While following this thread, I am printing photos from my most recent
trip to Pennsylvania.
But RA-4 chemicals don't smell the same as B&W! And it's not quite so
much fun when you can't see the shadows appearing on the print. I just
have to imagine that somewhere inside the roller processor that bluish
piece of paper is developing into a photograph.
Ken Hart
kwhart1@xxxxxxxxxxxx
On 06/08/2018 01:02 PM, Richard Sullivan wrote:
Bob,
Me too.
When young, I printed on Saturday and Sunday. At the crack of noon, i would scurry over to a liquor store on the corner c-- walking distance to by a siz pack -- my first of the day. <grin> The young clerk would look at me and say,our smell like a darkroom. He could always tell when I was printing.
--Dick Sullivan
On Fri, Jun 8, 2018 at 7:54 AM, bobkiss caribsurf.com <http://caribsurf.com> via Alt-photo-process-list <alt-photo-process-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:alt-photo-process-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>> wrote:
"I love the smell of Amadol in the morning...smells like...HISTORY!"
All seriousness aside, in REMEMBRANCE OF THINGS PAST, Proust
mentions that even a waft of a whiff of his deceased mother's
perfume brought intense visual and other memories of time with her
flooding into his consciousness. Those of us who were raised on
chemical photography will probably always have a strange form of
nostalgia for certain smells; the sharp smell of acetic acid stop
bath, the slightly sulfurous smell of degenerating thiosulfate
ions, and for me, the chemical refinery smell of Amadol. I first
smelled it at RIT when we did sensi strips comparing various
developing agents. Then, when I started doing my personal work
around 93 after my advertising/fashion career, I started mixing
Adam's amadol dev. Dektol had its own smell but not as interesting
as Amadol.
I also loved the smell of 35mm film, especially color, when I
first opened the canister, originally metal, then plastic. It was
some unique combination of sweetness, paint, and chemicals.
Just some nostalgic thoughts for a Friday morning...
CHEERS!
BOB
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