Opening a darkroom in Budapest. General advice wanted.

Hi all,

I'm currently working on opening a communal darkroom in Budapest, Hungary. Whilst I've set up small, personal darkrooms over the years, this will be larger than anything I've worked with, so I'm reaching out to the community for advice and suggestions.

I know there are many people here who have set up, or used many larger darkrooms, and I'm wondering if you have any general advice, or tips you may have wished you had received in the renovation/set up stages.

I've scoured the forum for answers to many queries, but still open to suggestions.

I'm about to run plumbing and ventilation, but haven't 100% locked in my layout, so thought now is the time to ask.

We have a very unique space, built around 1859. The premises has 2 main rooms with large vaulted ceilings. Room one will be a workshop area, and room 2 the darkroom. Is has the original exposed brick - I would love to keep the walls as they are but worry dust may be too much of an issue (even after treating/sealing).
I'm looking at 4-6 enlarger stations in the darkroom, with a small, private room for one as well.

I'll link the FB page. There are a few photos of the main room, but more will come.

PM me if you would like to offer advice, or comment in the thread.

Thanks,

Best,

Pat

https://www.facebook.com/AltFotoBudapest/

I think most is pretty obvious and you will know what to do. I have been in your situation and there's one thing I would recommend: that you make the sink (for the trays) accessible at both long sides. Meaning it should come out into the room. That way you can stand on either long side and at the short side, with three people easily . . . Hope I am making myself clear !

No advise but just wanted to wish you good luck with this project.

The same. I never came across a public darkroom. So I find that very interesting.
I think advice should be on that public aspect and related issues.

I have made many large darkrooms , my sinks are in the range of 55inches x 12 ft I am open to discuss any darkroom building issues.. www.alternativephotoservices.com you can reach me at bob@alternativephotoservices.com . I am actually in the stages of building my last permanent darkroom and I have figured out my needs and would be willing to give you any advice.

Probably the best starting advice would be as follows.

Start from the floor and make the base with floor drains if possible and have a surface that will be ok for spillage , leaks and easily walkable
Make the base of the sink out of metal that can over time be raised and lowered.- you may need pics of this which I can supply.
Use very large garden hoses that can be moved from sink to sink from above, rather than hooking plumbing to each sink..
Make the sinks out of wood so that you can continually fix or adapt them
Make sure you can walk around at least three sides of the sink.
Make them 10 inches larger than any print size you want
Make your trays out of hard plastic which you can weld together with handles- may need pics of this which I can supply
Have one good dedicated hot water tank for your dark room use only not to affect others in the building
Use only simple water regulators or even shower regulators with a simple themometor to adjust tem
Hook up two hoses to the regulator so you have two wash lines.
Regarding hoses- mine are over 30ft long and I can walk on the suckers and they are easily moved around the room to wash and clean up.
I use large thomson lights for safe light as they give a nice glow in the darkroom
Do not use daylight bulbs in the darkroom for overall illumination, you may want to do a alternative process that does not like the daylight wavelength.
Paint walls a light colour away from the enlargers and dark around the enlargers.
Brace all the enlargers and have a alignment system.
Make stackable print racks that you can easily store and then use 2 x4 chunks to separate when doing large printing sessions. use fan to circulate air.


Ok hope this helps.

Bob

Also, have well segregated wet & dry areas and lockers so users can store their supplies.

E. von Hoegh said:

Also, have well segregated wet & dry areas and lockers so users can store their supplies.

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If this is for a communal darkroom some of my comments may be off, I assumed this was for a private workers darkroom

Make sure there is adequate ventilation since it will be open to the public.

Guideline for air exchange over here is 8x room volume per hour.

Thanks for all the advice so far. And the general words of encouragement. Some very good points raised, and it's good to hear what people consider important design considerations.

Bob Carnie said:

Probably the best starting advice would be as follows.

Start from the floor and make the base with floor drains if possible and have a surface that will be ok for spillage , leaks and easily walkable
...

Bob

Click to expand...

Thanks for your detailed reply, Bob. I'll certainly be taking your advice while finalising my designs, and send you a PM with some specific enquiries.

What are you thinking about
1. Darkroom door...a maze or a rotating door, or...?
2. Darkroom floor, to deal with inevitable drips and spills?

PTO said:

Thanks for your detailed reply, Bob. I'll certainly be taking your advice while finalising my designs, and send you a PM with some specific enquiries.

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I replied thinking you were making a private dkrm my bad but I have had a lot of experience with dkrm related issues so feel free to pm . I prefer the email though.

wiltw said:

What are you thinking about
1. Darkroom door...a maze or a rotating door, or...?
2. Darkroom floor, to deal with inevitable drips and spills?

Click to expand...

1. This has been the hardest part of the design process as I'm trying to keep the existing double door way (for moving large items in/out), but also split the door way in 2 (to make separate entrances for a mezzanine-bathroom (that has natural light). It sounds very strange? it is. Currently looking at a folding-modular-U-door light-trap option.

2. It's all tiled. see photo

One setup that I have seen is have each enlarger in a small room with a door, and then have the sinks/wet side/ processing in a central communal area. That way each person can expose and open their paper in their own room and there is no risk of light contaminating a neighbour's paper. If someone has an enlarger on and then lifts up the head to reposition the negative carrier a lot of white light can spill out that could possibly fog someone else's paper.

This makes sure that all the light in the processing section is safe, and all the exposing light is contained within the small rooms.

Craig said:

One setup that I have seen is have each enlarger in a small room with a door, and then have the sinks/wet side/ processing in a central communal area. That way each person can expose and open their paper in their own room and there is no risk of light contaminating a neighbour's paper. If someone has an enlarger on and then lifts up the head to reposition the negative carrier a lot of white light can spill out that could possibly fog someone else's paper.

This makes sure that all the light in the processing section is safe, and all the exposing light is contained within the small rooms.

Click to expand...

I agree with this in theory, and have been considering it, but most of my favourite darkrooms (for multiple people) have had a more a open feel. I guess I could look into a curved kind of rod with black out curtain for each enlarger bay so people have the option...

Since your darkroom appears to be below ground level: watch out for humidity, it can easily get out of control and mold can destroy much of your precious work. BTDT. The rooms look dry now, but wait for hot and humid weather outside, people going in and out or just leaving the doors open, and full water sinks inside. It's typically cooler inside, which turns 80% relative humidity outside into 100+% inside. There are devices for dehumidifying rooms, but these draw quite a bit of electrical current over time. Make sure that at least your enlarger lenses are stored in a somewhat dry place.

Second issue may be dust and little debris falling from the ceiling, which can easily ruin a print if it happens during enlargement. Consider covering the ceiling with plywood sheets, walls are much less critical in my experience.

Finally: make sure you have a double door system between your dark room and the outside, this way people can enter and/or leave the darkroom without letting light in.

Good luck with your darkroom!

Instead of dehumidifying one can heat the room.
And with a high ventilation the room would warm up anyway in summer.

But yes, climate control is a complex matter.

I've volunteered and one large darkroom and also used another. Many good suggestions above, but the first question in my mind is whether to have 1 large multi-user darkroom or a few smaller one-person rooms. There is no right answer, it depends on individual circumstances. Plus your physical structure may dictate one or the other. Some pros/cons (IMO):

• Large multi-user darkrooms are very inefficient UNLESS you provide chemicals. If you provide chemicals, one large (say 4x8 ft) sink can support 6 to 8 users. But if users provide their own chemicals, and do not share trays, that same sink can really only support 2 users (2 lines of trays). If you provide chemicals, then someone needs to monitor / maintain them. A large multi-user darkroom can support classes. Signage is important to let people know the proper procedures so they don't mess up others.
• Small individual darkrooms allow people to work to work without interference. They can choose their own chemicals. They aren't bothered by others who might, for example, contaminate developer with stop bath or fixer. But no classes (except perhaps one-on-one). You need some sort of reservation system. It's easier to monitor damage and potential theft.

Some random comments:

• If using a revolving door, there are ways to attach it in its opening so that it can be removed when moving large items in or out.
• How will you handle used fixer? In the darkrooms I've used, a silver recovery system was attached to a dedicated sink for fixer dump.
• Print drying takes up a lot of room unless you have a print dryer. It's a tremendous convenience for users to be able to dry their prints and film quickly, so a 2nd trip back to the darkroom is not necessary.
• Good light in the darkroom is a must. It's not like a one-person darkroom where you can turn the lights on temporarily. A Thomas Duplex safelight is great.

My first thought on seeing the rooms is air handling , HVAC, heating, ventilation and air conditioning. Beautiful space. Here in the central part of the USA , we see anywhere from -30 to +40 C. The humidity in the summer can be awful. I have my darkroom in an air conditioned home, I still run a dehumidifier 7 months out of the year. The winter months bring 15C in my darkroom without additional heat. If you bring a lot of outside air in during humid months it will make it worse.
If you can use low odor chemistry that would help. Maybe let the toning baths be in a separate space.
Archival washers that drain directly into the drain pipe . i.e. try to minimize evaporation associated with large sinks, huge trays etc. Dry the prints in a separate room if practical. 5 or 6 people working in that space is going to get close.

Good luck it's a very worthy goal.

I’m in the process of setting up a darkroom that I intend to make available to the public.

A few things that I’ve discovered along my path so far: flooring, unless it’s already got drains built in, the flooring should be able to get wet and be easily cleaned up. Air control, this is complex. You need to be able to ventilate and control temperature, humidity, and particulates in the air. Light control, this can be complex too. You can’t have people fogging each other’s paper. Chemical control, as pointed out by others, if everybody uses their own chemicals the darkroom becomes very space inefficient unless you spend some money on slot processors, which will significantly increase how many different chems you can be running at the same time.

I’ve foregone the trays in a wet table route and am instead going the slot/tube processing route as that pretty significantly cuts down on the size of the wet area.

Figure out if you want to make it a large volume of people classroom style, or more of a smaller volume rental style and that help you make decisions.

If you’re going the classroom style, look at how other school darkrooms are set up, otherwise it might be better to make a handful of smaller “rental” dark rooms that are in the larger facility.

Dear PTO,

Good luck! Dead Link Removed is the community darkroom I use on occasion. They might give you some advice. Personally, I don't like the revolving doors but the do save space.

Neal Wydra

PTO said:

1. This has been the hardest part of the design process as I'm trying to keep the existing double door way (for moving large items in/out), but also split the door way in 2 (to make separate entrances for a mezzanine-bathroom (that has natural light). It sounds very strange? it is. Currently looking at a folding-modular-U-door light-trap option. View attachment 198767

2. It's all tiled. see photo

Click to expand...

you might consider for the door something readily removeable, like this...



The brown sections represent wood framed panels/walls which slide into place into 'brackets' made of wood/metal which are bolted to the walls (with sponge rubber or foam spray sealant serving as a light seal between the bracket and the stone wall). Trickier to solve is what forms a light maze vertically (at the tops and bottoms of the wood sections) where you might not have surfaces easily 'sealed' with

Do you have a drain in the floor, so it can be hosed down, then squeegeed and allowed to dry? Simply allowing fixer and developer to get on the floor to oxidize and dry out makes for an unholy smell.