In the epistle "Re: Karen's trip to AZ" scribed 03-12-98 10:11,
Karen Wattie did thus proclaim to Bob Dial:
Karen 
KW>  BD>  In control of all facets allows us
KW>  BD> to make pretty nice shots out of mediocre negs sometimes, and
KW>  BD> almost never less than the level of routine finishing.  
KW> 
KW>  Well, maybe after I learn how, but wouldn't I ruin a couple of
KW>  rolls until I knew what I was doing?
It is entirely possible to develop colour negatives in a home
darkroom. You emulate a machine that is programmed to do a
dull and repetitious job with a high degree of accuracy in
both timing and temperature. While it is a task perfectly
suited to a machine, it is deadly boring to an intelligent
human. Any one-hour lab will do the process for less than
the cost of your time, materials and sanity - no matter how
cheaply you work. Manual color film developing is not at
all difficult - just program yourself to do the same precise
routine over and over again - if your intelligence approaches
the level of a machine, you might find it fascinating!
I have processed probably in the tens of thousands of rolls
of black and white and colour negs, so perhaps am more easily
bored. To me it is drudgery. The only positive is that you
are directly responsible for the job. You assure the freshness
of the solutions, accuracy of the temperature and timing. I
have a couple of one-hour labs in the vicinity that I know I
can trust, but not everyone has such an advantage. The machine
does rely on the operators that maintain it. 
Let the local lab develop your film and then DO THE PRINTING
yourself. You WILL ruin a few sheets of paper while learning
(and even AFTER learning from time to time - except by then
you will call them "test prints").  No matter how bad your
first print might be, negatives will not be hurt and no rolls
will be ruined. It takes a certain amount of trial and error
to get the colour balance of any new package of paper. Only
if you are very lucky, will you able to get a good print the
first exposure. However, there is no need to use a full sheet
of paper for a test print. It is in printing that the final
step of creating the image takes place.
While freelancing, I did keep the film chemistry on hand in
case a client absolutely had to have a job delivered by the
next day. I also had a pretty good setup for doing the
processing but rarely did it myself - boring. While for best
quality, precision is also needed with black and white, but
it tends to be a bit more forgiving.
If you do decide to process your film and doze off, the only
really critical part is the developer. Even then, if you are
off a few degrees in temperature or seconds in time, the
negatives should still be very printable - if not ideal. There
is an amazing amount of slack that can be taken up during the
printing of a negative. A few extra minutes or being off by a
number of degrees in the bleach-fix would probably not be
noticeable with hand-made prints.
I don't meant to discourage you from experiencing negative
processing - it can be handy to have the stuff on hand to
do it. However, I would recommend starting with printing
first and then add film developing.
larry!
... EH?:>\ (Canadian DOS prompt)
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