Analogue Magic
04th November 2022
One of the fascinations of analogue, or film, photography was watching an image appear in front of your eyes on the paper in a developing tray.
Apologies first for not posting anything for a while as I've had some health issues to contend with for which treatment is ongoing but I'm feeling some improvement.
Developing and printing films was a right of passage for many photography enthusiasts for decades, not to mention an integral part for many students nd some professionals. It's stoll there of course, with many newcomers getting involved. It takes more time and requires some dedication but then so does any hand crafted or artistic pursuit. While I no longer participate in the art of the darkroom I spent some of my formative photography years there, though not as often as I'd have liked to.
I'm limiting this blog to cover black and white printing from negatives as that's my personal experience and what the majority of photographers are, or were, familiar with.
There are various stages of 'magic' associated with processing and printing. The first is pulling the developed film from the developing tank and taking the film from the spiral holder. The tongue of film you see protruding from a cassette before loading it into a camera is opaque, so to see images on a clear strip of film is, at least for the first few goes, exciting. That is, if you've loaded th film correctly in the developing tank and used the developing chemicals correctly. Not everyone developed their films, concentrating on the printing side and there's nothing wrong with that as personal circumstances can come into play. For those that wanted to ther was a whole host of different chemicals and processing regimes to consider.
The real 'magic' though was seeing your images appear on the paper in the developing tray. Images can be made to fade in on screen, but we know that's a visual effect. To have an image gradually appear on a humble piece of white paper (even if there's some clever chemistry) is captivating. It's certainly wondrous when you see it for the first time. Even for seasoned photographers there's that anticipation and hope that the exposure was correct and any dodging and burning had the desired result. That's literally a 'hands-o' involvement.
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Because you can watch the image appear before your very eyes under safelight conditions you really feel involved. There's always a time when you rapidly whip the print out of the developing tray into the stop bath whn you see the image appear very quickly because ou've over exposed the printing paper, in an effort to salvage something. I never did colour printing where the paper had to be processed in a sealed drum. I guess there was the anticipation, opening the lid of the developing drum and fetching out the print to see if it was exposed well and the colour was acceptable. After mono printing though I'd feel somewhat detached from the process.
In some ways watching prints appear on the paper from one of the 'instant film' cameras that are avilable has some of that magic.
Do I miss that aspect of photography? Part of me does I guess. Shooting colour transparencies or many years meant what you shot was what you got and you couldn't see images appear before your very eyes. Digital though has it's own magic and gives plenty of creative control and it's very satisfying to see an image come alive as adjustments are made.
All text and images © Keith Rowley 2022
Apologies first for not posting anything for a while as I've had some health issues to contend with for which treatment is ongoing but I'm feeling some improvement.
Developing and printing films was a right of passage for many photography enthusiasts for decades, not to mention an integral part for many students nd some professionals. It's stoll there of course, with many newcomers getting involved. It takes more time and requires some dedication but then so does any hand crafted or artistic pursuit. While I no longer participate in the art of the darkroom I spent some of my formative photography years there, though not as often as I'd have liked to.
I'm limiting this blog to cover black and white printing from negatives as that's my personal experience and what the majority of photographers are, or were, familiar with.
There are various stages of 'magic' associated with processing and printing. The first is pulling the developed film from the developing tank and taking the film from the spiral holder. The tongue of film you see protruding from a cassette before loading it into a camera is opaque, so to see images on a clear strip of film is, at least for the first few goes, exciting. That is, if you've loaded th film correctly in the developing tank and used the developing chemicals correctly. Not everyone developed their films, concentrating on the printing side and there's nothing wrong with that as personal circumstances can come into play. For those that wanted to ther was a whole host of different chemicals and processing regimes to consider.
The real 'magic' though was seeing your images appear on the paper in the developing tray. Images can be made to fade in on screen, but we know that's a visual effect. To have an image gradually appear on a humble piece of white paper (even if there's some clever chemistry) is captivating. It's certainly wondrous when you see it for the first time. Even for seasoned photographers there's that anticipation and hope that the exposure was correct and any dodging and burning had the desired result. That's literally a 'hands-o' involvement.
[
Because you can watch the image appear before your very eyes under safelight conditions you really feel involved. There's always a time when you rapidly whip the print out of the developing tray into the stop bath whn you see the image appear very quickly because ou've over exposed the printing paper, in an effort to salvage something. I never did colour printing where the paper had to be processed in a sealed drum. I guess there was the anticipation, opening the lid of the developing drum and fetching out the print to see if it was exposed well and the colour was acceptable. After mono printing though I'd feel somewhat detached from the process.
In some ways watching prints appear on the paper from one of the 'instant film' cameras that are avilable has some of that magic.
Do I miss that aspect of photography? Part of me does I guess. Shooting colour transparencies or many years meant what you shot was what you got and you couldn't see images appear before your very eyes. Digital though has it's own magic and gives plenty of creative control and it's very satisfying to see an image come alive as adjustments are made.
All text and images © Keith Rowley 2022