filters. Colour heads magenta filters will not produce the same highest contrast available from a #5 Ilford filter - and you will definitely need a #5 filter. The filter set is not expensive, but indispensible.

 

Make sure you have no light leaks or spill light from the enlarger, and be careful of your safe light - that is a sure way to degrade contrast.

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Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

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Hi Michael

B&H delivered the inform filters today. I had made up a filter holder on the rig with perspec as my plan was just to use a lamp. I'm sure I could mount the holder under the enlarger lens but I was under the impression that the filters are better above the lens.

I will mount the B$H safe light on the opposite wall..

I'm so excited about making that first contact print. Today a shot a nice picture with my 4x5 it's in the drying cabinet right now, I will scan it in the morning and post it tomorrow.

My Chamionx 8x10 will be delivered on Monday........ patience might kick in tomorrow and I may see if I can collect it myself :)

Later

Neil

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andybarton

andybarton

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Neil

 

Before you get carried away with that black paint...

 

http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2010/06/darkroom-paint.html

 

http://www.apogeephoto.com/the-10-steps-to-setting-up-a-home-darkroom-on-a-budget/

 

https://www.photo.net/discuss/threads/darkroom-black-paint.11076/

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pico

pico

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What Andy Barton wrote. The only place in the darkroom I've painted flat-black were part of the walls that reflect light reflected from the easel.

Edited by pico
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Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

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What Andy Barton wrote. The only place in the darkroom I've painted flat-black were part of the walls that reflect light reflected from the easel.

Thats what the boys over on APUG just told me............any chance of one of you guys calling my wife and explaining that to her.........., a lot of that black paint got splashed on her...not a happy woman right now :( :( :( 

 

Neil

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Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

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Question

Malaysia is 240v The enlarger comes with a 12v transformer and my gralab timer is 110v

I'm guessing that the enlarger goes straight into the 12 volt transformer. The transformer then goes into the gralab timer and then I need another transformer from 240 to 110v....... is that correct or am I missing something???

Neil

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Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

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Agree with Andy, white is what you want, not black.

BTW Neil, what happened to the avatar etc?

Gary

To late mate it's black over black.......... it's going to be fun though.

I going to get a safe head lanmp so whatever I'm looking at will have some sort of illumination:)

 

I figured that if your in a black over black darkroom then you can't see the Aviator anyway so removed it :)

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Michael Hiles

Michael Hiles

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I think the first job is to fix light leaks. The main argument, in my view, for white walls and ceiling is that the safe light is more effective. My safe light is aimed to bounce of a white ceiling and the room is nicely bathed in orange light. As a matter of practice, I try to stand so that paper - in hand, easel or tray - is in my shadow and little direct light from the safe light falls on it (only quite diffuse and weak-ish reflected light).

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Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

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A little update. My darkroom is just about complete. Today I picked up my new 8x10...... wow frigging wow.

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After getting it all set up I took two pictures, one of my wife the second of the same flower arrangement that I took with my 4x5 yesterday

Because I'm using TRIX320 I had to mix my first batch of D76.......... that did not go to plan. Because I don't have a gallon container I decided to make a 1/2 gallon concentration instead. I added the bag of chemicals to 3 pints of cold water and 20 minutes later I couldn't understand why the chemicals hadn't devolved. I checked the packaging and noticed that I was meant to have used hot water. So I put that mix in the microwave on 800 for 5 minutes and warmed that puppy up. Twenty minutes later I had 600ml in the freezer waiting for it to get to 20 deg. 
 

After 15 minutes it was ready so into the darkroom I popped and developed my first sheet of 8x10 in trays.......... wonderful 

 

Darkroom

Darkroom
 

The neg looks amazing with lots of shades of gray....... it's currently drying now and tomorrow morning I'm going to make my first ever contact print......... pictures to follow 1f642.png :) 1f642.png :) 1f642.png :)
I've come up with a neat way to time this process in the dark. 
I use the iPhone app massive Dev which gives me the first 6 minutes time along with tick tock tick tock 
I set the grabxxx timer to 12 minutes and start both clocks. 
I then remove the film from the holder and pop it in the Dev. The time it takes to get it out of the holder and into the Dev is my 10 to 15% reduced devolving time........... I like to do that  :) 
Once the iPhone app bell goes off at 6 minutes I pop the neg in the stop and count that one minute in my head. I then put the neg in the fix and the gradxxx will stop me after the 5 minutes is up. 
Later

 

Neil

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Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

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I think the first job is to fix light leaks. The main argument, in my view, for white walls and ceiling is that the safe light is more effective. My safe light is aimed to bounce of a white ceiling and the room is nicely bathed in orange light. As a matter of practice, I try to stand so that paper - in hand, easel or tray - is in my shadow and little direct light from the safe light falls on it (only quite diffuse and weak-ish reflected light).

 

I was in the darkroom today and I can see fine with the one safe light..........I look like i'm also light tight for developing negs.........first ones in the trays all okay :)

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Doc Henry

Doc Henry

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Yes , Neil a good guy , doing a good job (painting) for a good result (print)  :)  .

Nice darkroom. Your red lamp is too far from the dev. cuvette to see the print when

you develop. :)

Good luck

Henry

Edited by Doc Henry
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Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

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Yes , Neil a good guy , doing a good job (painting) for a good result (print)  :)  .

Nice darkroom. Your red lamp is too far from the dev. cuvette to see the print when

you develop. :)

Good luck

Henry

 

Morning Henry

I will see how I get on today doing my first contact print, if I need to move the save light I will move it......its a wee bitty of trial and error, but its so much fun I could burst :);):) 

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Doc Henry

Doc Henry

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Morning Henry

I will see how I get on today doing my first contact print, if I need to move the save light I will move it......its a wee bitty of trial and error, but its so much fun I could burst :);):)

 

Neil ,good evening :D

 

Anyway, as far as I am concerned , I am more satisfied to see the result of my work of shooting with a darkroom than to work in front of his computer and through heaps of softwares to be able to print (on a ink jet printer which has nozzles which can blocked just at the right moment or ink that drops into large spots on your print)

There we see what the negative has in the belly  :)  and ability to give us a picture as we like . A lot of possibilities to get a nice picture as we like , going through for example the hand to hide the light at a corner of the photo or put a filter to highlight what we want to highlight , example clouds of a landscape !

Best

Henry

 

"... but its so much fun I could burst"  > I always said that the photographer profession is a dangerous job  :D

 

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Edited by Doc Henry
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  • 1 month later...
Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

Guest NEIL-D-WILLIAMS

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Update

Darkroom is complete. I moved the safe light so that it is directly above the table with the trays..............got rid of the Grablab timer and now have a Beseler enlarger timer that works amazing. Bought a new set of under lens multi contrast filters with holder (also works fantastic). A few days ago I got a Unicolor roller with two 8x10 Beseler drums for daylight processing 8x10 and 4x5. I have 16x20 RC paper waiting for me when I get home so that I can print some of my favorite 6x6 negs...........

What else. The guy that was going to sell me the 4x5 enlarger has gone quite on me, so not sure WTF went wrong there. I have a back up plan to get one from the guy in Canada KSH or something like that as I still plan to make a proper darkroom in Thailand.

Pictures to follow

 

Neil

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