Madcap darkroom moments?

[Bassism]

Inspired by Larky's recent description of his method of developing film, I thought it would be interesting to hear others' tales of whimsy in the darkroom.

I'm pretty new to the whole thing myself, and just starting to figure out that I don't really need to be all scientific when I don't feel like it.

My most improvised moment was probably realizing that I had neither enough id11 nor microphen to make a 1+1 solution. So I poured both of them in, topped it up with water, and let it sit for a while. To my satisfaction, the negs came out quite well. Since that day I don't bother myself too much...

 

[pesphoto]

last weekend I was washing some prints and decided to leave the darkroom for a while.
Well, I flipped off a power strip before leaving. Plugged into the power strip was the pump that pumps the water out of the tub under my sink and into into the house drain.
Needless to say the tub overflowed and my basement and darkroom were flooded. Not terrible, but enough to really piss me off. Spent the afternoon sopping up water.

 

[Ducky]

The cardboard that comes packaged in with photo paper is not photo sensitive and will mess up your developer if you try to process it🙂.
The photo paper in your paper safe is photo sensitive but not safe if you leave the lid open.
A 150 watt bulb in a tiny basic enlarger is too much.
25 watts is not enough.
Different papers have different exposure/developing times.
Read the instructions.
All this I learned in a single three hour session this morning.

 

[dcsang]

I once drank some used Rodinal because I thought it was grape kool-aid....




ok.. I didn't.. but I've thought about it 🙂

Dave

 

[capitalK]

Forgetting to stop down the enlarger lens has resulted in a few extremely underexposed shots.

I recently measured out a 1+100 dilution of HC-110 but developing with the 1+49 time I originally intended to. There was an image there but the negs were pretty thin.

 

[David William White]

Hey, these are great!

Okay, I once fixed a print in urine. And not my own!
I don't recommend this, but you get some nice toning.

 

[Al Kaplan]

Ahhh, memories! Like when my girlfriend realized that the counter between the two enlargers in my darkroom was exactly the right height for her to sit there and for me to stand there and I didn't get much printing done that night.

 

[Ducky]

GraLab timers are a royal PITA.

 

[Al Kaplan]

MOVE the GraLab! You're not supposed to sit on them.

 

[Bassism]

You guys seem to have way more fun in the darkroom than I do...

 

[PCB_RF]

Hmmm....had a floor lamp in the darkroom with a red bulb for print illumination. One day the procedure went like this:

Grab lamp socket with chemical-wet hands to bring closer to development tray. Wonder what the tingling sensation is. Wonder why I can't let go of the lamp. Realize I'm being electrocuted, so finger muscles are contracting around socket. Shake hand vigorously to dislodge lamp.

Pick up lamp, repeat.

After shaking the lamp free during the second electrocution, the bulb broke. I remembered being glad the bulb broke, because if it hadn't I knew I would have done it a third time.

No, not the sharpest knife in the drawer.......

 

[Leica0Series]

I just had a nightmare last night that I forgot to pre-soak my film, and then I had left the fixer in another location and had to drive to get it ... weird. Too many margaritas the night before, I guess.

 

[Al Kaplan]

Bassism, the Sixties were WILD times. By the Seventies we had being wild down pat. Now that we are IN our sixties and seventies we have lots of great memories. You young folks have it tough these days. Taking a chick in the darkroom, the pale amber glow of the safelight, the soothing sound of gurgling water in the print washer...it's probably a lot more romantic than staring at a monitor with her. If we had the right chemistry things would develop!

 

[nuckabean]

Haha how many madcap photoshop stories do you hear?

 

[Ducky]

Pick up lamp, repeat.

quote]
Now that's gotta be the best so far.

 

[nuckabean]

On April 1, I went into the school darkroom to print some contact sheets. The teacher had set out a box of expired paper to use for contacts so I took it in with me. I did a test strip, but it came out blank. I did another, to make sure I didn't screw up, came out blank again. Went out, complained to the teacher that the paper wasn't working. At that point she started cackling because she had swapped the developer with water. It didn't really set me back at all but she thought it was hilarious.

 

[ChrisN]

Hmmm....had a floor lamp in the darkroom with a red bulb for print illumination. One day the procedure went like this:

Grab lamp socket with chemical-wet hands to bring closer to development tray. Wonder what the tingling sensation is. Wonder why I can't let go of the lamp. Realize I'm being electrocuted, so finger muscles are contracting around socket. Shake hand vigorously to dislodge lamp.

Pick up lamp, repeat.

After shaking the lamp free during the second electrocution, the bulb broke. I remembered being glad the bulb broke, because if it hadn't I knew I would have done it a third time.

No, not the sharpest knife in the drawer.......

Mate, this is fantastic - the funniest thing I've ever read on this forum, even better than Al's reminiscing. Thank you very much for sharing. 😀😀😀