What is the biggest b&w darkroom print you ever made?

[68degrees]

With this new interest of mine in MF, I was wondering how big I could make a print with my Beseler 23CII XL? I know it can project horizontally on a wall or the floor. Is 48" x 48" beyond the realm of home darkroom possiblity?

 

[biomed]

I have printed a few poster size prints (24x36). Usually the largest was 16x20. The poster prints were done on the wall. The main issue was the handling of the large paper during processing. I once tried developer in an aerosol can. I was not impressed with the results.

 

[x-ray]

Roughly 52x96 inch B&W.

 

[68degrees]

Roughly 52x96 inch B&W.

wow thats awesome..

 

[xia_ke]

I personally haven't printed bigger than 11x14, but thought you might enjoy this link...

http://www.clydebutcher.com/photographic-techniques

 

[x-ray]

I worked for an ad agency in the mid 70's. We had an account that we shot portraits of reps for that client. This was in the day of papered billboards. We printed on kodak mural paper and the billboard company pasted them up on the board when they hung the other paper.

We had a huge set of PVC tanks for dektol, stop, fix and wash. They were about three feet x sixty inches and four and a half feet deep. We had a device with cables and pulleys and rack that we could hang four or five prints on and run them all at once.

Surprisingly they were pretty good quality.

I've done quite a few art prints about that size too and tons of 20x24.

 

[walnuts]

printed an Xpan image with a friend to 6 feet long. Printed a 4x5 neg to 5x4 feet. Both black and white, lots of fun was had on both prints.

 

[68degrees]

I personally haven't printed bigger than 11x14, but thought you might enjoy this link...

http://www.clydebutcher.com/photographic-techniques

he charges 90,000 for a 52x76" print
http://www.clydebutcher.com/image/50

Im going to stop by his gallery tomorrow and look at these titanic images. They are open 10-4

 

[xia_ke]

he charges 90,000 for a 52x76" print
http://www.clydebutcher.com/image/50

Im going to stop by his gallery tomorrow and look at these titanic images. They are open 10-4

An argument could be made that $90k is a bargain when compared to...

http://gizmodo.com/the-10-most-expensive-photographs-in-the-world-866891077

 

[Moto-Uno]

11 x 14 and anything past that seems to get into some pretty large containers,not to mention chemicals, my dark closet just ain't big enough. But I bet it'd be fun. Peter

 

[68degrees]

An argument could be made that $90k is a bargain when compared to...

http://gizmodo.com/the-10-most-expensive-photographs-in-the-world-866891077

ya I dont understand that. The value aint in the photographs so it must be in the marketing of them. One hell of a marketing team.

 

[zuiko85]

I picked up some 16X20 trays at a photo show from the free box. Really too big for my small laundry/darkroom. Made one 11X14 with some 30 year out of date Kodak paper. From a 35mm half frame negative no less. Came out ok if you don't view from too close up.

Now my darkroom is an apartment bathroom, even smaller at 5X8ft. and my enlarger is a gifted Durst F30
I print 35mm @ 6X9 on 8X10 paper, 35mm half frame @ 6X8 on 8X10, and 16mm 10X14 negatives on 5X7 paper. The last using a Mamiya Enla head.

That's it for enlargments. My motto is; "Ya got small negatives? Make small prints!"

 

[Pablito]

you can print quite large on RC roll paper if you make some tray/tanks out of PVC pipes, split them and make troths, you need to roll the paper loosely to get it into the chemicals. Or process flat on big sheets of plywood covered with tarp, and sponge the chemicals on - use gloves!

 

[haempe]

In the 80s I printed regulary up to 3x4 meters (in parts) onto 1m wide material from roll. Usually from 18x24 cm negatives.
The largest I remember was a 12x2 meter panorama, but this needed some theoretical preparations and good internegatives...
Developing was done in trays of ca. 1,5x0,8 m with a level of ca. 20cm (ca.35 litres solution).
Developing by submerging the entire roll and than rolling constantly from the one end to the other...
Later (in the 90s) we had a RA-4 developing machine (up to 120cm width) for that kind of stuff (large b/w-prints was become rare...).

 

[Photo_Smith]

I've done some 6ftx4ft for a TV studio backdrop. We processed them in troughs putting a metal roller on top of the paper and used a two man 'see saw' action. I probably made dozens of the things, rinsed off with a hose in the car park–it was the 1980's...

30" wide is the largest colour image from 4x5 film, which was done on a floor standing enlarger put through out Kreonite processor.

 

[jsrockit]

Largest I did personally, and did well, was 16x20" ... however, I did try using 4 - 16x20" sheets together and projected onto the wall for exposure. The results were not so great.

 

[Matus]

4x5" contact prints, I somehow never made it to the next level 😱

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

$90,000 for a print? I woz done! 😀

Once did staff shots for a reception area to 6ft x 3ft (cut from a long roll). As photo_smith, I used trough processing but my boss's darkroom sink was just a tad larger than 6x3 (about half an inch all round) so I could wash in that.

The shots were hand-held 35mm Tri-X and I didn't need the magnifier to focus on the grain. 🙂

From a few feet away, though, they looked impressively sharp.

 

[farlymac]

16x20 was the largest I ever did. It was for an album cover, and I didn't get a photo credit. I kept the trimmed off part to mount with the cover for later display. But usually I did 11x14 for my personal stuff. I rented darkroom time at a place in Columbus, OH, and did help out a couple times when folks were doing big stuff by turning the enlarger heads around to project onto the floor.

PF

 

[zauhar]

11 X 14 is the biggest I've made, that's all my small enlarger will handle.

But now I acquired a bigger enlarger, so I should be able to make bigger prints! Unfortunately I discovered the bigger enlarger won't fit in my cramped basement space. ;-(