Stupid mistakes in the darkroom

jerl · Jun 10, 2011

I have this negative I like but is very annoying to burn in properly- after about a dozen tries, I nailed down the timing correctly- it takes about 15 minutes in total. After making this last print, I finally place it in the developer tank, and then turn my back to do some other tasks. I come back about a minute later and notice that part of the print is not covered in developer, but it's too late. Even after placing it in and waiting another minute, you can still see a ring where the surface of the developer was, so I had to make another one. Very frustrating indeed.

wogster · Jun 10, 2011

StevieG said:
worst ever? first time I developed colour having done loads of B&W one shot development. I had the chems warmed precisly, was critical with time and every step. It was only when I finished washing and was hanging the film to dry I realised - I had just poured the entire, brand new stock of developers and fixer away. Doh!

That's not so bad, the stuff only lives about 48 hours anyway, that's why I gave up on colour in 1983, you spend $20 ($42 in Today's money, although my income hasn't more then doubled ) on chemicals and they die before you get the third roll done. Easier to just give the colour to a lab....

cp16 · Jul 6, 2011

A film developing sequence of fix - stop - develop... on my friends wedding photos

daleeman · Jul 6, 2011

While enjoying massive ammounts of "Adult Beverages" back in the 1970s I tried to fix film in my Nikor tank with Old Crow. I still wonder if I was drinking the fixer that night. I've never been the same.

Sirius Glass · Jul 6, 2011

cp16 said:
A film developing sequence of fix - stop - develop... on my friends wedding photos

Where you working on undoing the marrage? A divorce?

cp16 · Jul 6, 2011

Sirius Glass said:
Where you working on undoing the marrage? A divorce?

well I must admit the bride was quite a catch!

mijosc · Jul 10, 2011

Just recently I was developing a single roll of film in my double reel tank. I put the unloaded reel in first... and used just enough chemicals to develop a single roll of film.

dnjl · Jul 11, 2011

mijosc said:
Just recently I was developing a single roll of film in my double reel tank. I put the unloaded reel in first... and used just enough chemicals to develop a single roll of film.

That's a classic one I'm really paranoid about.

BetterSense · Jul 11, 2011

I just developed 5 rolls of film using Rodinal 1:100 instead of 1:50, because I was using 1-liter tanks instead of 500mL tanks. The negatives have images on them but they sure are thin.

Dennis S · Jul 18, 2011

Mistakes suck

BetterSense said:
I just developed 5 rolls of film using Rodinal 1:100 instead of 1:50, because I was using 1-liter tanks instead of 500mL tanks. The negatives have images on them but they sure are thin.

That has got to hurt. I have "superstitious" rule about never doing that many rolls in one tank. Even if it would save time I think if I take extra time being careful with shooting I can spend extra time developing. You might be now too.?

tomalophicon · Jul 18, 2011

First time I developed E6 I put the colour dev in before the first dev. Slides turned out blue. From then on, my first developer is always labelled colour developer and vice versa.

mwdake · Jul 18, 2011

My latest stupid mistake is due to my timer being messed up.
Recently when I switch on the focus switch the enlarger lamp does jot come on. If I leave the switch on and set a time then hit the expose button the light stays on after the time is up and if I hit cancel to turn off the lamp. So, I have been doing this now to focus. As you can guess when actually making prints I keep forgetting to turn off the focus switch off and after the timer clicks off I am standing there wondering why the lamp did not go off. It takes a few seconds for me to realize I left the focus switch on.

Maybe I should just start setting my times a few seconds less than needed, or get a new timer.

bdial · Jul 18, 2011

just recently I was developing a single roll of film in my double reel tank. I put the unloaded reel in first... and used just enough chemicals to develop a single roll of film.

A good reason to always fill the tank, no matter what.

Sirius Glass · Jul 18, 2011

bdial said:
A good reason to always fill the tank, no matter what.

That is what I do.

zsas · Jul 24, 2011

Ok I have to confess another. Was letting the Patterson tank wash after my 1st successful roll of C-41 was finished and thought the sink could drain the amount of water that was running, well, it didnt and I turned my back for a few seconds and water came over the top of the sink and proceeded to drench the floor, cabinet and got my iphone wet (which I use for a timmer). The iPhone has been spending the weekend in a bag of rice. The device still works, but is behaving a little buggy at times (so looks like to be a costly mistake).

So, rule 1 (which everyone in the world knows but I guess me) - dont turn your back on a running sink, and 2 (which everyone knows but I presume me) if you use a device like a smartphone/ipod, etc for your timer, put it away from where water can reach it if rule 1 is violated....sigh...

Juri · Jul 30, 2011

Today I developed a roll of 135 and a roll of 120 film. It was when I finished the 120 roll when I remembered that it needs more liquid than the 135.

Akyiia · Aug 10, 2011

not very happy story

Couple years back I was shooting wedding of my friend; everything went fine but at the end the bride had asked me if I could shoot some in B/W..so I did but I could not develop this film for few weeks. When it came to it I had about 5 films to develop and I knew that the wedding was the most important so I left it to the last. All films were developed the same except for the wedding photoshoot - I forgotten to put the middle spool in - the one that blocks the light to come in to the tank. All was fogged..

Akyiia · Aug 10, 2011

another one

About 6 months ago, I found a box with some of my old negatives. These were from the time when I was teenager and when I kept them all in rolls. I've decided to wash them, hang them dry and keep them properly. One of the films I was doing late afternoon and I had it in running water when I realised that I had to run for work. So I just left it in the tank, closed it and thought I will hang the film when I return. After 5 days I realised that I still had the film in the tank; the film was completely washed.. Luckily I managed to make scans before I loaded the tank and the images were not so important.

ricardo12458 · Aug 12, 2011

DarkroomExperimente said:
ya just don't get stories like this with digital!

"oops I deleted the file" simply isn't as funny

About a year ago (before I switched to film), I went to a cultural fair in Houston with some of my friends. While there, I was using 2 d*****l cameras. One of them can take videos with sound, the other cannot. As I was downloading the files to my computer, the first camera came out fine. The other camera was a total mess. 42.7 MiB of lost file/file sectors. That represented ~150 pictures/silent videos. Since then I have switched to film. I have had no problems since then.

Sahebnazar · Sep 26, 2011

Going through this thread is really a great learning experience! Now I know that a wet/humid plastic reel will most definitely result in a expletive-laden, sweaty-handed scratch-a-thon, culminating in a miserable night of scanning ruined negatives.

removed-user-1 · Oct 4, 2011

I'm taking a darkroom course at CPCC (local community college), and I have found that some of the students leave reels, tanks, and other stuff lying out after they finish. I like to have a clean work area. So, I tossed all the used stuff in a sink and turned on the faucet, then went off to do something else. I could hear the water running so I figured there was no problem. Apparently one of the tank lids got sucked onto the drain... Suddenly the sound of the water changed to that of a waterfall, and I came running but it was already too late, there was water all over the floor. And no mop in sight! I used every towel in the darkroom to clean up the water... never done that before!

walbergb · Oct 4, 2011

stupid mistakes

Took an introductory b&w darkroom class out for a photo shoot one Saturday afternoon. We went back to the darkroom to develop the 20 plus rolls of film. Other photographers (community darkroom) were making prints, so we developed the film in safe light mode. Not one roll of film turned out! Cause: previously, someone had poured the stop bath into the film developer bottle instead of the stop bath bottle! Teachable moment to be sure.

Newt_on_Swings · Oct 5, 2011

walbergb said:
Took an introductory b&w darkroom class out for a photo shoot one Saturday afternoon. We went back to the darkroom to develop the 20 plus rolls of film. Other photographers (community darkroom) were making prints, so we developed the film in safe light mode. Not one roll of film turned out! Cause: previously, someone had poured the stop bath into the film developer bottle instead of the stop bath bottle! Teachable moment to be sure.

Wow I hope not all 20 were lost and only 1 was... =[

toledosun · Oct 9, 2011

I started developing my own film using Ilford DD-X and Ilford Rapid Fix. After a few successful rolls, I started getting entire rolls that were totally blank (not even the numberings came out). To compound the problem, not all the subsequent rolls were bad. Some days, the rolls came out ok, and some days, they were blanks.

I blamed it on the film, I blamed it on the water, I blamed it on the thermometer until one day, I realized that my developer was labelled "DD-X" on one side, and "Rapid Fix" on the other.

I then remembered that one day, I had removed the sticky label from my Rapid Fix bottle to read what was written beneath it. After that, I must have stuck it back on the DD-X instead of the Rapid Fix bottle!. So, in the end, I had to blame myself !!

Juri · Dec 23, 2011

Today I was developing film, when I suddenly noticed that someting was wrong. Developer bottle had a white cap, unlike other R09 bottles. So I was developing film with print developer. I finished the proccess as I normally would. Apparently Fomadon R09 and Fomatol LQN are not so different, although negatives came out more contrasty than normal.

I'm happy I got something out of the roll, because there were shots of a very nice, but camera-shy girl. I also took about 7 photos of her with my medium format camera. All of them nicely on one frame, because I forgot to wind the film.

Stupid mistakes in the darkroom

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