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Basic Darkroom Techniques: Getting Started
Whether you are new to photography, or have been doing it for a long time, if you are just starting out with darkroom processing you should gather some information before you expend the time and money to build a darkroom. These are some of the things I recommend doing to get you on the road to darkroom processing.- Read books about photography and darkroom processing. I have a list of recommended books that you might like to peruse. Many of these will be available at the local library, or at a college or university library near you. Start with some of the basic books, and move on to the more in depth works by people like Ansel Adams.
- Take a local photography course that includes darkroom work. Most junior colleges, community colleges, universities and even high schools have these kinds of classes. They are an inexpensive way to try your hand in the darkroom.
- Rent time in a darkroom. Many cities have rental darkrooms where you can use the equipment for a period of time to determine whether you like it, what kind of equipment you want in your darkroom, and how much time you need to dedicate to this hobby.
- For printing, the enlarger is the most important piece of equipment in the darkroom, find out which ones suit you best, by taking classes or renting time, and get yourself a good one.
- You can develop films almost anywhere, if you have a changing bag which you can buy or make.
- You can develop prints in the bathroom, or kitchen, if you can negotiate the time for those areas. Be sure to clean up well afterwards though.
- Once you are ready to build a darkroom, there are a lot of resources available to you for information.
DarkroomSource is only one.
There is a pretty extensive FAQ page here.
- For starting to process in the darkroom, try this techniques page
