Our history, our darkrooms

As the interest in the courses of Michele Pero raised, The Darkroom turned into an actual photography school, with its own proper photography programs and classes, premises and facilities.

 

"I remember that Adobe Photoshop was yet at its 4th edition...
 

The first original darkrooms were two, equipped with the best enlargers photographers ever had for working with. We wanted to make a darkroom of a superior level, not simply a student darkroom with enlargers like toys. All our enlargers were professional models made by Durst and IFF, representing the top of the Italian engineering of the sector. Our enlargers were including Durst A600, Durst D659, Durst DA900, Durst Laborator 138, IFF Duogon, IFF Duogon Superdichroic, IFF Duogon Colormix. All models well known by professional printers and professional photographers.

At the beginning, our first premise was equipped with two darkrooms. Darkroom A was counting seven enlargers, all equipped for printing black and white photography; darkroom B was equipped with four enlargers for printing color films and it was including a Termaphot ACP 505 automatic printer for RA4, black and white and any other photographic process for bulk paper automatic processing.

In the film development lab any tool was available for developing any kind of film, both manually with Paterson tanks and automatically with Jobo CPP film processor. We were doing b&w, C41, E6 and also Cibachrome by Ilford.

The two darkrooms became soon overwhelmed of people, students and photographers which liked the classic way of making photos and the famous 'darkroom life', often spending hours overnight on the fine art print that had to turn out perfect for the exhibition. Yes, we were giving the key to all our participants. They could share a darkroom 24 hours per day, all week long, all year round, no stop. We were giving so much, we know.

 

In order to face the growing demand for darkroom facilities, we had to expand our premises for three times, meeting larger and larger darkroom spaces with every time a bigger number of enlargers. The last TheDarkroom was counting three darkrooms with 36 enlargers, updated to the latest models made by Durst, the amazing Durst Laborator 900, also known as L900, twin lens automatic focus enlargers for to print up to 6x9 cm film format. All darkrooms were able to print both black and white and color films. Some models were equipped with Durst CLS 450 color head, some with Durst CLS 500, some other with Durst VSL Multigrade head. 

We were offering indeed condenser enlargers also, for who wanted to print harsher in the most classic and traditional black and white way, the 'grainy way'.

Our three big Durst L138 with condensers and Durst CLS 301 color head were completing the sets, allowing our photographers to print 4x5 and 5x7 inches sheet films also. 

Each darkroom was equipped with large plastic wet & dry tables for doing any chemical process at one's choice, from tray development to hand emulsifying or toning of prints.

But the rules for environment protection were getting tougher...

 

Once, the photographer's darkroom was a room with a table and a sink, with an enlarger and some running water, with many boxes of photo paper and bottles with chemicals. A very artisanal way of doing photography. Very artistic, I'd like to say.

Then the World begins to say that some chemicals in use in classic photography may be dangerous or hazardous for the human health or for the environment. Soon strict rules were enforced to law and the life for darkroom photographers became very tough. 

At the beginning a simple exhaust chemical recycling was enough. Then special permissions, official documents and registered files became mandatory. Every year a new and more strict rule was enforced, obliging many darkroom to spend lots and lots of money to meet the necessary requirements for respecting the laws. 

 

Nowadays the law says that 'not a drop of a possible contaminated water or chemical must be drawn or splashed on the pavement' or you are in serious troubles being put together with criminals of the environment such as those managers of BP of the Gulf of Mexico disaster...

A darkroom today must have a closed circuit for water. That means a special water filtering system for cleaning any chemical from the water you do use for mixing the solutions, washing your jars, tanks and cylinders, washing your prints and even washing your hands. Such a closed water managing costs from a minimum of 20.000 euros up. The special filters for cleaning the water must be regenerated at every cycle, that means an extra of 500-1000 euro a month, depending on the amount of water used in the processes. The plus is that you do not pay for water consume anymore, since you do reuse always the same one...

Also, a darkroom must have a certified air change of a specific power. 'Certified' means that you must pay an engineer to write the technical specification for the factory that has to build a huge air extractor. When such a machine is running, the doors (or the darkroom curtains) may not stay in their position since the air vacuum inside is so strong. And the air cannot be extracted from any point of your darkroom ceiling. Nop, you must extract the air from the edge of any of your working place, including development tables, sinks, trays and so on. So you must provide for special sinks and working tables made on purpose for your labs. Just think at the canalizations from tables to air extractor..

 

Is that all? Not at all! Who ever works in a darkroom must in the order: wear a special clothing such as an apron to be wasted at the end of each session; wear special protective glasses (since we know photography chemicals are so dangerous...!); wear rubber gloves to be wasted at every session.

Moreover you must collect any little piece of wasted film and photo paper in a special trash bin, since you cannot waste those super hazardous materials together with normal waste. They contain little amounts of silver. It may pollute the world in an irreversible way! 

Chemicals also must be recycled and wasted accordingly with special recycling rules. And chemical bottles and containers must be wasted accordingly too! Also burnt lamps of the enlargers or of your darkroom must be stocked in a special container for being sent to recycling. 

So, you must have all separate special containers in your darkrooms for wasting all these different materials: clothing, film & paper, lamps, chemicals, containers.

 

All the above mentioned recycles must be filed on official registers, stamped and approved by an official bureau. Once every a due time (at least once a year) they must be send to a special factory where they will be processed and reduced to unpolluting compounds. You must pay for that and you are also responsible for what the factory decides to do with the exhausts you give them. So, if they want to throw them to the river, you must respond of that to the law...

Last but not least: do you have a special room, metal jacket, fireproof, lockable, where to store your stock chemicals? If not, you are outlaw!

 

Ok, that's definitely all. Do you understand now the reason why we do not have darkrooms and labs anymore? The costs to hold such a terribly polluting and hazardous premises are too high nowadays. You, our faithful student, would you like to bear such an evident extra cost included in your tuition fee?

We may discuss the reason why just few years ago that wasn't that hard to run a darkroom. We may realize that it all changed when the power of the biggest chemical companies such as Kodak and Agfa came less with their bankrupts or economic problems. That's anyways how it works today. No matter why. We all understand that the environment must be protected, even if honestly I do not understand the restriction level to photographic processes in a time out there at least three billions people are driving a car which needs to burn oil to work! (just to make an example).

 

We, the photographers, are kindly asked not to use chemicals anymore.

So ask yourself if you want to set up a darkroom anymore, or, at least, be careful if you're going to do so! Yes, better don't tell around! It's still a great experience I wouldn't stop, never.

 

We are TheDarkroom, a photo school without darkrooms. That's the reason why. And I keep wandering how the other photo schools with active darkrooms can keep doing so...

Well, Adobe Photoshop is at its 12th version and today, actually, it works great!"

 

Michele Pero, academic director

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