Zooming.

Pentax K1000, Ilford HP5+, ISO 400

Busy day! Off to work early, with plenty to do all day – the highlight being some leftover cauliflower and broccoli cheese (my comfort food when I was ill last week) for lunch! It was a bit of a day for leftovers – when I got home I demolished a portion of chicken pesto bake I’d made on Friday, too – nothing better than a ‘rip and tip’ (as my aunt would say) meal... Rip open the container, tip on a plate.

My photography classes at Grey’s start at 7pm, but to get home from work, have something to eat and catch a bus out to RGU, is a quick turnaround. I caught the bus by the skin of my teeth and made it on time for my 2nd photography class. Last week’s class had been a bit of an anticlimax, with the main lesson being in exposure/aperture and other things I know fairly well. This class was very different! I felt completely out of my comfort zone in the darkroom, and felt quite daft when I realised it was (duh) very dark. I thought you could develop negatives by red light, but apparently not!

We had a couple of goes winding blank films onto spools in the light, then it was time to have a go with our own films in the dark. I was quite surprised how well I managed – I was on my own and popped open the canister, cut the tab from my film and wound it onto the spool quite quickly. I had a bit of an issue with the plastic bit on the end of my film getting stuck, but other than that it went well! Sadly, when I put it in the light-tight box, I managed to put the lid of the box on upside-down, but realised my mistake just a second or two after our tutor had flicked on the lights, and had quite quick reactions for flicking them back off again! I wasn’t the only one, which made me feel better. Luckily, I’d realised so quickly that once the negatives were developed there was only the faintest of dotted lines across a small part of my film strip, so no problem there.

Developing my own film was so exciting! It took ages for the class of 13 to develop a roll each, and we all kept bumping into each other and splashing smelly chemicals on ourselves, so we didn’t get a chance to print contact sheets, but we’ll do that next week. I had a look at my negatives on a lightbox and I think I’ve done Ok – a lot of my classmates’ films were just black! I did manage to walk into a table though, and have a bruise the size of the palm of my hand on my thigh – it’s so swollen! What a dafty. Can't wait to print my photos next week!