Keep in mind that it is one thing to have the formulas, and quite another to be able to use them to create working chemistry. Aside from scales to weigh chemicals, beakers, magnetic stirring device, and variety of other equipment, you also have to lay in a variety of bulk chemicals, which can cost from $10 to $75+ each. To explore half a dozen of the developer formulas you might find can require an initial outlay of $250.The positive side of that is that once you make your investment, you have the resources on hand to produce fresh photo chemistry as needed, and in amounts which would cost thousands of dollars over the counter, as well as products no longer available at any price.
There's a soviet photo- recipie book from the 60s. It's only about 200 pages, takes up little space and it pretty much is entirely photo chemical formulas. My daily go to for black and white stuff. It's got pretty much all the classic kodak black and white stuff, also stuff from agfa - it has many cool soviet formulations as well. At the end there is a section on agfacolor chemicals but all that is pretty much obsolete. It's "the photo recepie book" by Mikulin . The only issue for most of you is that it's in Russian. I really ought to sit down and translate it one of these days - it's just where to find the time? Thank you for the video! As always great content!!!
Would like to see some formulas for cyanotypes in a video, I kinda like the old 1860's era look. As photography changes towards digital more and more I actually find the older more involved processing technology more interesting! Subscribed.
@@TheNakedPhotographer can't wait! Thanks again for the info, you get out what you put in. A cellphone pic has a short time in the spotlight. Make a pic from film and it becomes something far more meaningful!!
Check out "the silver sunbeam" by J. Towler -. It is an extensive cookbook on pretty much all photographic processes of the time - published in 1864. I think you can find pdfs of it online - I have a 1970s reprint. It's full of useful info if you're into the old processes.
I always enjoy your videos, this one being no exception. Here is a publication you may want to check out. In 1986, NASA published a 157 page paper called, "Black and White Photographic Chemistry. Although it's a fairly dry presentation, there is lots of excellent information, including 27 pages of assorted formulas. Best of all, it's free. You can download it here: ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19870000744.pdf
Interesting. I’ve got an older photo-lab-index and it’s got close to 300 formulas in it. I think they were assembled based on technical publications as they came in. Not all are the same.
The Darkroom Cookbook is like the bible for the lab hehehe. If you loke old clasic formulas I recommend "Agfa formulas for Photographic use" there are several editions, and the mostly unknown "Dupond´s Defender Formula Book" can be found by googling And as bonus track, also recommend the FX series of developers made by Geoffrey Crawley, some are here: www.cjballphotography.org.uk/formulae.html you must google for more
Thanks for the video - some new material to look out for. However, I suspect you may have bought a copy of the Photo-Lab-Index that has had all the interesting bits removed. My copy was an ex-serviceman's, kept up to date between 1959 & 1963 & it has 100's of formulae from Ansco, Ilford, Gavaert, Dup Pont ,Kodak, Agfa & more. It also has some interesting entries such as direct positive film developing with Ilford chemicals & HP5. Your reference to Sulfate & Sulfite may well not be typos, as they are different compounds, similar, but different.
aaaah. New nice intro. Self isolating in (hot) darkroom helps ;-) . But the digital pixels should be… analog (towel per(t)haps). My daughter (10) noticed me chuckling and wanted to see… got her mom, who suggested I should do same on my Darkroom. 17°C duh! Women! Would LOVE to learn a bit more about toning variations and influence of (paper) developers! Great stuff again.
One item you definitely want to understand photo chemistry and get a good number of formulas is Modern Photographic Processing by Grant Haist, from Kodak.
I've got the Photo Lab Index from 1942, as well as the Mees book on photochemistry, as well as a few others, plus the Darkroom Cookbook (prior edition). There's a lot of good research online-the sulfite free formulas come to mind. Hubl Paste is still one of my favorite formulas. Slow working, single agent glycin and staining (in an alkaline fixer).
I have never used that developer to know what its properties are, but you could try Dassonville D-1 “Charcoal Black Developer”. You can find it in the Darkroom Cookbook and online.
@@TheNakedPhotographer Thanks for getting back to me. I'm moving to Huntington WV, and will be setting up a darkroom. I have a design for a print washer I would like to discuss with you. I wrote an in View Camera article about Alistair Inglis Inglis cross jet
Another resource which is only marginally available so far as I know is the collected issues o a magazine originally named Darkroom Photography. I think it started publication in the mid-1970s and ran for about 15 years. It started with a narrow focus on darkroom techniques, film developing, print making and DIY photo chemistry. Over the years as digital invaded the space, it modified its name and expanded its content to try to reach a wider audience. In summary, it fully covers all aspects of wet printmaking including B&W and color chemistry and how to make it., along with nearly every other aspect of the darkroom experience. It was published by a small family operation and back issues are practically not available. However, I think it can be found in libraries of most medium to larger urban areas. Near its end, it had a series of articles I still intend to explore showing the use of film scanning and inkjet printing onto transparency sheets to produce printing masks to micro-manage selected area contrast and density variations. Sort of high tech split tone printing and burn/dodge in complex image areas.
Dan Burkholder had a really great book on digital inkjet negatives. I haven’t looked recently to see if an updated version is available, but the latest edition of The Darkroom Cookbook has a great chapter on the subject.
@@TheNakedPhotographer Yes, Burkholder has updated his original version. It may only be available via PDF though...not sure. Some day, I'd also love to hear what you think of the book "Way Beyond Monochrome," by Ralph W. Lambrecht and Chris Woodhouse. Some really good info in there.
@@TheNakedPhotographer IMHO "Way Beyond Monochrome" is the best book about B&W silver photography. "The art of photography" by Bruce Barnbaum is a very good alternative for WBM. Post Exposure by Ctein is a, kind of, appendix, to those two books. Worth reading, chapters about how humans see changed how I see photography. "The darkroom cookbook" and "The film developing cookbook" by Anchell and Troop are excellent sources about formulas and techniques of film and paper developing, but unless one want to go experimenting with developers and developing techniques, "The art of photograhy" or "Way Beyond Monochrome" are more than enough for average darkroom user. Wery good source of information about sensitrometry is "Beyond the zone system" by Davis, but most darkrooom users doesn't need that book. As for alternative photography I highly recommend "The book of alternative photographic processes" by Christoper James. That book covers almost every alternative technique I've ever heard of (and I've learded a lot of new processes from it). It's like Way Beyond Monochrome + both cookbooks and post exposure, in one book, for alternative photography. What I don't like about those books is their prices. Insane prices, even for used books. I'm hunting now for Tim Rudman books about lith printing and toning and current prices of those, used, books, are way beyond my price range.
Keep in mind that it is one thing to have the formulas, and quite another to be able to use them to create working chemistry. Aside from scales to weigh chemicals, beakers, magnetic stirring device, and variety of other equipment, you also have to lay in a variety of bulk chemicals, which can cost from $10 to $75+ each. To explore half a dozen of the developer formulas you might find can require an initial outlay of $250.The positive side of that is that once you make your investment, you have the resources on hand to produce fresh photo chemistry as needed, and in amounts which would cost thousands of dollars over the counter, as well as products no longer available at any price.
Randall Stewart Or just make up some D-23, and maybe you’ll be hooked for life.
There's a soviet photo- recipie book from the 60s. It's only about 200 pages, takes up little space and it pretty much is entirely photo chemical formulas. My daily go to for black and white stuff. It's got pretty much all the classic kodak black and white stuff, also stuff from agfa - it has many cool soviet formulations as well. At the end there is a section on agfacolor chemicals but all that is pretty much obsolete. It's "the photo recepie book" by Mikulin . The only issue for most of you is that it's in Russian. I really ought to sit down and translate it one of these days - it's just where to find the time? Thank you for the video! As always great content!!!
Would it be possible to have a list of the books in the video description to aid in finding some of them?
Thanks!
Would like to see some formulas for cyanotypes in a video, I kinda like the old 1860's era look. As photography changes towards digital more and more I actually find the older more involved processing technology more interesting! Subscribed.
I will eventually get to alternative processes, but I have a lot on my plate before we get there.
@@TheNakedPhotographer can't wait! Thanks again for the info, you get out what you put in. A cellphone pic has a short time in the spotlight. Make a pic from film and it becomes something far more meaningful!!
Check out "the silver sunbeam" by J. Towler -. It is an extensive cookbook on pretty much all photographic processes of the time - published in 1864. I think you can find pdfs of it online - I have a 1970s reprint. It's full of useful info if you're into the old processes.
100 likes now, I really don’t want to break this
I always enjoy your videos, this one being no exception. Here is a publication you may want to check out. In 1986, NASA published a 157 page paper called, "Black and White Photographic Chemistry. Although it's a fairly dry presentation, there is lots of excellent information, including 27 pages of assorted formulas. Best of all, it's free. You can download it here: ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19870000744.pdf
I’ve read that before, and you’re right, it is dry.
Lol intro. Don’t laugh. It’s actually easier to develop this way. No clothing stains.
Nice...very nice! This is the video I hoped you'd produce. I have the Anchell (sp?) books...love them all.
It would be awesome to see some comparisons between home brew formulas
I’m getting there, be patient.
Amazing unique information!
first comment, thanks for the video!
Interesting. I’ve got an older photo-lab-index and it’s got close to 300 formulas in it. I think they were assembled based on technical publications as they came in. Not all are the same.
I’ll trade you
The Naked Photographer thanks but I’ll think I’ll keep it. Try to find one from the late 50s
The Darkroom Cookbook is like the bible for the lab hehehe.
If you loke old clasic formulas I recommend "Agfa formulas for Photographic use" there are several editions, and the mostly unknown "Dupond´s Defender Formula Book" can be found by googling
And as bonus track, also recommend the FX series of developers made by Geoffrey Crawley, some are here: www.cjballphotography.org.uk/formulae.html you must google for more
Thanks for the video - some new material to look out for. However, I suspect you may have bought a copy of the Photo-Lab-Index that has had all the interesting bits removed. My copy was an ex-serviceman's, kept up to date between 1959 & 1963 & it has 100's of formulae from Ansco, Ilford, Gavaert, Dup Pont ,Kodak, Agfa & more. It also has some interesting entries such as direct positive film developing with Ilford chemicals & HP5. Your reference to Sulfate & Sulfite may well not be typos, as they are different compounds, similar, but different.
aaaah. New nice intro. Self isolating in (hot) darkroom helps ;-) . But the digital pixels should be… analog (towel per(t)haps).
My daughter (10) noticed me chuckling and wanted to see… got her mom, who suggested I should do same on my Darkroom. 17°C duh! Women!
Would LOVE to learn a bit more about toning variations and influence of (paper) developers! Great stuff again.
One item you definitely want to understand photo chemistry and get a good number of formulas is Modern Photographic Processing by Grant Haist, from Kodak.
I've got the Photo Lab Index from 1942, as well as the Mees book on photochemistry, as well as a few others, plus the Darkroom Cookbook (prior edition). There's a lot of good research online-the sulfite free formulas come to mind. Hubl Paste is still one of my favorite formulas. Slow working, single agent glycin and staining (in an alkaline fixer).
A very nicely presented video and very informative. Thank you and I look forward to your next one.
That 4 edition is huge!!!, my 1st one is half the size :(
Thanks
Looking for a fixer formula similar to TF5 .
I’ve only seen TF-2 and TF-3
Have you come across a formula close to Edwal's Ultra Black print developer. I like using it with Ilford warm tone multi contrast paper.
I have never used that developer to know what its properties are, but you could try Dassonville D-1 “Charcoal Black Developer”. You can find it in the Darkroom Cookbook and online.
@@TheNakedPhotographer
Thanks for getting back to me. I'm moving to Huntington WV, and will be setting up a darkroom. I have a design for a print washer I would like to discuss with you. I wrote an in View Camera article about Alistair Inglis Inglis cross jet
Another resource which is only marginally available so far as I know is the collected issues o a magazine originally named Darkroom Photography. I think it started publication in the mid-1970s and ran for about 15 years. It started with a narrow focus on darkroom techniques, film developing, print making and DIY photo chemistry. Over the years as digital invaded the space, it modified its name and expanded its content to try to reach a wider audience. In summary, it fully covers all aspects of wet printmaking including B&W and color chemistry and how to make it., along with nearly every other aspect of the darkroom experience. It was published by a small family operation and back issues are practically not available. However, I think it can be found in libraries of most medium to larger urban areas. Near its end, it had a series of articles I still intend to explore showing the use of film scanning and inkjet printing onto transparency sheets to produce printing masks to micro-manage selected area contrast and density variations. Sort of high tech split tone printing and burn/dodge in complex image areas.
Dan Burkholder had a really great book on digital inkjet negatives. I haven’t looked recently to see if an updated version is available, but the latest edition of The Darkroom Cookbook has a great chapter on the subject.
@@TheNakedPhotographer Yes, Burkholder has updated his original version. It may only be available via PDF though...not sure. Some day, I'd also love to hear what you think of the book "Way Beyond Monochrome," by Ralph W. Lambrecht and Chris Woodhouse. Some really good info in there.
Never read it. I read the chapter on unsharp masks once. I do like Post Exposure by Ctein.
@@TheNakedPhotographer IMHO "Way Beyond Monochrome" is the best book about B&W silver photography. "The art of photography" by Bruce Barnbaum is a very good alternative for WBM. Post Exposure by Ctein is a, kind of, appendix, to those two books. Worth reading, chapters about how humans see changed how I see photography. "The darkroom cookbook" and "The film developing cookbook" by Anchell and Troop are excellent sources about formulas and techniques of film and paper developing, but unless one want to go experimenting with developers and developing techniques, "The art of photograhy" or "Way Beyond Monochrome" are more than enough for average darkroom user. Wery good source of information about sensitrometry is "Beyond the zone system" by Davis, but most darkrooom users doesn't need that book.
As for alternative photography I highly recommend "The book of alternative photographic processes" by Christoper James. That book covers almost every alternative technique I've ever heard of (and I've learded a lot of new processes from it). It's like Way Beyond Monochrome + both cookbooks and post exposure, in one book, for alternative photography. What I don't like about those books is their prices. Insane prices, even for used books. I'm hunting now for Tim Rudman books about lith printing and toning and current prices of those, used, books, are way beyond my price range.