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A lifelong hobby
One of my lifelong hobbies is photography. I have been taking photographs since I was about 10 years old when I was given an old Kodak folding pocket camera that had belonged to an uncle, Bertrand Perrett, who was a professional photographer and painter in England. I learned to develop and print black-and-white film at school when I was a teenager back in the 1970s.
The Slower Pace
When digital photography came along I moved to that medium, but recently I’ve come back to film aga...
What are paper developers?
Paper developers allow the latent exposed image to become visible to the naked eye and form part of a processing workflow along with a stop bath and fixer. Read our guides, for more information on picking the right paper for you or which chemistry to choose
When shopping for photo chemicals always check the application. We produce a range of photo chemicals including stop baths, fixers, toners, wetting agents as well as paper and film developers. Film developers are speci...
ILFORD PHOTO offer an extensive range of black & white photographic paper. A photographer's choice of paper is a subjective decision based on personal tastes and preferences. It can also be impacted by the type of images you shoot and the final look you want to achieve.
Papers all have different characteristics and purposes and so this guide will walk you through the terminology and choices available to help you pick the perfect paper for your darkroom printing.
Base: Resin coated versus Fibre base...
One of the best things about film photography is that the creative process doesn't end in the camera. Processing your images in a darkroom is not only great fun, but it also allows you to exercise complete creative control over the final look of your image.
We cover some of the essentials needed to set up a darkroom in our beginner's guide and have also developed a series of short animations which cover essential darkroom equipment, darkroom safety tips as well as how an enlarger works.
Below, we cov...
A family of photographers
It’s difficult for me to imagine my family members without their cameras. I grew up in a family of photographers. This seemed so natural to me, that, as a child, I thought all my friends at school had photo labs at their grandparents’ house. For years, underneath my bed, sat my great grandfather’s wooden photographic chamber, along with its imposing tripod.
Ilford FP4 Plus / Hasselblad 500CM / Sonnar 150mm
Fujifilm Acros 100 / Hasselblad 500CM / Distagon 50mm
&nbs...
An appreciation of Ilford FP4
The greatest pleasures can be taken from the simplest of things. An appreciation of something old that gets passed by while everyone tries to keep up with the crowd or the relentless progression of technology. For me Ilford’s FP4 is one of those little pleasures.
The RAF
I was a photographer in the Royal Air Force from 1986 -1995. At my RAF unit we had little choice of film stock. It was FP4 and HP5 for black and white. Being stationed at a headquarters unit mean...
An experiment in chemical possibilities
When I took up a camera after a few years’ hiatus in 1990, I was surprised to discover that I could no longer get a black & white film developed through the nearest camera shop, never mind through the local pharmacy. If memory serves, I was told it would cost $40 for a single film. Naturally, I returned to processing my own film just I had done when I first took up a camera in the early 1970s. The world had moved on, and colour film was the default medium f...
An Interest in Large Format
Large format is an immensely rewarding and enjoyable way to make a photograph. It can also feel overwhelming when you’re just starting out, but it doesn’t have to be complicated. This article is for anyone with an interest in large format.
I got into 4x5 because I wanted to challenge myself, and to try something new. Over the last two years it has become my favourite way to take a photograph. There’s something special about slowing down and being so deliberate with each...
Heading West
Last September my family and I headed west. It had been a few years since we’d visited the West Country, we had come to love it when our family was young, and now that they were grown we decided to return to see if it still has a special place in our hearts.
While my teenagers packed their essentials - clothes and iPhones, and my other half packed enough books to keep a large reading group going, I set about doing the important task of packing my camera equipment.
My focus was on which...
Mindtraveller
Technical info
Film Used: ILFORD HP5+ (pushed to 3200)
Format: 120, shot as 6x7
Camera : Mamiya RB67 Pro SD
Lens: Sekor 50mm f4.5
Exposure time: 20 minutes
Other equipment: Tripod
Location: Norman Wells, Northwest Territories, Canada
Tell us the story behind this image. What inspired you to shoot it?
In the Canadian Arctic, we are gifted with the otherwise-evasive Aurora Borealis on almost a nightly basis. On many nights, the spectacle is nothing more than a faint gre...