The Darkroom Bears Fruit

The final result of my first foray back into the darkroom after an absence of two decades, warts and all. I'm sure I could do much better with this negative, but not bad for a first go. If nothing else I've learned I need to do a better job dusting.

It's a little depressing for me to think that I haven't been making darkroom prints since three or four years before the kids were born, and my oldest just turned sixteen. As my regular readers will recall (and thanks for your continued support by the way, both of you) last summer I up an old Durst M601 enlarger along with a host of related accessories and materials to set me on my way back to having a functional darkroom. Well, here we are half a year on and not much more has been heard about it. Well, here at last is a photo presented as a newly-made print from that enlarger rather than the usual negative scan.

I've presented it here in all of its glory as a straight scan, dust spots and other flaws included. The image itself isn't new, it was shot in the Autumn of 2013, a few months after I first started with the Mamiya RB67 system.I chose it because I've always liked it and because it looks best cropped square, allowing it to be printed in the Durst's stock carrier which will accommodate negatives up to 6x6. The condensers and bellows are large enough to handle full frame 6x7 negatives but unless I'm mistaken there's no carrier available in this size. I'm also just not keen on the glass sandwich design of the stock carrier. It's clever, with a four bladed mask that can adjust for any film size up to its maximum, but the glass means more surfaces to attract dust, I'll probably have to see what I can come up with on my own.This enlarger may be the subject of several DIY projects before I'm through.

Having been away from it for nearly twenty years I didn't head in to the darkroom expecting to produce anything gallery worthy. It was more a shakedown run where I hoped to find out whether I had lost much over the years or if darkroom skills were more like the proverbial ability to ride a bike. The result, I'd say, is not bad but I don't feel what I've achieved could in any way be considered the definitive print from this negative. I'm sure I'll return to it again and I'll do better next time.

The reasons this all has been so long in coming are several, though I must admit a fair share of the blame lies with the fact I've been comfortable with the groove of scanning all my negatives and doing all my "darkroom" work in Photoshop for presentation here an elsewhere on the web. Though everything I do when I work this way has its equivalent in the darkroom - exposure and contrast adjustments, dodging and burning, toning and spotting - I've also been anxious about my ability to achieve the same level of fine control under the enlarger. There is no undo button in the darkroom. The other thing that's been keeping me from diving right in is the fact that my equipment haul did not include everything I consider a necessity, and it was only last week with the arrival of a simple but serviceable enlarger timer that I finally had the last must-have crossed off the check list.

That's the check list for a basic level of function, but you can bet that's not the end of it. My next priority will be getting back to printing on fiber based paper followed eventually, I hope, by carbon transfer printing (not to be confused with carbon inkjet printing). That will probably be a long way off. For now I just want to get comfortable working under the enlarger and see how things go from there. As always I'll keep you posted.