Darkroom wall color?

[BradS]

Every darkroom I’ve ever been in has had black walls - except my temporary set up in the bathroom. I’m remodeling the hall bath to make it more of a darkroom and less a bathroom. Wondering how important is it to have black walls ?

 

[Sirius Glass]

Every darkroom I’ve ever been in has had black walls - except my temporary set up in the bathroom. I’m remodeling the hall bath to make it more of a darkroom and less a bathroom. Wondering how important is it to have black walls ?

Well my dry and wet darkroom has very light colored walls, so I would say none because all that is required for a darkroom to be dark is absence of light. No light bounces off white walls as well as it bounces around black walls.

 

[Lachlan Young]

Black matte around the enlarger is a good idea to help kill spill, but the rest of the darkroom is better being a light/ neutral colour - white is fine. However, painting it the same colour as the safelight is reportedly markedly unpleasant.

 

[Mainecoonmaniac]

I think it's just aesthetics not on function. I painted my darkroom walls yellow. I wanted something bright. Dark walls will make it feel more closed in.

 

[MattKing]

The temptation to say "raspberry" is really strong, but that is from a couple of other threads.
Are you going to be working alone, or sharing the space?
If alone, start out with beige/flat white. Then add areas of dark/black, where you have light sources that you don't want to affect materials. Places like behind and above the enlarger light source.
A light, neutral colour is a much, much, much more pleasant place to work when the lights are on, and you will spend a lot of time there with the lights on.
In particular, a light coloured ceiling makes it much easier to reflect and diffuse a safelight. And you can always put a dark patch above the enlarger.

 

[voceumana]

White--you need all the reflected light from the safelight that you can get. Flat or at most satin, as you don't want to create glare reflections from enlarger spill. But if you enlarger has much spill, fix the spill.

Why make the darkroom a dismal place? If you have a finished ceiling, get cheap track lighting (if you can still get it) and mount it on the walls, with the reflectors aimed to the ceiling for diffuse light. It worked great for me.

 

[Born2Late]

Off white.

 

[Michael Firstlight]

I used a medium gray - - void of any color and not so dreary as black and not any significant reflection from the enlarger.

MFL

 

[Sirius Glass]

The temptation to say "raspberry" is really strong, but that is from a couple of other threads.
Are you going to be working alone, or sharing the space?
If alone, start out with beige/flat white. Then add areas of dark/black, where you have light sources that you don't want to affect materials. Places like behind and above the enlarger light source.
A light, neutral colour is a much, much, much more pleasant place to work when the lights are on, and you will spend a lot of time there with the lights on.
In particular, a light coloured ceiling makes it much easier to reflect and diffuse a safelight. And you can always put a dark patch above the enlarger.

So you want us to give you a "raspberry"? Really?

 

[BradS]

So you want us to give you a "raspberry"? Really?

I think I’ll commission a painter from school to do a portrait on the back wall of a pretty young woman wearing a raspberry beret....the kind you find in a secondhand store.


You know, so it’s not so dreary in there !

 

[BradS]

...and an artist’s interpretation of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon album cover on the wall behind the enlarger ...

 

[BradS]

Thanks all! looks like white is gonna get the nod....with the additional content mentioned above.

 

[laser]

Black where stray enlarger light will strike. The rest is best white.

 

[DREW WILEY]

I have a separate clean room for film work, entirely anti-static washable black. Also black in the vicinity of all the enlargers. In the sink and processing room itself, the walls and ceiling I stupidly painted light tan enamel to better reflect safelight, based on some old routine bad advice. This makes it somewhat clumsy to correctly judge the exact hue achieved during toning, so I installed a light neutral gray panel alongside the usual toner tray position. Exact evaluation of either color prints or fully dry black and white ones is done in completely different room with color correct lighting along with my mounting and retouching stations.

Any kind of loud color in a darkroom is a bad idea due to the physiological phenomena of both simultaneous and successive contrast. If you don't understand these, look them up. I don't like white because it doesn't absorb any accidental stray light, although I do use white FRP fiberglass panels (FRP = fire resistant panel) above and behind powerful halogen colorheads. Everything lower down is black. That's because FRP panels only come either white or very light gray. This might seem overly cautious, but it can potentially help with fire dept business inspections or related insurance.

 

[btaylor]

Black where stray enlarger light will strike. The rest is best white.

This, exactly.

 

[voceumana]

If you insist on thinking about black near the enlarger, go for flat white first and see if stray light reflection is a problem. You can always paint around the enlarger later if necessary.

 

[Jesper]

White walls and I've never had any problem.

 

[Hilo]

One more vote for white. And I have painted walls and ceilings behind and above the enlargers, medium to dark green, and also medium to dark blue. I just do not like black walls.

To find out to which direction your enlarger(s) cast light, turn off all other lights in your room, also any darkroom lights . . .

 

[Bikerider]

If the walls are matt then I cannot see there being any problem with reflection from the enlarger. My darkroom is off-white all over and I have never had a problem. I think painting black behind the enlarger is a solution looking for a problem. If there was a significant issue then mine would be duplicated because I have my enlarger in the corner of the room with white walls on two sides.
I did have a problem with the location of my DUKA safelight which was closer than it should have been when printing colour and reflecting light off the brighter parts of the enlarger, but directing the light up to reflect off the ceiling stopped that.

Put your worry beads away and just get printing.

 

[Johnkpap]

I just painted mine with what ever Discount / Free off white cream paint I could get.......it’s a dark room if the walls are not exactly the same colour it does not matter

 

[ozphoto]

Just completed my new darkroom and this time I've gone for white walls which have made a marked difference when using my safelights. Previously, the walls were a form of wood panelling and quite dark which made it even darker under safelight.

Not had any issues around the enlarger either - changing to lighter coloured walls has been a very good move.

 

[Zathras]

White is good because it reflects the light from the safelights and makes it easier to see. I did paint the walls behind the enlarger flat black just
to be safe. The most important thing is to make sure that there's no light leaking in from outside.

 

[btaylor]

I didn’t paint the area around my enlargers black, but I do have light leaks from the Beseler I use most. Rather than pulling out the paint can and roller I simply made a skirt out of black cloth. Problem solved.

 

[Michael Firstlight]

I didn’t paint the area around my enlargers black, but I do have light leaks from the Beseler I use most. Rather than pulling out the paint can and roller I simply made a skirt out of black cloth. Problem solved.

And when using black cloth, I find black velvet to be 100% light absorbing.

 

[Deleted member 88956]

All the "mega science" behind black around enlarger as strictly worth no attention. Whatever color you prefer. I prefer white, use matt white because any reflections off of glossy when lights are on are disturbing to me, but have no effect on darkroom function in its dark state.