Now that things are calming down on the wedding photography front, I've had a chance to break out the Patterson tank and get developing a bit of B&W 135.
Are there any other develop your own types on here (or ex home developers?)
Thats going back a few hundred years I had a patterson tank and one of them whats its that sent the photo onto photo paper, no computers then or mobile phones just a stop watch to get my pictures perfect, all them chemicals and getting the right amount in the tanks, I used ilford film and chemicals those were the days, when eggs were eggs with a lion stamped on them by hand.
I do it occasionally, still got Durst enlarger. I use a Paterson tank with a changing bag,
not a female undressing by the way, but not as good as a Jobo daylight loading tank
which made film processing easy. These seem to be defunct now unfortunately.
I tried infrared with Kodak HIE film, but much easier with digital. Paper and chemicals
a bit harder to get since Jacobs closed, however there's a Calumet branch in Glasgow
I think which might stock such materials.
There used to be suppliers advertising in Amateur Photographer who sold the raw chemicals
to make your own brew like D76 etc, but that's a bit of a palaver. BTW, I got a mint
Nikon F2 from a small camera shop for about £75, when it came out it would have cost
me a month's wages. Unfortunately Leica stuff not going so cheap.
Interesting!
When I was 11 years old, I was given a Brownie 127 camera from my mother and a Johnson Home Processing kit from my brother to develop the film and make contact prints. (56 years ago)
Over the interim period I built my own darkroom/studio in my back garden and for many, many years enjoyed the pleasure of photography.
Like Agrippa, I had all the bits and pieces needed, I still have my old Krokus enlarger that I fitted with a German lens. (Cannot remember the name)
I loaded my own cassettes with bulk film , my favourite Ilford FP4 and in the latter days used the Ilford filtration system and Multigrade paper.
If I remember correctly the last film I processed was back in 1998.
My images have adorned the pages of Amateur Photographer for whom I wrote a couple of articles and several critiques of exhibitions of work by others at the Margaret Cameron home "Dimbola". I have exhibited in many galleries, sold hundreds of prints. Lost count of how many weddings I have covered as an experienced amateur, had a notable commission to photograph a funeral and interment.
Forgotten too much to try and recall but the art of photography still draws buit nowadays I content myself with a compact digital whicgh fulfils my needs!
As far as I know, some chemicals are still available try Speed Graphic:- http://www.speedgraphic.co.uk/darkroom/bw_chemicals/179_0c.html (http://www.speedgraphic.co.uk/darkroom/bw_chemicals/179_0c.html)
I would be very interested to know how you get on with your endeavours. Peter.
PS. I have a brand new changing bag if anyone is interested, I'll not use it again?
Quote from: petercharlesfagg on October 30, 2014, 05:43:10 PM
Interesting!
When I was 11 years old, I was given a Brownie 127 camera from my mother and a Johnson Home Processing kit from my brother to develop the film and make contact prints. (56 years ago)
Over the interim period I built my own darkroom/studio in my back garden and for many, many years enjoyed the pleasure of photography.
Like Agrippa, I had all the bits and pieces needed, I still have my old Krokus enlarger that I fitted with a German lens. (Cannot remember the name)
I loaded my own cassettes with bulk film , my favourite Ilford FP4 and in the latter days used the Ilford filtration system and Multigrade paper.
If I remember correctly the last film I processed was back in 1998.
My images have adorned the pages of Amateur Photographer for whom I wrote a couple of articles and several critiques of exhibitions of work by others at the Margaret Cameron home "Dimbola". I have exhibited in many galleries, sold hundreds of prints. Lost count of how many weddings I have covered as an experienced amateur, had a notable commission to photograph a funeral and interment.
Forgotten too much to try and recall but the art of photography still draws buit nowadays I content myself with a compact digital whicgh fulfils my needs!
As far as I know, some chemicals are still available try Speed Graphic:- http://www.speedgraphic.co.uk/darkroom/bw_chemicals/179_0c.html (http://www.speedgraphic.co.uk/darkroom/bw_chemicals/179_0c.html)
I would be very interested to know how you get on with your endeavours. Peter.
PS. I have a brand new changing bag if anyone is interested, I'll not use it again?
Peter
I use to love all that stuff. I converted a small downstairs room into a darkroom with its own sink, work surfaces and blacked out windows.
Like you I used to load bulk FP4 and colour film (can't remember which sort though) into cassettes. That saved a fortune. Processed all my own black and white and colour neg films and transparencies. I used a Durst enlarger and spent many a happy (and frustrating) hour producing 10x8 and 20x16 prints. Some were great, most were useless but it was such fun!!
I have so many black and white and colour negs and transparencies of preserved railways - all scanned into my computer - converted to digital!! Long gone are the days when you would show your favourite slides using a projector pointed to a white wall.
All gone now.. Still a keen photographer but all digital. I use an Olympus OMD EM5 with Lightroom as a digital darkroom and catalogue. I have to say that current top end digital cameras are so good they don't need a lot of adjustment to their images unless you want to be extra creative.
I suppose that's the real advantage of digital. Still miss the magic of watching an image appear in a developer bath in a dark room under a red light - but digital is great even if its not so involving.
Yeah, I've got an old Paterson tank somewhere. I used to sit in a cupboard under the stairs with a torch with red cellophane over it.
"I love the smell of fixer in the morning!"
I gave up Wedding photography in2004 after doing it for over 20 years, I did not like what I saw regarding skin tones with early digital cameras, I have not given up film though, like you I still have B&W photography flowing through my veins so load my SLRs and old Yashica TLR with Ilford PanF or FP4 film, develop it myself , use Canons top line film scanner to get them into Gimp 2.6 on the PC and generally have a ball.
Many, many moons ago, I was in the school photography club. We learned how to develop our own black and white films.
In my last year, my friends and I were official school photographers, for the school magazine.
When I left school, I had a short term job in an electronics company. Taking photos of their components for publicity purposes. Unfortunately, the my boss was taken ill and I got asked to develop a film for the MD. Completely unaware, I picked up a bottle of developer and proceeded to develop the film.
When I hung it up to dry, I noticed that it had a blue colouration and could not see any pictures.
It transpired that my boss had filled that bottle with bleach and not marked it up. Like I said, this was a temporary job...................
:laughabovepost: :laughabovepost: :laughabovepost:
Thanks for your interesting responses, great to see a fair few camera types on here. The film thing is really gathering momentum again, the most notable recent win being the overwhelming support for FILM Ferrania, a new film factory in Italy, as well as lots of support and chatter on Twitter indicating people are picking up film, there's even been a few labs opening up in the UK and the States.
http://www.filmferrania.it/news/2014/success (http://www.filmferrania.it/news/2014/success)
I shoot weddings on digital which is great, I agree that skin tones on early digital camera were awful but now they're lovely and I can do a lot to make a great photo even better for my client. The performance of micro four thirds cameras is becoming very impressive, as is the tech in camera phones even. But something is missing from shooting all this digital stuff which made me switch back to film for my personal work; taking a digital camera out seems a bit too much like a busmans holiday! So I shoot with a Canon F-1 or a EOS 1-N and take my time and, sometimes, not take the photo and commit it to memory. The processing part is equally enjoyable, the smell of Ilfostop reminds me of when I worked in a lab aged 18 (a long time ago for a 30 year old!)
Luckily, Ilford isn't too far from me so I can go and buy film and chemicals direct in Knutsford, or I can see Bob Rigby in Bollington for film and chemicals. I've found film for sale in the obvious places like Calumet Manchester and the Real Camera Company but you can still find it in Manchester's London Camera Exchange or Jessops.
Long live film!