Is building a darkroom worth it?

[Emile de Leon]

Personally..I decided to go to LF cams and just contact print. Eliminate the enlarger entirely..You just cant beat a contact print on chloride paper and all you need is a lightbulb and a sheet of glass for the best and most easily made lil print gems in the world..they glow..
As far as the Focotar 2's go..these lenses are made to be used wide open or 1/2 stop down..as they are process lenses and are the best with glass carrier on a Focomat....I'm talkin 50mm Focotars here..not the lesser 40..if you tested the Focotar at F8 or smaller ...then they cant compete with the other brands..but I found corner to corner rendering on the Focomat at f5.6 ...amazing..

 

[PKR]

Good idea to keep the tech stuff and hardware simple.

I started working as a PJ in 1968 when I was in college. After College and after getting shot at and nearly getting my head separated from my body I apprenticed in a commercial studio. I stuck with commercial, editorial and documentary ever since. No regrets.

No RC back in my day until about 1973. Polycontrast RC was pretty bad back then. In later years when RC got better I used it when pressed to get something out fast. Until a couple of years ago I still used my Pako high gloss drum dryer. You just can't beat the brilliance of a properly ferotyped fiber gloss print.

In the PJ days I shot almost exclusively TX (the original not this stuff they call TX today).

Over the years I shot different films depending on what I felt was the best at the moment. Doing studio work and very controlled location work I used a medium speed film mostly. Agfa pan 100 was a favorite for years with a little 25 tossed in. Of course original TX 400 and 320 sheet was used.

I did trade trial testing for Kodak on TMax 100 & 400 but hated it. Also did testing for Ilford on Delta 100 & 400 which I dropped all my other films and went to Delta for years. My Fuji rep dropped a couple of bricks of Neopan 400 and Acros 100 in 120 at the studio. I'm not easily swayed from favorites but I switched to Fuji. Years ago I bought a large freezer and filled it with Fuji.

I'm about out now and am going to HP5 and looking for the right 100/125 film. It's most likely going to be FP4. I'm also testing Bergger pancro 400. I'm hoping it is as good as their paper. I recently bought a dozen rolls of Foma Retro 320. Its terrible in my opinion. I don't know why they think this mushy flat film represents film from the past.

I've mainly used HC110 and Rodinal. I got a degree in chemistry and like any good student got into modifying my Rodinal. It had it producing fantastic negscwith TX until Kodak ruined it. I use a little PMK and D76 and if I need to really push I use Acufine.

I went looking for a Plus-x replacement and settled on Neopan Acros. It's not the same emulsion as Neopan 100. Much finer grain than PX. HP5 I use with my Oly XA and occasionally in a F3. I picked these two films because I like the way they scan.

I think more than half the time I'm on a tripod with the Nikons. I treat an F3 like a ground glass viewing system camera without moves. When I did my assisting time, I did a lot of 8x10 studio stuff. Never owned one and stayed away from medium format for years. I owned a Sinar F 4x5 that was very light weight and would dissemble to a flat package for travel. I rarely used it outdoors. It was a studio and portable studio camera for table top stuff mostly.

I really try to travel with as little gear as possible. I get a lot more work done. I don't think the gear nuts understand this. I looked through a lot of job related film a while back for archiving. I began tracking my lens use except for special case jobs. About 90% of the portfolio grade photos were done with a 35 or a 55 micro, which I used as a normal lens.