darkroom goodness

[monkey]

my dad is letting me make our basement into a darkroom for me and sebi as long as me and sebi do the research and most of the building, and only spend about $1000.

have any of you ever built one? have any advice? im in the research process. im gonna buy a used enlarger, i figure b&h should be reputable enough to be able to buy a used one. and... i dont know... what else?

[ms.peachy]

Make sure you have a plan for how you are going to store and dispose of your chemicals that is in compliance with local regulations, or you could get yourself into a heap of trouble.

[Dr Deaf]

maaan. this reminds me of last summer when i scored a technics SL-D2 turntable for $5 from a yard sale. on my way to work i noticed it along with a sign that said "dark room supplies". that day i actually had to do some work. i didn't get back to the sale until a few hrs later. i snatched up the turntable and inquired about the dark room equipment. dood mentioned he had sold it. i was curious what he got for it. i was thinking like $500-1000 all day.

nope. $50. the whole enchilada. safe lights, trays, paper, enlarger, cutting board, filters etc etc.

that was the deal that got away.

i'm thinking you'd be best to find a similar package deal for a steal. good luck.

$250 (http://cgi.ebay.com/Complete-darkroom-setup_W0QQitemZ7564263231QQcategoryZ29993QQtcZphot oQQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem) and it's nearish you.

[monkey]

i was looking at ebay, and they do have some good prices, but im scared of getting bad equipment. i was looking at the b&h used store, and they sell the enlargers for about 200, a light setup for another 30ish, and so on. i wish i could find a good steal... i tend to only find that kind of thing when shopping for clothes (prada skirt for 5 bucks. whaaaa?!)

[beastieangel01]

that's pretty awesome. Wish I knew about building one. I want one in my home one day (y)

[TonsOfFun]

A darkroom would be soooo funky.

Thought about digging down so we had a basement to build one.

Good luck with it all. It'd be pretty cool to see how it goes...

[jabumbo]

black wallpaper

[cosmo105]

look around at photo labs for personal ads for darkrooms-for-sale. a lot of people will sell all their old equipment for an amazing price and it's usually in good shape because they just want to upgrade/get rid of it.

best photo warehouse: freestyle photo. (http://www.freestylephoto.biz/) (y)

[Extra Cheese]

a friend of mine called up high schools and colleges that offered photography and asked if they had any old enlargers they wanted to sell. a high school ended up selling him some equipment and material, i dont remember what exactly, and they gave him a broken enlarger for free that he got fixed for like $25. apparantly high school kids fuck up a lot of photo equipment but the schools usually get them fixed but this one school just gave him an enlarger

he said it was a huge hassle buying from the school and would never do it again even though he ended up with a good deal.

[monkey]

i bought the equipmentzzz! i got the enlarger, a brand new lens, plus a bunch of other equipment for $150 from a dude selling it on craigslist. everything is in perfect working order. it's fantastic. now i just gotta buy the chemicals, some trays, and fix up the basement some. (y)

[QueenAdrock]

Wee! Good for you. I used to do photo back in high school, I bought a new camera for it and everything and now I don't do it much. I wonder where my camera even is. :(

My dad also made a semi-dark room out of the basement, but that was when I was much younger. I'm not sure if anything works right anymore.