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Anonymous
>>64860 I got all my supplies (developing tank, dishes, etc.) and chemicals for about $35 total. And that, as of 22 months later, was a one-time investment. I develop 4-5 films monthly (in one session), and you can barely see there's anything missing from the 250 ml bottle of Rodinal (Foma's R-09 actually). Concentrated fixer runs out faster, but I still have about 4-5 months worth of it. The only recurring cost is distilled water, which is like $1,75 for 5 litres (one developing session takes about 2 litres).
I actually do all my stuff in my very room, with a nice big window taking the bigger part of the wall. Night and a dark blanket hung over it does the trick.
But you don't even need that for just developing. Wait until it's dark, put a dark blanket or two over your duvet, hop under it making yourself enough of sealed space to manipulate stuff, and wind the film on the spiral and put it in the tank there. Et voila, rest of developing process is done in the light.
Developing your own films is as easy as it sounds. Don't make it look harder and more expensive, because it's not. All it takes is a small one-time investment, and evening or two of "dry" practice, and a bit of reading. Which you can do here:
http://www.silverlight.co.uk/tutorials/toc.html http://digitaltruth.com/devchart.html
The only thing I ever messed up (and I started with zero experience) was pouring out freshly mixed fixer solution instead of saving it during my first developing session. I was quite nervous as you can guess, but the film itself turned out perfectly
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