Developing Your First Roll of Black And White Film
If you ever watched movies or TV shows that depict photographers working in a darkroom, developing film and enlarging images, you may have found it incredibly complex. The scene usually goes as this: a photographer working in a windowless room with black-painted walls and a single red bulb barely lit up his face. Several prints hang from the selling; shelves are filled with chemicals, and a series of colour-coded trays are on a countertop. Compared to modern photography, where all you have to do is plug in the SD card and launch your favourite photo editor, immediately pushing exposure and adding contrast and saturation, the work in a darkroom seems much more difficult.
While the masters of darkroom use complicated techniques to achieve elaborate results, the basics of developing a roll of black and white film, however, aren’t all that difficult. And spoiler alert: you don’t need a professional, dedicated darkroom to process your film rolls. Today, several affordable and easy ways exist to develop black-and-white films in the comfort of your home.
I’ve been developing black-and-white films for the past four years. While still in college, I bought a used darkroom kit for $100 from a retiring photographer. It included all the accessories to process 35mm but also an enlarger to make prints! Sadly, between all my moves throughout Canada, I never had the time or space to install the larger pieces of equipment, such as the enlarger and the developing trays.
However, to develop the film (the process of taking the film out of the film cassette and revealing the images onto the film strip), you can do it almost anywhere. From your kitchen to your bathroom, as long as you have a few essential tools.
I divided this article into sections corresponding to the stages required to develop your first roll of black-and-white film. At the beginning of each section, I’ll list the items you’ll need and guide you step-by-step. However, Paterson and Ilford have a starter developing kit that includes almost everything you need to process your first roll of black-and-white (see below).
By the end of the article, you should hopefully better understand processing black and white 35mm film. Although the steps are similar for medium-format film, this guide will cover 35mm.
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