Half frames

So I get this txt from BCD to go and get my develop on. I've never developed my own film before and we shot a couple of rolls each at the Shoe Ball so we decide to go in and knock it out on Thursday night at the darkroom. I get all the time info off the web for the Pan F and start to read. I noticed while info-hunting that no one reccomends pushing this film a stop and guess what... it was my full intention to do so, so I shot it high and there we are. Well she shot hers at 125 and whats done is done, let's measure out some t-max and get to work. I find a canister, she brings her own and we get all situated to pull the film in total darkness. Lights out, we crack open (well twisted them open as I rolled the films into plastic canisters) and get to threading the plastic spools. Now I've practiced this in the light outside the darkroom and it was pretty good but now with the lights out, the thought occurs to me that I AT LEAST should have closed my eyes once, out there.

No matter, here we go, wind wind wind, crunch. Uh o. it's stuck. But seriously it was like 6 inches from being done! So i unwind unwind unwind, basically let the roll hang to the floor as I suck at balancing the thing in hand with the spindle too. Eventually I get the thing threaded back onto the dual spool and proceed with the other. Meanwhile the CD player was cranking out some amazing mean funk hand selected by ?Questlove from The Roots. BCD is asking me how I'm doing while we both scan what was supposed to be a pitch black room. There's enough light through a couple of holes to nearly be able to see tones. That's not so cool.

Eventually, we are through with the darkness and get to the chemicals. Mix it up, pour it in, hit the timer, we're off. 4 minutes in TMAX, sweet, I'm excited. Agitate and then smack!on the table. It's about this time I notice that I don't have a lid on my tank. I see BCD turn hers over a bit and I do the same hoping that there is some secret one-way valve tucked in there.

splash.

nope. Now I'm cleaning up some developer off the table as we laugh and search through the canisters for a suitable lid. Nuffin. So I try to be a bit more careful. We dump those chemicals back into the bottle and hook up the fresh stop we made, etc etc. We finally get to the rinse and hypo. We give the negs a 'cloudiness' check and the top half of one of my rolls is decidedly creamy-looking. BCD mutters oh shit as I look at her curiously. Yeah that developer that spilled obviously wasn't in there so it wasn't incontact with the negs. Ooops. I'm now 1 for 2 at best. Hypo, photoflow and ta-daa, we're pulling out negs off the spool. Squeegee in effect we pull the excess water off and hang them, realizing that the giant 55 gallon drum trash barrel has to go somewhere else or the negs will keep trying to curve toward one another and make love, which is bad because they get stuck together when drying and they do not make little film roll babies that you can use later.

We get all straightened out and there they are, unerexposed, slightly blurry, whatever. She has a club to go to and I need a bit of food before I head to bed so there they hang, waiting for their scanned glory.

Why all these words to explain the rough and tumble of the devloping world? Well, because it was new and interesting to me and that's what you're supposed to write about in your fancy online blogedness. Oh and to tell you that when you look at your rolls of film and think, "hmmm black and white, I could develop this myself...", you could say, "hmmm, maybe I will pay the 4 bucks to NOT do this and leave it to the professionals with their clever machines."

I need practice.