The darkroom is busy this season!

[Anthony Martinez]

I've decided, in light of my dwindling funds, that my family and close friends will be getting framed prints for Christmas this year. The negatives I've identified are all from my Scotland trip. In all, I'll be making 18 prints - four are already dry.

The original drying frames I made weren't very sturdy and the weight of wet fiber paper cratered them. I fixed that problem today by making new frames out of 1/2" PVC. Light, sturdy, and pretty inexpensive to make.

A while back I also made a digital timer for my darkroom, and while it's got a few annoying bugs it does work great. Using a momentary push-button switch for the focus mode was stupid. I'll be replacing it with a toggle switch so I don't have to contort myself to focus my enlarger.

Big thanks to everyone who helped me join the dark side. Your large-format predictions have come true, as there's a Shen Hao 4x5 with a 135/5.6 Symmar-S MC on it waiting for me to expose some FP4+ and make my first large format contact prints. That'll have to wait until the next 14 prints are finished.

[venchka]

Good for you!
Merry Christmas!

Wayne

[sdenman]

Anthony That is great. I know that your gifts will mean lots more to them than something you purchased. Might be starting a new tradition.

[Anthony Martinez]

All of the 5x7s are printed, and I've decided that cropping to fill anything but a square won't do the prints intended for my parents and grandparents any justice. I'll be putting my 11x14 trays to use so I can get 10x10 prints to put in 12x12 frames for the folks who helped make me who I am today. Edit: Looks like my washer won't handle 11x14. Guess I'm going to try for 8x8.

Here's an outtake from yesterday's 12hr darkroom adventure. Clearly needed some more time under the enlarger. Another 3 seconds did the trick. I'll probably scan the prints I actually intend to use after they're mounted.


Exposure test by Anthony J. Martinez, on Flickr

One thing is for sure, I need to figure out what size filters I need, and if there's a reasonable chance that I can pick one size, and buy step-down rings for the rest. Several negatives proved very difficult to print on account of the sky. I'm better at dodging than I am at burning (though really when you dodge one thing you're just burning the rest, and vice versa) so I found myself doing quite a bit of dodging after exhausting all contrast filter options. I tend to think I could have minimized that if I'd shot with any sort of filter. Even a yellow would have helped.

[Anthony Martinez]

I survived. Everything is printed and framed. That took way longer than expected!

[Big Dog]

Originally Posted by Anthony Martinez

I survived. Everything is printed and framed. That took way longer than expected!

It almost always does ...