There's really no excuse not to. You've come this far. You'll need a bare minimum of equipment. You'll need a processing tank, some reels, and some graduates to mix and hold chemicals.

Hey 4x5 folks! Check this out!

About Tanks.

You can get metal, you can get plastic. Photo classes tend to lean towards metal. I say "to heck with you guys, I'm using plastic."

Metal tanks

Metal tanks are basically a stainless steel can with a hard plastic lid that snaps on. The lid has holes that allow chemicals in and out, but not light. This is good... it means you can load up the tank in the dark, close it, and then do all your pouring of chemicals and watching the timer in the light.

Metal tanks have advantages over plastic. They can be heat-dried. They allow for changing the temperature of the chemicals inside. They're cheap, and everyone has them.

Plastic tanks

I use a plastic tank because I'm lazy. I make sure that my chemicals are at the right temperature before I let them near the film. Plastic can't be heat dried, it will melt. Plastic also doesn't bend out of shape when you drop it. With plastic tanks and reels, you know that they're beyond hope when you drop them and they crack. Metal reels tend to get bent slightly, and then your film gets unevenly developed. By the time you notice, it's too late to do anything but hope there were no important pictures on that roll.

Plastic has several other advantages. They're much easier to load and unload the reels (this is arguable! There are metal reel loaders that apparently work in about 1/3 the time of a plastic reel takes to load.) Agitation is a breeze with certain plastic tanks. Plastic tanks tend to be designed so you don't have to dislodge bubbles from the film by tapping the tank... there are no bubbles to begin with. My tank that I use is a 2 reel plastic tank set, sold under the Rokunar name. It came with 2 plastic reels, which are adjustable for various films... 135, 126, 127, 120/220. Agitation (up and down AND rotating) is accomplished by turning a spindle on top. There is a funnel built into the tank. The tank fills from the bottom up, so there are no trapped bubbles which prevent proper development.

And of course, I just like it better.

Yet another thing I'm going to say about steel tanks

I will say at this point: I just tried a steel tank today for the first time. It was awful. The reel was a pain to load in the dark, but my plastic ones were wet. Agitation wasn't nearly as hard as it's described, but we used a non-standard method (rather than turning back and forth, we used two constant turns to agitate.. one axial, one perpendicular to axial). Oh yes, once the reel was loaded, the tank agitated, the development all finished, and the film washed... it turns out that the film was loaded incorrectly so some of the film was undeveloped. this NEVER happened with the plastic reels. I intend to unborrow the steel tanks tomorrow and buy more plastic ones. (For you techie types who want to know what actually went wrong, no the reels were not warped; but the film managed to get stuck together in two places. Fortuneately it was at the leader and NOT in the middle of any frames, but it's still a bad bad thing to have happen and I'm not risking any more of my images to it.)

And furthermore... I did try using a steel reel spooler. I looked at it, couldn't figure out how it worked in the light, and decided it was hopeless. A plastic reel took about 30 seconds to figure out, is easier by FAR to load and unload films ("fool proof").

The dangers of plastic tanks

The first time I used a plastic tank, I wasn't sure where everything was laid out. I couldn't find the center spindle in the dark. Due to the design of the tank, the center spindle is an integral part of the light trap. I fogged about half a roll of film. MAKE SURE that the spindle is installed properly, or film will be fogged.

Other equipment

Of course, You'll probably want a darkroom thermometer, and maybe some stirring paddles. Remember that if the chemicals are too cold, you need to give a lot more time to the film in the chemistry. If they're too warm, you'll need to shorten your times. Of course, up here in Wisconsin, It's a comfortable temperature year-round. We have sunshine in the summer, and furnaces in the winter. I usually work at ambient temperature, which has tended to be 74°F lately. Remember, of course, that "standard B&W working temperature" is 68°F, so shorten your developing times appropriately if you're running warmer than that. Of course, if your local temperature is colder than that, warm it up. Warming up can either be done by heating the chemistry, or by raising the ambient temperature. I'm a big fan of heating up the room instead of just the chemistry. That way, you spill less chemicals on your leg from shivering.

You may also find a timer handy. A good darkroom timer is built to switch an enlarger on for a time and then turn it off, however a digital kitchen timer that can be set for a few minutes and seconds will work fine for development times. A good darkroom timer usually costs about 10 to 15 times more than the equivalent kitchen timer.

Chemicals

To actually make the raw film into negatives, it requires some chemical processing. A minimum of two steps, possibly four or five, depending on how much you care about your images.

Developer

Developer forms the image on the film. It does this by converting the silver halide which has been exposed into metallic silver (which is opaque). A developer generally consists of a developing agent (which actually does the work of turning halide into metal), and an assortment of stabilizers and buffers. The developer generally has to be alkaline to work properly.

Stop Bath

The stop bath serves to stop the action of the developer. It functions in two ways: first, by diluting the developer still clinging to the film away from the film, and second (in a chemical stop bath) by being acidic. Since the developer requires an alkaline environment to function, it just "stops".

Fixer

Fixer removes the undeveloped silver halide from the film. Since silver halide is light sensitve (and partially opaque), it would be a real pain to print an unfixed negative. Fixer "fixes", the state of the negative. After being fixed, a film is no longer light sensitive, and the undeveloped areas are transparent, more or less.

Other Chemicals

Wash Agents
This covers things like hypo-clear. These are chemical additives to one of the washing stages that neutralize any remaining chemicals on the film.
Hardeners
These increase the overall physical strength of the photographic emulsion, making it more resistant to scratches, and also resistant to certain chemicals. For example, some film cleaners will DESTROY an unhardened negative (i.e. PEC-12 will cause the emulsion to peel away from the base as a stringy mass if it is not properly hardened). Anything that increases the durability of the emulsion is considered a hardener.
Wetting Agents
Wetting agents are lower the surface tension of the water remaining on the film, thus allowing it to dry faster. This is a good thing.

Developing the film

It's amazingly straightforward. Be sure to pour out the previous chemicals before pouring in any new ones. And of course, consult your local library's photographic section for a good darkroom book to properly explain all this. Indispensable to me has been The Morgan & Morgan Dark Room Book.

What chemicals do I use?

When you go into the photo store, and you look back in the darkroom section, and you see that myriad of chemicals.... don't get confused. You don't have to know the difference between Rodinal and Refinal, Dektol and XTOL, or ID-11 and D-76. You don't need to know why Farmer's Reducer comes in such a small packet, nor why all those packets of dry chemical all look alike.

Read the packages

Nobody learns this overnight. Wander around, look at the chemicals, read the packaging. Often, they'll say what they're recommended for. For example, Acufine is a film developer that increases film speed, while maintaining a fairly fine grain.

Developer

Almost exclusively, I use Rodinal 1+25 as a film developer. It has a very pleasant grain pattern, reasonably short development times (I get IMPATIENT in the darkroom! Eventually I'm going to build an auto-agitator.), and yields very sharp images. My standard prints are 8x10 from a 35mm negative. Rodinal 1+25 and APX 100 look very nice together (roughly 6-8 minutes develop). As for economy: I pay about $7.50 for a 125 mL bottle of Rodinal. At 1+25, It takes 10-12 mL for 325 mL of total solution, adequate for one roll in my tank. If I was cheap and patient (I'm not), I'd use 1+50 and save more and get even sharper negatives. (Lower concentration, less alkaline solution... less grain clumping). So I figure on about $.75 a roll developer cost.

Stop

I usually omit the acid stop. Why? Well, I use a plain-water stop. I read in one of many darkroom books that an acid stop can, with certain developers, form carbon dioxide bubbles within the emulsion. I didn't like that idea; they suggested using a plain water stop for a full minute. I think that's absurd. 10-15 seconds washing in water between develop and stop is plenty for me.

A proper acid stop bath takes about 15 seconds. Pour in the stop, agitate gently once or twice, pour it out. It just needs to come into contact with the film, and the agitation helps to pull away the developer that was stuck to the film (and mix it down to an acid from an alkaline solution). It also helps minimize developer carryover to the fix.

IF YOU DECIDE TO OMIT THE STOP: You are fool. I did this a few too many times, and my fixer was rapidly exhausted. If you don't want to actually STOP, at least rinse the film with water at this point. This is very important.

Fix

I use Agefix 1+7. I've tried higher concentrations; it just eats up too much fixer. It's worth the extra 25 seconds or so. How long to fix? Twice clearing time. Twice clearing time is the MINIMUM adequate; I fix for about 5 minutes. A radio is very helpful during fixing. Agitate every other minute or so.

MAKE SURE that you use fresh fixer. Always. Don't even think of using stale fixer, or exhausted fixer. You'll be sorry; you heard it here first. I learned this the hard way: three rolls of otherwise very nice shots were ruined. (Note: it IS possible to refix and rewash; I'm just saying it's very disconcerting to look at your film see that there's a big cloudy streak through the middle of it lengthwise.)

Harden

I don't harden. Eventually, If this is ever more than a hobby, I will.

It consists of another chemical, another agitation cycle, and then dumping it out.

If you use a hardening fixer, you save the cycle, but you have to make sure that you either start with a hardening fixer, or make sure that your hardening agent is compatible with your fixer.

Wash

I wash for about 1/4 the recommended time, and my water is too cold. Technically, I should be washing for 5-10 minutes, but I don't. I perhaps wash for 1-2 minutes. Why would I do this? Well, It goes like this. I have a short grounding in chemistry. Basically, it goes like this: If you dilute something down 100 times, there isn't that much difference than if you dilute it down 120 times. Particularly if you're dealing with a few milliliters to begin with. By the time all that water has rinsed off the liquid chemicals, it is my theory that most of the chemicals within the emulsion will have leached out, considering that the emulsion is only a few micrometers thick (APX 100 has an emulsion that is 7µm thick; a standard roll would then have an "emulsion volume" of just over 1mL. Any chemicals that are stuck in that 1mL have plenty of oportunity to leach out as I run about 3000 mL over them. Osmosis and all that.).

Agfa says on their website: 8 changes of water should eliminate all residual chemicals. So, if you're following my advice so far and your tanks match mine, you're doing 1 roll, the volume of chemistry needed for 1 roll is 325 mL, and 8*325=2600 mL. Hey, I guess I'm not a total moron, Agfa's idea is similar to mine. (I read their page after writing this one, then updated.)

To wash it effectively, even somewhat correctly: Sit the processing tank under a tap running water just a little over the processing temperature, making sure that the water does not directly hit the film (i.e. it should fill the tank through the various baffles rather than with the top off and beating up the emulsion). Let it overfill a little, dump it out. Repeat 8 times, letting it overrun more and more each time. Basically, the first time, you wash the chemical off the surface, and each additional time you allow more and more to leach out from that dreadfully thick emulsion.

BIG WARNING NOTE: IF YOU ARE A PARANOID TYPE: Agfa said that about ROTATION development; i.e. continuous agitation (like on a motor base), controlled temperature, and whatzyerwhoozer. OTOH: my style does indeed seem to work. I do recommend at least a minute or two of washing with dumping out the tank, where most people do NOT recommend dumping out the tank. It seems obvious to me that if you want to get the chemicals OUT of the tank and away from the film, you need to dilute them and then dump that out.... repeatedly. Leaving the tank lid on eliminates the need for a hose to make sure the tank fills gently; the flow is already indirected so it is "gentle enough". It also helps to rinse out the tank before the next use. So, if you're really a paranoid type, I say you should try it my way, and then do a residual fixer test (look in any GOOD darkroom book in the section on archival processing).

Anyway, I'm primarily worried about chemical sitting on the surface of the film forever, not about the ultraminute traces that all films will have within their emulsions.

Wetting agent

The wetting agent allows the film to dry faster. To do it "right", after washing (rinsing), you fill the tank with water, add a little wetting agent, agitate, wait about 30 seconds, and then hang the film to dry. This cuts the drying time down quite a bit so less dust has a chance to get stuck in the film. It also helps the film to dry without water streaks on it.

Note that you do NOT rinse off the wetting agent. Leave it on the film and squeegee. Allow it to evaporate off.

Hang it up to dry

When I was younger and more foolish, I thought it would be a good idea to hang film in front of a fan to dry. Then I realized that this is a bad idea. The fan will blow any dust it can find right into the emulsion of the film, where the dust will stick, because the emulsion is wet. You can't pull it off, because you'll scratch off more of the pictures than were covered by dust. The only real way to speed this up is to use a wetting agent, or use heat drying system like is part of the developing machines used at a 1 hour lab. Basically, the film is pressed between hot rubber rollers after being run through a wetting agent. I just hang the film up to dry.

Slightly more technical version of how to develop.

Developer

Mix developer up according to instructions; select a development time according to basic time and your developer concentration, and also the developer temperature.

If you want to PUSH PROCESS, that is, increase effective film speed, the "magic number" is "to double film speed, increase develop time by 20-25%".

Stop

An acid stop is not essential; a stop of some form IS. Properly, you want a dilute acetic acid solution for between 30 and 60 seconds. Improperly, (but hey, it works for me) rinse in plain water for about 15-30 seconds to remove excess developer from the film so that the fixer lasts longer and the development doesn't linger on too long.

Fix

"Fixing time is twice clearing time." Take a test piece of film; plunge it into fixer, and time it. Watch the film; it should become clear. Note the time. Double this time. Fix for that long. That is, if the film is clear after 1.5 minutes, fix for 3.

Simple.

Still not satisfied?

No problem! I'm not offended. I'm just trying to help. I recommend that you check out Agfa's website, particularly their B&W Lab course pages.

Think you're a smarty? Think I'm a moron?

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