Question for those who were/are pros out in the field; Nick Nolte darkroom

rpavich · Jul 26, 2016

I was re-watching the movie Under Fire with Nick Nolte as the photographer and I saw something that made me wonder about how realistic it was.

Nick has a darkroom and in it he's got about 15 strips of negatives hanging. While he's in the darkroom with Joanna Cassidy he's smoking a cigarette the whole time and they are walking around stirring up a bunch of dust.

If anyone has been in a field situation like this my question is: is this realistic? Would a real photojournalist treat his negatives and / or darkroom this way?

I can hardly keep crap off of my negs and they go right from the salad spinner (taking excess water off) to the negative dryer.

I'm just curious.

Frank53 · Jul 26, 2016

My father smoked in the darkroom
Actually, I don't remember him without a sigarette untill he turned 75. Then he stopped smoking.
Regards,
Frank

gone · Jul 26, 2016

I don't know the movie, so I'm not sure what sort of photographer he's playing in his role. If he's a photojournalist, then he could care less about a little dust, and the cigarette isn't going to create any issues. The negs don't care if he's smoking.

If there's humidity where they are, then dust isn't being stirred up. When I lived in New Mexico, dust was a struggle minute by minute. Sometimes it was second by second. Here in Florida, I'd have to physically pick up some dust and place it on the neg, or drop it on the floor, to get it to go on there. Totally different experience, dust wise.

rpavich · Jul 26, 2016

Frank53 said:
My father smoked in the darkroom
Actually, I don't remember him without a sigarette untill he turned 75. Then he stopped smoking.
Regards,
Frank

Interesting.

momus said:
I don't know the movie, so I'm not sure what sort of photographer he's playing in his role. If he's a photojournalist, then he could care less about a little dust, and the cigarette isn't going to create any issues. The negs don't care if he's smoking.

If there's humidity where they are, then dust isn't being stirred up. When I lived in New Mexico, dust was a struggle minute by minute. Sometimes it was second by second. Here in Florida, I'd have to physically pick up some dust and place it on the neg, or drop it on the floor, to get it to go on there. Totally different experience, dust wise.

Ahh...that could be part of it, they are in a humid area for sure.

Thanks to both of you for replying. I learned something.

darkroommike · Jul 26, 2016

I was a just starting out photographer in the 70's, know a lot of the old hands smoked in the darkroom. A lot of the darkrooms I worked in had cigarette burns on every horizontal surface. And I've had to clean that yellow crap off lenses, etc. I've never smoked and it's like working inside an ashtray, a lot of old darkrooms lack the ventilation that modern labs have. That said the cellophane off a pack of cigarettes makes an excellent diffusion filter under the lens when printing portraits.

Bob Carnie · Jul 26, 2016

Smoking Pot, Smoking Cigarettes, Drinking, having sex- having a bath in the sink- sleeping - yes these all have happened in thousands of darkrooms.

rpavich · Jul 26, 2016

darkroommike said:
I was a just starting out photographer in the 70's, know a lot of the old hands smoked in the darkroom. A lot of the darkrooms I worked in had cigarette burns on every horizontal surface. And I've had to clean that yellow crap off lenses, etc. I've never smoked and it's like working inside an ashtray, a lot of old darkrooms lack the ventilation that modern labs have. That said the cellophane off a pack of cigarettes makes an excellent diffusion filter under the lens when printing portraits.

Lol...that's very interesting!

EdSawyer · Jul 26, 2016

Looks like a bit of a combination darkroom/kitchen/? heads of garlic hanging on the wall are something I havent' seen in many darkrooms.

yeah, that drying protocol is not ideal, but as a photojournalist for a newspaper, it's not like it will make a huge difference in print if the negs are not perfect.

benjiboy · Jul 26, 2016

The movie was "Under Fire " watch it in full here it's excellent

jvo · Jul 26, 2016

i wonder why he's got a camera around his neck... is there also gonna be a spontaneous battle breakout that he needs to capture - in the darkroom???

(oh yeah! hollywood)

Trask · Jul 26, 2016

Gene Smith developed film in bucket -- or a toilet, I can't remember which -- when traveling through Spain, and later mentions in the book "Darkroom" that he'd developed some of his Minamata film in the vicinity of an open fire, IIRC -- trying to keep warm.

But yes, what you're looking at is Hollywood's attempt to show the viewer that Nick is a real photographer, because he has all that photo stuff hanging about.

Paul Howell · Jul 26, 2016

While the Air Force smoking in the darkroom was not allowed, some did if no one was watching. Later in the mid 70s I free lanced for the Sacramento Union, the woman who ran the darkroom with the help of few part timers was a chain smoker. Never noticed that smoking had any impact on the final prints. For the most part the PJ take pictures, the film or digital file was or is turned over to the newspaper or wire service for developing/processing and printing. I know that small newspapers had a staffer took the picture, then developed the film and printed as well. There were time I had to develop in the field, because my bread and butter was those negatives I was very careful with them. On the other hand I read in a text book, sorry I don't remember the name, on introduction photo journalism with a great picture of a JP working for AP who while on assignment in East Germany was washing his film in a hotel toilet, a bunch of stainless reels with the handle taped up so the toilet kept running. After his negative were dried he had them smuggled to the west in books, one strip of negatives hidden in the pages.

Eric Rose · Jul 26, 2016

Bob Carnie said:
Smoking Pot, Smoking Cigarettes, Drinking, having sex- having a bath in the sink- sleeping - yes these all have happened in thousands of darkrooms.

Yes, no, yes, yes, no

Rick A · Jul 26, 2016

Bob Carnie said:
Smoking Pot, Smoking Cigarettes, Drinking, having sex- having a bath in the sink- sleeping - yes these all have happened in thousands of darkrooms.

Funny, I don't remember you in my DR......

MattKing · Jul 26, 2016

In the late 1970s I worked for a summer as a darkroom technician for the Vancouver Sun - one of the two daily papers in Vancouver. The rules had recently been changed and smoking was no longer allowed in the darkrooms and nearby areas. There were a lot of grumpy, older photographers .

In many cases, film handling was far from gentle. And the things some would do with prints!!!!!

Of course, we were oriented toward deadlines and the relatively low definition half-tone screens used for preparing a daily broadsheet newspaper with image quality standard for the time.

But even then, when we prepared extra prints for display use or sale to the public, some results were spectacular - there were some fine photographers there at the time.

On the subject of darkroom drinking, I was just barely old enough at the time to legally drink, and didn't drink a lot, but it was certainly part of the culture. There was a wall at the end of the darkroom area that didn't go quite up to the ceiling. The story I heard was that several years later, when the photo departments of the two daily papers were combined in a cost cutting measure (they had the same publisher) the premises were combined and that wall was taken down. Behind the wall they found the shattered remains of hundreds/thousands? of liquor bottles

Bob Carnie · Jul 26, 2016

Trask said:
Gene Smith developed film in bucket -- or a toilet, I can't remember which -- when traveling through Spain, and later mentions in the book "Darkroom" that he'd developed some of his Minamata film in the vicinity of an open fire, IIRC -- trying to keep warm.

But yes, what you're looking at is Hollywood's attempt to show the viewer that Nick is a real photographer, because he has all that photo stuff hanging about.

Russel Monk did indeed process film in India using Diafine for his Heavan and Hell Series.

Bob Carnie · Jul 26, 2016

I will still have a beer or two when printing. I get paranoid with pot so that's out- I will not comment on the others.

Ronald Moravec · Jul 26, 2016

Smoking in a darkroom used to be done all the time.

Nobody cared that vapors got inside enlarging lenses. Few cared it destroyed lungs and caused heart disease. Guess it is up to you.

Gerald C Koch · Jul 26, 2016

Small imperfections like dust are obscured by the halftone printing process used in photo journalism.

DREW WILEY · Jul 26, 2016

Maybe he was experimenting with a nicotine-based developer! But it works both ways. When some friends of mine demolished a professional sound
studio they gave me the old industrial air cleaner that trapped all the damned cigarette smoke. Now this thing was built - true commercial quality
made of many septums of charged copper plates, then anti-static air output. It would cost a fortune to make nowadays. Not just a silly filter system.
And it was made to be serviced. The bank of plates can be pulled out for cleaning. And enough nictoine came off that device to allow Nick N. to nicotine-develop a movie version of War and Peace if he wanted to. The nice thing about nicotine development is that you don't need any expensive
Harrison & Harrison amber filter to photograph something like the Godfather. Things just come out all amber and hazy on their own. And even Marlon
Brando wouldn't have to fake that gruff gangster voice, since he'd have an authentic lung cancer intonation with smoker's cough. What will they think
of next!

M Carter · Jul 26, 2016

I learned darkroom printing in my junior year of high school, we had a nice darkroom. In the photo class, I somehow befriended three beautiful senior girls as sort of big-sisters. (I think because we'd eventually do portraits and I was about the only guy actually interested in photography and not just an easy credit).

Anyway, they were great friends and the last week of school before summer (with the three of them heading off to college), I snuck a bottle of champagne into the print washer and toasted their futures under the safelights. Of course the teacher came in (the revolving door giving us time to stash stuff).

She said "Man, it smells like apples in here"... but we remained unbusted.

Nowadays my only illicit darkroom activity is peeing in the sink when a lith print takes 40 minutes to come up...

Paul Howell · Jul 26, 2016

Bob Carnie said:
Russel Monk did indeed process film in India using Diafine for his Heavan and Hell Series.

I usually carried a quart size Diafine, a quart packet of fixer, a small bottle of wetting agent, stainless steel tank with 2 reels, when covering the revolution in Angola I used 1 liter beer bottles to mix the Diafine water for rinse, washed in the bathtub, hung in the closet to dry.

eddie · Jul 26, 2016

About 35 years ago I was head darkroom tech for a lab. I smoked back then, and did so in the darkroom. The metal cans bulk film came in made great ashtrays...

pentaxuser · Jul 26, 2016

Bob Carnie said:
Smoking Pot, Smoking Cigarettes, Drinking, having sex- having a bath in the sink- sleeping - yes these all have happened in thousands of darkrooms.

Yes but those were mainly in Woodstock, weren't they?

pentaxuser

GarageBoy · Jul 26, 2016

Eh, a little bit of debris never worried anyone in the newspaper biz
There were stories of guys who ran their negs through high concentrations of HC110 or even Dektol, rinsed it off, dunked it in some fixer, and slapped the whole still chemical covered mess into the enlargers (note, this destroys your carriers) - made a print and went home

Question for those who were/are pros out in the field; Nick Nolte darkroom

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